Page 41 - Grapevine July-August 2015
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Around The Vineyard
advanced technology. through everything,” he said. “If we were using
more gallons (of water) per acre, we wouldn’t finish
With On Target sprayers, Lingenfelder discovered it in ten days. So there would be some period during
he could essentially eliminated drift and dramati- the season where we would not have coverage.
cally minimize noise. “We wanted to be able to tell “If we were using the other technology, we would
the neighbors, ‘Look, we have done everything we probably need at least one more tractor and one
possibly can to keep it as quiet as possible and keep more sprayer, and that is quite an investment,”
the drift down to a minimum,’” he said. Lingenfelder said.
What he discovered next surprised even himself. He also achieved his original goal. “Now, with the
After treating the vineyard with the electrostatic electrostatic sprayer, we don’t get the drift,” he said.
sprayer, Lingenfelder noticed that the block, long a “And it is so much quieter than an air-blast sprayer.
problem spot for mildew, was mildew free. Now the sound of the tractor engine is louder than
“That was our worst spot for mildew, and when we the sprayer.”
switched over to the electrostatic sprayer, we didn’t
have mildew anymore,” he said. “We bought the Roberts, who manages about 900 acres of
other two sprayers just because we liked the perfor- vineyards for Wente Brothers, said he has been
mance, and we were able to cover so much more intrigued with the electrostatic technology since it
ground.” first emerged in agriculture in the early 1990s. Not
until On Target came out with its advanced models,
Today, because of the efficiency he attains with however, was he confident enough to try it. “The
electrostatic sprayers, Lingenfelder is able to protect On Target unit was the first one that I thought was
his entire acreage with just three sprayers. “With dependable enough that I wanted to try it,” he said.
the three sprayers, it takes us about ten days to get “With the On Target unit you’ve got (electrostatic
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