Creating management zones and writing prescriptions (BETA)

Imagery brought into your fields through FarmQA's integration with Planet can be used to help you write variable rate prescriptions for your fields. Any NDVI Planet image can be used to create custom management zones for your fields. Management zones can then be used to write any variable rate prescription you'd like for your fields, and ultimatley exported to use as you see fit. Check out the article below to learn how to create management zones and write variable rate prescriptions for your fields in FarmQA. 

Create a management zone from Planet NDVI imagery

Writing and exporting a prescription from a management zone

Create a management zone from Planet NDVI imagery

• Log in to your FarmQA account from the web app if you aren't already. 
• Within the Map tab, locate the field you want to create management zones for and click on it. 
  
• In the slide out map pane, click the Edit layer icon next the map layer that contains the image you want to create a prescription zone from. 
• Locate the image you want to use, then click the Create management zone icon (pictured below). 

• Fill out the following information to setup some parameters for your management zone (pictured below): 
  1. Give your management zone a Name.
  2. Add a Description to your management zone if you want to. 
  3. Toggle on the Show labels  option to -
  4. Use the Clustering Algorithm dropdown menu to choose a method used to generate your management zone map. For most users, we recommend the Equal Interval method. 
  5. If desired, set a Minimum polygon size (ac) for your management zones. This will depend on what you want to get out of your management zones as well as the size of your field. 
  6. Set the Number of zones you'd like for your field. 
  7. Use the Colors dropdown menu to choose a color scheme to color your management zones with. If desired, you can toggle on the Invert option to swap the colors used to color your zones. 

• Click the Preview button to check your work before downloading your management zone. From the Preview page, consider doing the following (pictured below):
  1. Change the Minimum polygon size (ac).
  2. Use different Colors to color your management zones.
  3. Either Add or edit the ranges of the cluster groups that will be used in your management zones. 

• When you're satisfied with your management zone, click the Submit button at the bottom of the screen. You'll now be able to access your management zone from the slide out map pane in the Map tab. 

Writing and exporting a prescription from a management zone

• Log in to your FarmQA account from the web app if you aren't already. 
• Within the Map tab, locate the field you want to create a prescription for and click on it. 
• Click on the Zones button in the slide out map pane (pictured below). 

• Find the management zone you want to write a prescription for, then click on the Create prescription  icon (pictured below). 

• In the Specify attributes window, input the name of the attribute you're going to be writing prescriptions for, like nitrogen or seeding rate. Use the dropdown menu to the right of that text box to specify whether it's going to be a Number or Text based prescription. 
• Click the Add button below the attribute name to add another attribute to create a prescription for if want to. 
• Click the Next button to continue writing your prescription (pictured below). 

• In the Specify the values for each zone window, put in the prescription values you'd like to associate with each of your management zones. 
• Fill in more information about your prescriptions in the Description box if you'd like to provide more context to your prescription. 
• When you're done, click the Download button (pictured below). 

• Your prescription will be downloaded as a zipped shapefile. The zipped folder will contain four files: .DBF, .PRJ., .SHP, and .SHX. 

Please contact FarmQA Support with any further questions