A phone-based app to track trees from the nursery to the planting site is well on the way to being ready for use. The app, developed by tech company Integral, enables users to scan a unique GPS-linked identifier on each box of trees as they leave the nursery, and then at every stage of the journey including when the box reaches the planting site.
The app is due to be tested at PF Olsen’s Glenbrook Nursery, and nursery manager, Kevin Haine, can identify three immediate benefits the app will have for him.
“First, we’ll have the information we need to find out what happened to the trees between leaving the nursery and planting. We’ve had examples of trees sitting in boxes for two months and then the client complaining that they didn’t grow! So that will mean we can resolve issues like that much more easily. Second, I’ll know where my boxes are – I use around 70,000 boxes a year, so knowing where they are and getting them returned to the nursery more quickly will save money and increase efficiency. Third, because each box leaving the nursery can be tracked, it will mean we can trace boxes and trees very quickly if we have any biosecurity problems.”
Kevin envisages a time when individual tree tracking becomes reality, where trees of known genetic origin are tracked from the nursery, GPS-located at planting and then monitored through their rotation and beyond.
Collaborators: Integral Ltd; PF Olsen Ltd.
