"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm.
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus This reminds me a bit of fruit walls, the technique that northern Europeans used in the 17th century to create teeny microclimates for a specific crop: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming-in-the-1600s/
I first learned about those at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden; they have examples of that espalier pruning technique in their collection.
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus I think it's pretty well known that some crops (peppers specifically) are very happy with selective shade, especially in places that get abundant sunshine
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@antanicus This reminds me a bit of fruit walls, the technique that northern Europeans used in the 17th century to create teeny microclimates for a specific crop: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming-in-the-1600s/
I first learned about those at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden; they have examples of that espalier pruning technique in their collection.
@amanda I'm a simple man, I see a Low Tech Magazine article, I boost
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@cR0w @antanicus seems to be a rehash of a couple linked papers. The thing firing my low quality information (and probably AI generated) triggers is the fact that every single paragraph in the links article is a single sentence. The pull quote is really 7 separate paragraphs. Nobody writes like that to convey information, but it sure conveys pathos.
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@antanicus Researchers discover not all plants want constant unfiltered sunlight, a thing which has been known for literally thousands of years.
@NinjaDebugger @antanicus Yes, very much so. Meadows and fields with trees were still common in the hill country of my childhood because it was impossible to convert them to large open expanses required by industrial farming with million dollar machinery.
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus pretty sure nobody thought that lack of sunlight was the limiting factor for plant growth in the *Arizona desert*.
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@antanicus Researchers discover not all plants want constant unfiltered sunlight, a thing which has been known for literally thousands of years.
ah, but you don't understand! previously that was knowledge gained and spread by dirty peasants without a degree from havard or the like!
now thx to professors dr dr guy mac scientist (phd) this has become real knowledge done by serious scientists while also being able to pad their resume!
(/sarcasm)
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@antanicus Researchers discover not all plants want constant unfiltered sunlight, a thing which has been known for literally thousands of years.
@NinjaDebugger @antanicus for anyone curious who wants to learn more about this, three sisters farming has been practiced by the indigenous people of this land for thousands of years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Sisters_(agriculture)
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus
I have to use shade cloth in the summer , CA is way too hot inland. -
"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus
But think of the poor farmworkers who will bump their heads.... Said no one ever
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
This doesn’t seem to be mystery meat. Direct sunlight require plants to cool themselves by evaporating moisture.
It’s almost like plants do better with partial shade. You know like tree cover things like that a mixed environment with other plants whose roots are in the soil that diversify the soil biome creating more fertile environment, that recycles nutrients and water.
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
As with sugar or salt, one can have too much sun, especially as the Climate Crisis changes weather patterns and average amounts of daily sunlight.
Solar panels generate energy and shade, both of which can be good things, if used correctly.
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@antanicus This reminds me a bit of fruit walls, the technique that northern Europeans used in the 17th century to create teeny microclimates for a specific crop: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming-in-the-1600s/
I first learned about those at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden; they have examples of that espalier pruning technique in their collection.
The Romans, very early on would practice multi crop agriculture where a family could sustain itself on fairly small amount of land. I think it was under a hectare. Like a small percentage of a hectare. As the plow was introduced in farms became larger to produce a cash crop A family eventually began to need multiple hectares to sustain themselves
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@antanicus This reminds me a bit of fruit walls, the technique that northern Europeans used in the 17th century to create teeny microclimates for a specific crop: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming-in-the-1600s/
I first learned about those at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden; they have examples of that espalier pruning technique in their collection.
The fruit walls are also a counter example, since they needed all the light they could gather to sweeten the fruit. Microclimates differ in all sorts of ways.
I’m worried about the long term effect of techno trash being broken in fields and not quite picked up and driven over etc etc etc. It’s f’n hard enough to clean up old farms full of rusty iron and tilled in ag plastic and those are relatively inert.
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F folfdk@helvede.net shared this topic
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This doesn’t seem to be mystery meat. Direct sunlight require plants to cool themselves by evaporating moisture.
It’s almost like plants do better with partial shade. You know like tree cover things like that a mixed environment with other plants whose roots are in the soil that diversify the soil biome creating more fertile environment, that recycles nutrients and water.
@GhostOnTheHalfShell @antanicus It depends on the climate and the plant, of course. It works best where it's sunny and dry, because the solar panels stop half the sunlight but let all the rain through.
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@antanicus the article reprints an article that reprints an article that refers to a small-scale but promising study from 2019 - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335583033_Agrivoltaics_provide_mutual_benefits_across_the_food-energy-water_nexus_in_drylands
The area of the each test site was 9x18 meters, and the study seemingly was running only for a year or two. I am not sure if the results are as readily replicable as the articles claim. However, the point of the research was the plants that are adapted to shade - like cherry tomatoes and jalapenos - so it is not that surprising they'd thrive in such conditions, and humanity definitely should experiment MUCH more with stuff like this.
@nina_kali_nina @antanicus
Fraunhofer Institute, those who invented and spread the mp3 codec, research a lot in Agrisolar -
"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
@antanicus No one could have foreseen that! Why doesn’t Trump just issue a decree to change the laws of nature?
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"Shade is supposed to be the enemy of a farm. Crops chase sunlight, so roofing a field with panels ought to starve them. Yet plot after plot came in with more fruit, not less, and the plants looked healthier than the ones baking in the open. Stranger still, the shaded rows did it while drinking far less water. (...) Chiltepin pepper plants produced three times as much fruit as those grown in full sun. Jalapenos matched their usual harvest while using 65 percent less water. Tomatoes grown under the array came in at twice the normal yield."
Good luck achieving that with a nuclear reactor.
https://energiesmedia.com/solar-panels-farmland-crops-agrivoltaics/
Pilot projects in Southern Germany have shown similar effects with apple orchards. It has become too hot and sunny for the types of apples traditionally grown in the region.
Another topic for growing apples is hail, which can destroy the fruits. Solar panels also provide protection against hail. (Well, until the hailstorms get so desastrous that they also kill solar panels, okay.)
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@antanicus This reminds me a bit of fruit walls, the technique that northern Europeans used in the 17th century to create teeny microclimates for a specific crop: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming-in-the-1600s/
I first learned about those at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden; they have examples of that espalier pruning technique in their collection.
@amanda @antanicus Fruit walls are still used extensively today and taught in horticultural colleges, in England at least and elsewhere I would have thought.
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@antanicus
Ach? Warum bauen Landwirte wohl Folientunnel?@Boerps Weil es z.B. in Norddeutschland für viele Pflanzen draußen einfach zu kalt und zu nass ist. Da nimmt man dann auch in Kauf, dass die Lichttransmission von Plastikfolien etwas geringer ist als die von Glas, weil Plastik so viel billiger ist.
