Sensor Buoy
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Hi all,
I am looking into developing a low cost sensor buoy to monitor and track the growth of the seaweed and be able to improve the estimation of harvest yields. I would like to track salinity, pH, water temperature and sunllight (PAR) at a depth of around 2m. Optionally I am also thinking on integrating wave and current sensors.
Are there any other parameters you would consider crucial? or leave out form my list? Obviously more parameters is better but it's all quite expensive so I'm trying to keep the number of sensors as low as possible.
If anyone here already knows of any affordable alternatives (+/- 25k) or you've build something similiar yourself I would love to hear from you.
@matteo Hey Matteo, first off, I think your idea sounds cool. Before I elaborate, please take my comments with a grain of salt....a bit about me and my process... After 3 years we obtained all our permits/lease and our first crop of sugar kelp is in the water and growing now. We will be filling oyster cages with seeds next week. We chose the site based on a number of characteristics one being that sugar kelp grew natively adjacent to the site. Our assumption was that if it grew natively on the substrate it would likely grow at the farm site. I manually checked and recorded PH, temp and salinity for about a year and have that data. I deployed an ADCP (Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler) for a month to get current data (speed/direction) that my engineer used for the farm design. I did not check PAR however a government agency is currently collecting light data at the farm site. I saw a report somewhere (probably via Greenwave) where dissolved nitrogen was measured at a variety of farms in AK and compared against growth. That data point seemed to be a great indicator of growth. I don't know if they compared that to any of the other data points you referenced. I looked into measuring dissolved nitrogen at my farm site and it was quite expensive and if I recall, challenging to find a lab to do it.
Having said all that, I'm not sure what value your sensor buoy would provide particularly after the site was selected. I could see it being interesting and a part of the site selection process but now that my farm is in the water, knowing these values is less interesting to me... this could be out of ignorance on my part however I'm thinking that it's more a function of me being unable to control any of the factors that you would measure. Plus, if I had your sensor and it told me that the salinity was going going up or down do we know what that would mean for my crop? If I consistently have low (or high or fluctuating) yields the data could be interesting but again, short of moving my farm to different waters (which could be valuable info for me to have) I don't see the value in knowing the data.
I couple other thoughts.. having your sensor(s) integrated with a buoy would be OK but I already have a variety of buoys in place. Assuming I wanted one, I would just need the device with a way to attach it to the buoy and hang properly (vertically if you're capturing PAR) in a high current area.
As far as the price point, you mentioned +-25K.. for a small farm this is orders of magnitude beyond what I would pay. Assuming I saw the value in all the data, I'd need it to be a couple hundred dollars or less.
As I mentioned, all this is just one guys opinion.. I wish you luck and encourage you to proceed I'm mistaken about the value considering my role.
I put together a couple videos that go into detail on my site selection criteria and the water where our farm is located. I did these myself so the production value isn't stellar but it's good enough to tell the story.
https://youtu.be/efJRv40SVZo?si=fgwDZl9nbjgwBInR - site selection criteria
https://youtu.be/DKU8-KHlYpU?si=bB7Jo6dkY706Z3gD - knowing the waters around your seaweed farm
@mike_spranger Hi Mike, Thank you for your elaborate answer and taking the time! It's good food for thought. I looked into nitrogen as well but it's to expensive and not really suited for long term deplo for a single sensor. T.b.h. all sensors a quite expensive in my opinion. It's an interesting point you raise about the value of the data once the farm is installed, as you can't influence the parameters you would be measuring. I was looking at the potential that through a learning curve based on the data we could start estimating what yield could expect at the end of the season, the quality of the seaweed and what it would be best suited for in post-processing. How did you collect the data? Dit you use a handheld devices and do spot checks? Nice videos by the way!
@mike_spranger Hi Mike, Thank you for your elaborate answer and taking the time! It's good food for thought. I looked into nitrogen as well but it's to expensive and not really suited for long term deplo for a single sensor. T.b.h. all sensors a quite expensive in my opinion. It's an interesting point you raise about the value of the data once the farm is installed, as you can't influence the parameters you would be measuring. I was looking at the potential that through a learning curve based on the data we could start estimating what yield could expect at the end of the season, the quality of the seaweed and what it would be best suited for in post-processing. How did you collect the data? Dit you use a handheld devices and do spot checks? Nice videos by the way!
@matteo Hey Matteo, I can't reply to your reply (below) for some reason. I'll respond to your questions/comments here:
To be clear, I'm not trying to be negative or throwing up roadblocks... I'm just trying to give you more food for thought.. the fact that seaweed farming doesn't need/require any inputs (e.g. fertilizer, fresh water, etc) makes it a bit different than farming corn (which I know nothing about). I would imagine, though, a corn farmer could tell you they need soil with PH of X, temps of Y, water of Z, Q of fertilizer etc. to plant corn on a certain piece of land and to maximize yields. If you had similar requirements for seaweed then capturing the data via sensors would potentially be highly valuable. With the exception of Nitrites, I don't know of any meta data that has similar correlations. If they exist I would love to know about them.
@mike_spranger Thanks alot Mike, your view gives me a different perspective on the issue and I might have to take another look at it. Not as straight forward maybe as I thought it was. I probably need more info as well, so I might get in touch with a biologist. Anyways thank you for thaking the time and good luck to you!
@mike_spranger Thanks alot Mike, your view gives me a different perspective on the issue and I might have to take another look at it. Not as straight forward maybe as I thought it was. I probably need more info as well, so I might get in touch with a biologist. Anyways thank you for thaking the time and good luck to you!