If you grow leafy greens, celery or any other fresh-market vegetable, you already know weeds aren’t a once-a-season problem. They come up in every bed, they come up fast, and they compete with a crop that has very little room for error. Leave them and you lose yield and quality. Spray them the traditional way and you’re putting chemistry across the whole bed, including the plants you’re about to cut, pack and ship. And the other option, a crew walking the rows with hoes, is getting harder to staff and more expensive every year.
That’s the problem we hear about most when we sit down with produce growers. Not “what’s the newest machine,” but “how do I keep this crop clean without risking the crop?” It’s the right place to start, and it’s where this story starts too.
A different way to spray
Brian Kelley, President of AgTechnologies, puts the question to growers this way: “Have you ever wanted to just spray the weed itself?” For most of agriculture’s history the honest answer was “sure, but that’s not how sprayers work.” A boom covers everything under it. That’s changing.
The Verdant Robotics SharpShooter
uses cameras and AI to look at every plant as it moves down the bed. It identifies which plants are the crop and which are weeds, then fires a precise, tiny dose of chemistry only at the weeds. Verdant calls it “Aim & Apply,” and the idea is simple: aim before you apply. The system can target weeds as small as 2 millimeters, a seedling barely out of the ground, and it works day or night. Verdant reports up to 99% herbicide savings compared with blanket spraying, depending on the crop and how the machine is used.
Built for the crop you’re protecting
What makes the SharpShooter especially useful in produce is that it’s trained crop by crop. “We have models for all these different types of crops,” Brian explains, “which means we can safely apply chemistry in and around your leafy greens or your celery or other types of crops without contaminating the actual product you’re trying to take to market.” Verdant also uses a 3-D crop shield that lets it make targeted applications close to, and even under, the leaves of the crop without damaging it.
That matters most where the margin for error is smallest. In sod, a missed weed means a slab that doesn’t sell. In produce, chemistry on the wrong plant can mean a load that doesn’t ship. Precision protects both the field and the product.
It also changes the labor math. Verdant reports labor cost savings of up to 85% for specialty growers. One California grower, Daniel Alameda of TopFlavor Farms in Salinas, told Western Growers that “what used to take 30 people all day can now be done with one machine and one operator.” For produce growers everywhere who are being asked to produce more on fewer acres with fewer hands, that’s not a small thing.
Starting with your farm, not the machine
None of this means the SharpShooter is the right fit for every operation, and we won’t pretend it is. Every farm has its own crops, bed layouts, weed pressure and spray program. That’s why our conversations start with what’s actually happening on your farm. What’s coming up in your beds? Where is hand weeding eating your budget? Where has chemistry made you nervous about the crop? From there, we can talk honestly about whether targeted spraying makes sense and what return you could expect. Verdant reports that specialty growers can see a return in as little as 6 to 18 months, but we’d rather work through your numbers with you than lean on a general figure.
AgTechnologies serves growers across Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee and the Carolinas, and we expect to have the SharpShooter running in South Florida produce in the coming weeks. If you’ve ever stood at the edge of a bed and wished you could treat the weeds and leave the crop alone, let’s talk. We’re here to solve, not just to sell.
Want to see whether the SharpShooter fits your operation? Contact AgTechnologies to set up a conversation or a field demo.
