Infragram

you might be wondering what is an Infragram...
it is a neat way to see how well the leaves are doing on a plant just by looking at them,

here is a nice overview of it
http://petapixel.com/2013/06/01/inexpensive-infrared-camera-lets-you-take-a-peek-at-photosynthesis/

you can use a camera and edit the image color later and get the answer,
they do make special cameras to just take the picture,
or you can modify one to always take pictures like that for you (that way you can just look through the view finder to see how the leaves are doing,

or you can use a filter and just look through it (this is how I do it),

here is how to actually do it with a camera
http://publiclaboratory.org/tool/near-infrared-camera

if you get a color filter set from a lighting store there is a filter that will do it,
it is a purple ish looking filter, if  you play with them for a bit you will figure out what one it is and be able to get an entire sheet of it, I tried to take a picture of mine, and it is not much to see,
so I took a picture of a light through it (way better filter picture)

the light bulbs are a cree Q5 in case you want more data on the light.

here is more info on the filter
http://www.lifepixel.com/infrared-photography-primer/ch4-internal-filters-for-modified-cameras-super-blue-infrared-filter

here is my rice patch looking just fine,

and here it is again through the filter

and it is very easy to spot that there are some leaves that are not doing any photosynthesis at all,
and on closer inspection the leaves are dead on a few ends.

here is a squash plant

and with the filter

the brown spots on the leaves just pop out at you now,
and you can see what is not doing well.
(and yes, the flowers are not suppose to be photosynthesizing )

this is a very neat tool
you can tell how well a farm field is doing with just a picture of it,
could be a picture from a news story, or a satellite photo, or whatever


this lets you see how a forest is doing with nothing but google maps and a photo program like Gimp


it can tell you how well your grain fields are doing
or how well your neighbor's fields are doing,
you will be able to offer help to an area even before they know they will be needing it,




happy 4th of july !