Principle 4.
Ensure optimal balance

We are entering an era when we have to look at more and more systems as a whole. Where everything is related to everything and we cannot progress by taking one variable separately. There are dozens of variables in plant growth. We have to look and decide "systematically". It is more about the relations and the balance than the parts.

Plant balance

The energy makers which are at one end of the scale are the factors which affect the photosynthesis process. We distinguish between five energy makers: light, water, nutrition, CO2 and leaf area. The energy distributors are at the other end of the scale. There are three of these: maintenance, sinks and tempo. The development tempo of a crop according to us is exclusively and solely managed by the realised temperature. Just as with an old fashioned pair of scales imbalance can be remedied in several ways: You can make the heavier weight lighter or the lighter weight heavier. Or a combination of both. If you harvest a tasteless strawberry in the winter then that is because there is not enough energy available for the strawberry. The crop does not produce enough sugars meaning that an imbalance arises. We can remedy this imbalance by making more sugar; for example adding more light or more leaf. We can also correct the imbalance by reducing the demand for sugars; by reducing the number of strawberries Or by maintaining a lower development speed Or by a combination of these measures. By looking for a solution from the idea of balance we already see that there are several options. With our modern world we calculate which solution leads to the highest yield. This is the basis of the PlantLab solutions.

The source of the models

Already back in 1994 we started carrying out crop measurements on a large scale. First in rose cultivation, later for countless other cut flowers, pot plants, vegetable and fruit crops. Hence both glasshouse and indoor crops. It actually does not matter whether you can influence the 'energy makers' or not. The plant principles are applicable everywhere with the right conversion even though that may sound strange. Growers have taken crop measurements for us all over the world at hundreds of measuring fields. For years they recorded exactly how many items they harvested, how much the fresh weight was, how much the dry matter percentage was and how fast the development speed was. We were able to distil patterns from these millions of measuring data. Nature appears to lay itself down with great accuracy. We discovered the relationship between daylight and dry matter production. And the relationship between the various assimilation lighting levels and dry matter production. And the relationship between CO2 and dry matter production. And we calculated the exact relationship between temperature and development speed and we discovered that the development speed of the crop is simply and only managed by the temperature. In our growth model all these driving forces are included in the form of mathematical comparisons. We can calculate any crop without exceptions!

Our balancing act

We can rightly refer to our work as one great balancing act, as if we were in the circus Or behind a large pot of soup that had never been made before. Sometimes we also feel a bit like magicians.

The system receives 163830 reports about these variables per second and acts accordingly.
Each variable is linked to each other in terms of effect. Together they create an environment which is typical for a certain plant.