Cultura da batata (Solanum tuberosum L.) e sua relação com índices de vegetação obtidos por veículo aéreo não tripulado.

The potato is the third most important food crop in the world due to its richness in carbohydrates, vitamins, and minerals. To achieve good productivity, the crop requires milder climates, as it originated in the Andes, and shorter days which favor its tuberization. The use of remote monitoring of crops has been increasingly growing due to its precision and speed in results, given that the potato is affected by a large number of pests and diseases, especially during the tuberization phase. Vegetation indices are the combination of one or more bands that highlight a characteristic of interest, which can aid in monitoring pests and diseases, as well as, assessing the plant's water conditions. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to verify the correlation of different vegetation indices obtained in the visible spectrum with the productivity of potato crops. The experiment was conducted at the Horticulture sector of IFMG-campus Bambuí, using 44 different clones of potatoes in partnership with UFLA, where the spacing used was 0.80 meters between rows and 0.30 meters between plants, forming 156 plots. Aerial images were acquired weekly from planting, for 9 weeks, using an unmanned aerial vehicle. These images were georeferenced, and from them, four vegetation indices from each of them (MPRI, IKAW, MGRVI, and RGBVI) were extracted using GIS QGIS. For each image collection date, the average of the indices within each plot was calculated and correlated with productivity. All the indices evaluated in this study, with the exception of RGBVI, showed higher correlation values at the peak of tuberization. The potato's phenological stage that presented higher correlations between productivity and the vegetation indices obtained from aerial images in the visible region is tuberization.