Greetings,

        Growers at last week’s Maine State Pomological Society council meeting seemed interested when I mentioned that the Maine Office of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) now has color aerial photo images available online for much of Maine. A description of the project is at http://www.maine.gov/geolib/orthophotography.htm

At present, the highest resolution images (0.5 foot color) are only available for Cumberland and southern Androscoggin counties.  These are amazingly detailed.  The 1 foot resolution images are also very good and available for a larger area that includes York, most of Androscoggin, and extends into Kennebec, Lincoln, Knox and Sagadahoc.

By May 2006, the range of color photo coverage is supposed to extend to include just about all the places in Maine where there are apple orchards. You can see the images that already online at http://megisims.state.me.us/website/orthomap/viewer.htm

      The Google search engine site also has maps and satellite images online http://maps.google.com/      The images at the Google site are at a lower resolution, and not all areas are in color, but for some areas they are almost as good as the aerial photos. 

Here is an example of an orchard aerial photo at 0.5 foot color resolution from the ME GIS site.  (The actual image is better than this,  I had to degrade it somewhat to capture into an email)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can see the Google shot of the same location at
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=43.723134,-70.547333&spn=0.003418,0.006870&t=k&hl=en

        Orchard mapping can be a useful management tool.  Once you have image files you can use a computer printer to create inexpensive “photo-maps” to direct workers or U-Pick customers to a specific area of the orchard instead of giving them a verbal description which they may not remember correctly.  Such images could be useful for pest scouting to record hot spots for pests such as mites or leafminers.

         Before your memory gets foggy and next growing season takes over, this is a good time to make notes of pest management observations and lessons learned from the past growing season for use in 2006.

 

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        There will be apple pest management talks on December 13 and 14 at the New England Vegetable and Fruit Meeting.  http://www.nevbc.org/

         There will be an apple pest update at the Maine Ag Trade Show on Wednesday January 11.

 - Glen

 

Glen Koehler
Pest Management Office
491 College Avenue
Orono, ME  04473
Voice:  207-581-3882
Email:  gkoehler@umext.maine.edu
Web:  PRONewEngland.org
Fax:  207-581-3881
 

 

What we call the secret of happiness is no more a secret than our willingness to choose life. - Leo Buscaglia