Methods for generating soil maps and application prescriptions

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10475212-B2
Application number	US-201113978339-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 30, 2011
Priority date	Jan 4, 2011
Publication date	Nov 12, 2019
Grant date	Nov 12, 2019

Abstract

Methods are provided for generating a prescription map for the application of crop inputs. In one method, the user draws a boundary on a map within a user interface and the system identifies relevant soil data and generates a soil map overlay and legend for changing the application prescription for various soils and soil conditions. In another method, the user instead drives a field boundary which is recorded on a planter monitor using a global positioning receiver, and the system generates a soil map and legend for changing the application prescription.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method of generating a soil data map, said method comprising:
accessing a navigable aerial map of a geographic area which includes an image of a field of interest, said navigable aerial map having associated geographic location data which identifies said geographic location of said field of interest;
navigating said navigable aerial map so as to cause display, through a user interface, of said field of interest on a user display screen;
through said user interface, receiving user input defining a boundary of said field of interest by said geographic location data;
accessing a soil data map associated with said field of interest based on said geographic location data, said soil data map identifying soil types of said field of interest;
displaying on said user display screen, a portion of said soil data map as defined by said boundary;
receiving user input selecting a particular seed population for a particular soil type of the identified soil types of said field of interest through said user interface;
identifying a plurality of locations within said boundary of said field which comprise the particular soil type;
in response to receiving said user input selecting the particular seed population, selecting the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations identified as comprising the particular soil type and storing a seed planting prescription comprising the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations comprising the particular soil type.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein said soil data map comprises soil type polygons each identifying a soil type, and wherein only portions of said soil type polygons within said defined boundary are displayed on said user display screen.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the step of accessing said soil data map is performed by sending a request to a soil data server, wherein said request is in a markup language readable by the soil data server.

4. The method of claim 2 , wherein said boundary comprises multiple vector points, and wherein the step of accessing said soil data map comprises sending said vector points to a soil data map service and receiving a map overlay of soil type polygons.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the step of displaying a portion of said soil data map as defined by said boundary comprises determining a geometric union between said defined boundary and said soil type polygons.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein said boundary comprises multiple vector points, and wherein the step of accessing said soil data map comprises sending said vector points to a soil data map service and receiving a map overlay of soil type polygons each identifying a soil type.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein said user interface is a program on a system server accessible via a remote computer.

8. A method for creating a crop input prescription, said method comprising:
obtaining an aerial map of a geographic area which includes an image of a field of interest, said aerial map having associated geographic location data which identifies said geographic location of said field of interest;
receiving, through a user interface, input selecting vertices to define a boundary around said field of interest;
obtaining geographic locations corresponding to said vertices of said drawn boundary;
obtaining a soil data map of soil types within said boundary defined by said geographic locations of said vertices, said soil data map having soil type polygons identifying different soil types within said boundary; and
receiving user input selecting a particular seed population based on said soil type polygons;
identifying a plurality of locations corresponding to soil type polygons which comprise the particular soil type;
in response to receiving said user input selecting the particular seed population, selecting the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations identified as comprising the particular soil type and storing the crop input prescription comprising the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations corresponding to said soil type polygons which comprise the particular soil type.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the step of obtaining said soil data map is performed by accessing only the polygons intersecting said boundary.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the step of obtaining said soil data map is performed by sending a request to a soil data server, wherein said request is in a markup language readable by the soil data server.

11. The method of claim 8 , wherein said boundary comprises multiple vector points, and wherein the step of accessing said soil data map includes the steps of sending said vector points to a map service and receiving a map overlay corresponding to said boundary.

12. The method of claim 8 further comprising:
associating a unique identifier with each of said soil type polygons; and
associating each unique identifier with a single management zone and displaying which areas within said boundary are associated with each said management zone.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the step of displaying a portion of said soil data map within said boundary is performed by determining a geometric union between said boundary and each said polygon intersecting said boundary.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein each said polygon is associated with soil data and further including displaying soil data associated with each management zone.

15. A method for creating a crop input prescription, said method comprising:
obtaining a soil data map for a field of interest using a mobile device, said soil data map having soil type polygons identifying soil types of said field of interest;
recording a field boundary of said field of interest using a global positioning receiver;
identifying which of said soil type polygons are at least partially within said field boundary;
associating a single management zone with each soil type polygon which is at least partially within said field boundary;
displaying a control map identifying said management zone within said field boundary; and
receiving user input selecting a particular seed population for a particular soil type of said soil types of said field of interest;
identifying a plurality of locations corresponding to soil type polygons which comprise the particular soil type within said management zone;
in response to receiving said user input selecting the particular seed population, selecting the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations identified as comprising the particular soil type and storing the crop input prescription comprising the particular seed population for each of the plurality of locations corresponding to said soil type polygons which comprise the particular soil type.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein said mobile device is a planter monitor configured to control said crop input application parameter.

17. The method of claim 15 , wherein a data storage device is used to obtain said soil data map.

18. The method of claim 15 , wherein said soil data map is downloaded from a soil map database.

19. The method of claim 15 , further including displaying soil data corresponding to said management zone.

Assignees

• Sauder Derek A
• Sauder Timothy A
• Monday Steven D
• Climate Corp

Inventors

• Sauder Derek A
• Sauder Timothy A
• Monday Steven D

Classifications

• G06F16/29

  Geographical information databases · CPC title

• A01B79/005 Primary

  Precision agriculture · CPC title

• G06F16/9537

  Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries · CPC title

• G06T11/00 Primary

  Two-dimensional [2D] image generation · CPC title