Preliminary study of air assistance effect on greenhouse pesticide spraying

Air-assisted sprayers are used to improve pesticide spray application looking for an improvement on penetration and deposition on the underside of the leaves, because the air jet moves the leaves and helps the droplets transportation to the inner part of the crop row. A preliminary study of air-assisted effects on spaying with flat fan nozzles in a tomato crop was carried out. A reference spraying without air-assistance was compared with three air-assisted spraying at different air velocities (5, 10, y 15 m s(-1)). The spraying at 15 m s(-1) provided higher deposition on the underside of the leaves and better penetration but without statistical differences with the other two applications. Losses to ground were high in all sprayings but were slightly lower when increasing air velocity. Due to the slightly improvement observed on spray deposition when using air-assisted sprayer raises the doubt as if this kind of equipment is suitable for pesticide spraying on greenhouses because of the high cost. More tests must be done and should be complemented with field test.