The Fierce Battle with Tipburn ~ Common Plant Factory Issues ~

Hello everyone! I’m Shohei.
This column is written mainly based on my field experience.
After being on site for over 10 years, there are truly many things that happen. I’m writing about things I remember, as they come to mind.
Well, please read it casually, like “Oh, so that’s how other factories are.”

Tipburn, the Name of Terror

“There it is again~!”
When discovering those brown spots on the leaf tips during morning rounds, the hearts of plant factory staff sink. Yes, that dreaded “tipburn.”
It goes without saying that tipburn reduces product value. But actually, this is just a hair’s breadth away from productivity improvement. It’s like fate that it inevitably occurs when you’re trying different approaches day after day thinking, “I want to increase the yield more!”
It’s like the agricultural version of gambling, similar to how stock investors feel when “stocks purchased aiming for high dividends plummet right before earnings announcements.” Aggressive environment settings make you as nervous as investing in Bitcoin.

Tipburn Increasing Day by Day, and the Approaching Gloom

“It was only 5% two days ago, but today it’s 15%…”
When you see tipburn increasing day by day, this kind of line runs through your mind:
“Oh no… this is awful…”
Feeling an unparalleled sense of gloom is a common experience in plant factories, right? Colleagues’ expressions tend to cloud over too. There’s also the mysterious phenomenon of coffee consumption in the break room suddenly increasing. (Perhaps a strategy to blow away the gloom with caffeine?)

The True Horror of Tipburn ~ Reality in Numbers ~

For those of us working on site, isn’t the true horror of tipburn that “monotonous work time extends infinitely”?
For example, I once made this frightening calculation:
Let’s say you’re cultivating 10,000 plants, and tipburn appears in 80% of them, that’s 8,000 plants. The biggest impact is on the trimming process, requiring an additional 5 seconds of work per plant.
8,000 plants × 5 seconds = 40,000 seconds = about 11 hours of additional work!
In other words, about 2 additional staff members are needed. But it’s not like “tipburn countermeasure personnel” can be arranged so conveniently, right? Usually, “full-time employees with a low threshold for overtime” (for some reason, me) end up dealing with it, neglecting their own work.

The Fear of Falling into a Vicious Cycle

And what’s worst is when this continues daily and becomes the norm. Unable to spend time on investigating “why tipburn occurred” or improvement activities that should be done, days are spent just chasing after trimming…
“Instead of improving tipburn, my life is dominated by tipburn…”
The moment of reaching such enlightenment arrives. This is the true horror.
On the other hand, it’s also a problem if you become unable to make “aggressive” growth improvements because you fear tipburn too much.
“We could increase yield, but if the risk of tipburn increases… should we just not do it…?”
This kind of decision is incredibly difficult, isn’t it? The more aggressive you are, the higher the risk of tipburn. But if you’re not aggressive, yield won’t increase. Every day is spent in a mental state like walking a tightrope on the edge of a cliff.

The Moment of Panic

The most panic-inducing moment is when you don’t know why tipburn has increased.
If you’re intentionally practicing “aggressive” cultivation, you can be prepared with “as expected, it appeared,” but when tipburn suddenly increases without any warning…
“What’s happening? Environmental control system failure? Water quality change? Pests? A curse?!”
Response tends to be delayed because the cause is unknown. Meanwhile, tipburn continues to increase, dragging you into trimming hell.

In the End, the Fight Continues

Ultimately, the battle with tipburn is the eternal theme of plant factories. Even today, someone somewhere is wrestling with tipburn.
If there’s ever a day when you rejoice during morning rounds saying, “Zero tipburn today!”, that would be considered the greatest holiday in plant factory work. On such a day, I recommend capturing it in a photo. Because it might never come again.

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