Heat/cold degree days and Chill hours: Difference between revisions

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→‎Calculation of Chill Hours: add ref to looking in backup for archived today.ini
m (→‎Air Frost: grass frost added for completeness)
m (→‎Calculation of Chill Hours: add ref to looking in backup for archived today.ini)
This measure is sometimes called ''Growing Degree Days'', because it relates to plants or insects rather than heating systems, but that seems a strange labelling because growth in most plants and insects responds to warmth, although some seeds need a period of chilling to stimulate germination and as described below some fruit needs chilling to promote development. However, [http://sandaysoft.com/forum/tracker.php?p=1&t=262| enhancement request #262] reports a different definition of ''Growing Degree Days'' based on summing daily: ((MaxTemp - MinTemp)/2 - BaseTemp) for all days where the value is positive (negative values are not subtracted).
=== Calculation of Chill Hours ===
The traditional way of calculating the accumulation of Chill Hours is the number of hours the temperature is below 45 degrees Fahrenheit or 7.5 degrees Celsius for the period of 1st October to 30th April in the Northern Hemisphere. One Onapplicability Cumulusis thatto threshold,stone and startseed datefruit areas thetheir default,exposure soto youlow simplytemperatures observeduring the reportedwinter valuemonths atwill thehave a relevantsignificant timeeffect on 30the following Aprilharvest. TheToo currentfew figurecold ishours viewablecan onresult thein 'Thispoor Year'quality screenand accessedquantity fromof the Viewcrop. menuFruit (onlytree whenvarieties theprefer currenta yearChill isHour selected),rating andfrom isabout available200 via web tag <#chillhours>hours to bearound added1500 tohours. a web page template of your design.
 
On Cumulus that threshold, and start date are the default, so you simply observe the reported value at the relevant time on 30 April/1 May. The current figure is viewable on the 'This Year' screen accessed from the View menu (only when the current year is selected), stored in [[today.ini]], and is available via web tag <#chillhours> to be added to a web page template of your design. Should you miss checking the reported value on 1 May, then for a few days, you can look in the backup sub-folder for the necessary archived today.ini. In the current version of Cumulus, a new archive of the data sub-folder is taken just after each rollover.
 
One applicability is to stone and seed fruit as their exposure to low temperatures during the winter months will have a significant effect on the following harvest. Too few cold hours can result in poor quality and quantity of the crop. Fruit tree varieties prefer a Chill Hour rating from below 200 hours to around 1500 hours.
 
[[User:Sfws|Sfws]] 10:53, 1 December 2012 (UTC) (with thanks to Randy who raised [http://sandaysoft.com/forum/tracker.php?p=1&t=117| Enhancement Request #117] and supplied some of the above text)
 
=== Air Frost ===
However, the way it can be configured on Cumulus will allow you to track air frost (defined as when temperature at the standard measuring height is below the freezing point for water) hours, ground frost (temperature close to ground level is below freezing) hours or any other measure being below the threshold parameter. Sometimes the term 'grass frost' is used for whan the air temperature goes below 4 degrees Celsius, it roughly corresponds to when grass looks white due to frozen dew (water is more dense below 4 degress than above 4 degrees so the cold moisture falls onto the grass).
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