Soil moisture (VWC)
Capacitive probes report volumetric water content at root-zone depth, so irrigation advice follows the soil, not a fixed calendar.
Ground-Truth · Procured COTS
Ground-Truth Field Instrumentation
Where a project needs to confirm what the satellite sees, VarshaKrishi specifies and procures commercial off-the-shelf field instrumentation, configured per deployment: solar-autonomous soil-moisture, weather and leaf-wetness sensing that streams into the same evidence spine as the satellite advisory. We do not manufacture hardware. Instrumentation is optional and added only where a protocol requires validation.
What it measures
Ground Truth, Where It Counts
Micro-climate weather
Temperature, humidity and rainfall at the field edge sharpen the FAO-56 evapotranspiration estimate for that specific plot.
Leaf wetness and canopy
Leaf-wetness duration feeds the TOMCAST disease model, turning a regional forecast into a field-level disease-risk call.
Solar-autonomous gateway
An off-grid, weather-rated gateway buffers readings for up to 30 days and forwards them over LoRa where there is no cellular signal.
How it fits
Satellites Where There Are No Sensors. Sensors Where There Is No Internet.
Do I need hardware to use VarshaKrishi?
No. Satellite crop advisory needs no on-farm hardware at all. Instrumentation is an optional add-on for projects that must validate satellite readings against the ground, such as research trials and insurance or carbon programmes.
Does VarshaKrishi manufacture the sensors?
No. We specify and procure commercial off-the-shelf equipment, configure it for the deployment and integrate it. That keeps cost down and avoids hardware lock-in.
How does sensor data reach the platform?
Readings flow from the solar gateway into the same platform as the satellite indices, are cross-checked against them and are sealed into the per-field SHA-256 hash chain alongside every other record.
Where is this available?
Instrumentation is specified per deployment and can be sourced for projects worldwide. In India it is documented for GeM and institutional procurement, with a formal acceptance report.