PCA - The Peanut Company Of Australia

Aquaman & Afloman

Aquaman and Afloman are the Queensland Government's "superhero" team which can help peanut growers make better management decisions about their crops.

While Afloman keeps an eye on aflatoxin risk, Aquaman monitors irrigated crops and predicts the best irrigation timing and amounts.

RIGHT: An in-field weather station bring assessed for use in the Aquaman system

Aquaman

Aquaman works by using climate information recorded by Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) climate stations and in-field weather stations.

Climate data needed to run the Aquaman software include daily rainfall and irrigation amounts (in millimetres) as well as maximum and minimum air and soil temperatures. The only data growers need to input are the daily amount of irrigation and rainfall for their particular crop. Air temperatures are then automatically accessed from the BOM site for the weather station nearest to the crop. Soil temperatures are calculated by the Aquaman software.

Growers can input their rainfall and irrigation data for each of their peanut crops by logging onto the Aquaman website. They can produce reports as frequently as they like during the growing season.

The Aquaman report which is generated then advises an irrigation schedule for the farmers to follow, including how much water is required by the crop.

It usually takes just 5-10 minutes for an email to be sent back to the grower advising them that their report is ready for inspection. They can then log into Aquaman again and print it out.

Find out more on the Aquaman website

Afloman

Afloman is designed to assist dryland peanut growers to minimise aflatoxin contamination in their crops.

During wetter seasons, Afloman can also help dryland growers assess the risk of foliar disease infecting their crops, including leaf spot, leaf rust and net blotch.

The decision support system has been developed by the Department of Employment, Economic Development and Industry (formerly DPI&F) in conjunction with PCA, the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), the Agricultural Production Systems Research Unit (APSRU) and the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR).

The website allows growers to gain updates from sample dryland growing areas at Kumbia, Wooroolin, Memerambi and Coalstoun Lakes, as well as register to join the Afloman program which will provide real-time estimates of risk in their own individual paddocks.

Weekly updates are also published during the growing season in the South Burnett Times newspaper.

Find out more on the Afloman website

NB: For more information on either Aquaman or Afloman, contact Dr Yash Chauhan at the DEEDI - Primary Industries and Fisheries - Kingaroy on (07) 4160-0700.