Justin a really good resource to understand different sprayers and their performance in different applications is sprayer101.com.

Generally though you’ll be looking at a “low” pressure sprayer (20-90psi) with some decent boom width. Most general purpose or herbicide sprayers available are in this category, and your 50hp tractor can handle anything in the 100-300gal range depending on if it’s a towed or 3pt mount sprayer. Twin fan air induction nozzles (hypro and teejet both make them) offer great coverage in this system as long as rates are calibrated well. Not sure where you’re located but in MN you can find a used 300 gal sprayer with a 20′ boom and electric or gas pump motor for under $5,000. Anything smaller just means you’ll take more time to load and spray, anything bigger (or a custom application) will go faster, but you definitely don’t need to spend 10k for something that will work really well.

In hops, we’d cover an acre in about 15 min with 13′ row spacing (equivalent to a 13′ boom) at 3.5mph. In shaded cannabis, our 30′ boom sprayer covers an acre in 7 min. So you can use those crude numbers to figure out how long it’ll take to cover your 50 acres with different boom sizes. Add another 15 minutes for every time you have to fill the tank (bigger tanks mean less refilling).

With all this you should get an idea of:

1) How much time can I dedicate spraying in a given week?

2) what equipment will allow me to complete a full field application with the amount of time I have?

3) can I afford that equipment, or should I rely on custom applications?

I hope that makes sense! Happy to chat more about sprayers as I’ve run a lot of different kinds on a small/medium scale, just let me know what questions you have.