What Is Crop Steering?

Greenhouse Success: Taking the Wheel in Understanding Crop Steering

One of the greatest achievements for the commercial greenhouse industry was the development of highly sophisticated indoor spaces perfect for growing crops anywhere in the world and at any time. Growers can control the climate, irrigation, protect from disease and pests, and other key survival points plants need to flourish. To be highly successful, a grower needs to be knowledgeable about all factors that can affect plant growth and development to fully use them at an advantage. 

Crop Steering Defined

A way to use the greenhouse’s excellent ability to control all aspects of a plant’s environment is through a method known as crop steering. Crop steering is a method of managing the growth of plants directly through irrigation and climate. By changing these aspects, a grower can steer or direct the growth of a plant towards a specific goal or target whether it is vegetative or generative. Crop steering is a method that can be used at all stages of growth and crops including mother plants, propagation, bud development, and more. 

How Does Crop Steering Work?

Crop steering is not a new concept or idea. In fact, crop steering has been practiced by growers for years. This method employs the needs of plants, the genetic makeup of the plant, and its environment to control the growth and development of the crop over the course of its lifecycle. Crop steering can employ the use of temperature, water availability, humidity, grow lighting, nutrient availability, and even mechanical means through cuttings. The type of crop steering used is dependent on the operation and the type of plants being grown.

Steering with Irrigation 

One of the ways to steer crops is through irrigation. The amount, frequency, and overall timing of irrigation can influence a plant’s response and can steer growth and development. In conjunction with plant genetics and the stage of development, irrigation will ultimately lead to plant growth and improve overall quality. The ways that irrigation can help in steering plants is through key steps that a grower can undertake to either increase or decrease the growth of plants. 

Steering with Climate Controls

Just like water in a greenhouse, climate had a major impact on plant health and quality. Climate can be used as a tool to steer crop growth through proper research and testing specific to the operation and crop needs. Climate features that can be changed to impact the growth and development of plants are the temperature, lighting, speed of temperature changes, humidity, and ventilation. With operations that have photosensitive plants, an operator will already be utilizing at least one aspect of crop steering whether they know it or not. For example, in the production of chrysanthemums, a grower typically will need to control the amount of light for the plant as short-day lengths will stimulate flower development and maturity. This is one example of crop steering through climate changes.

Changes in the day and night temperatures can help with stretching, with significant differences with increasing inter-node spacing and smaller differences in decreasing it. Other factors can help steer plant growth as well such as the speed temperature is changed from night to day and day to night, humidity changes either increased or decreased, and the number of total air exchanges in the growing room.

Crop Steering Through Nutrients

Plants need an astounding seventeen different minerals and plant nutrients over the course of its lifetime. With plants being stationary, a grower must provide the plant with these nutrients and minerals when the crop needs it for proper growth to occur with little to no stress on the plant. During each stage of development, a plant must have specific nutrients to thrive. By knowing what to feed a plant and when, a grower can steer growth in a crop effectively which in turn saves time, money, and the plants. For nutrient steering, timing is essential. By applying nutrients correctly at the right stage of development, a crop can be steered in the desired direction by the grower.

By controlling these specific nutrients at the right time, a grower can tailor plant growth and development to steer a plant to grow in a way that is beneficial to them. Through proper testing and monitoring, as well as an understanding of the needs of a specific crop, a grower can successfully navigate the seas of nutrient crop steering.

When Should a Grower Utilize Crop Steering?

It is important to note that with crop steering proper research and testing should be conducted before applying the technique on a large commercial scale. This will vary from operation to operation as each is unique. A grower will need to research crop needs, goals of the operation, and plans for the finished crop. With that being said, there are good and poor times to implement crop steering depending on the type of steering being employed- lighting, watering, climate, etc. There are key changes that need to be observed and noted when developing a crop steering plan. These are root development speed, diameter of the stem, quality of the plant, plant height, leaf color and placement, flowering development, and rootzone WC and EC measurements in comparison to climate conditions.

For more information about plant nutrients, plant needs, crop steering, or any plant related topic, reach out to MORR Inc.. MORR Inc. is a southern California based company that is backed by expert staff with decades of combined in-industry experience. With grow op services in planning, installs, maintenance, waste management, and more it should come as no surprise that MORR Inc. is a trusted name in the commercial greenhouse industry.

For more information about MORR Inc.’s greenhouse, CEA, indoor and outdoor farm design, build out, or operational services, please visit- https://www.morr.com/services or Call to schedule commercial grow operation consultation! 1-310-967-2022