Abstract
Weed control is vital in agricultural production. Chemical control methods are generally preferred in weed control as they (1) affect quickly and (2) reduce the labour requirement. However, in conventional applications chemicals are generally applied to whole field surface. Therefore, non-targeted areas are also sprayed. This increases 1) amount of herbicide used and (2) risk of off-target chemical movement. In this study, a patch spraying system was developed to automatically detect and spray herbicides on weeds in the corn field based on weed density. In order to determine the weed regions, a digital camera was fitted in front of the tractor. The images taken using the camera were then simultaneously processed using an algorithm written in MatlabTM software. The results of the field study showed that at 4, 6 and 8 km h-1 forward speeds, application volumes decrease by 30.21%, 28.82% and 32.28%, respectively, when it is compared to the conventional application methods. It was also determined that the application accuracy rates were 80%, 81.66% and 75% respectively for 4, 6 and 8 km h-1 speeds.
Highlights
Some weed species have gained resistance against regularly and intensively used chemicals
Preliminary tests were performed by placing green objects at different spacing on a flat concrete surface to investigate whether or not the spraying application was performed at the right time and to the right regions
Since the region of interest (ROI) has a width of 1.5 m in the direction of the tractor travel, if the distance between the objects is less than 1.5 m (X1), the spraying process continues without interrupting between the two objects
Summary
Some weed species have gained resistance against regularly and intensively used chemicals. The amount of energy used for the weed control cost of weed control has increased. Product losses can be up to 20-30% in the first two months period from planting due to weeds. Weeds in corn fields make harvesting difficult and cause work loss (Aydemir & Karaoğlu 2008). Weeds are not desired in the corn fields as they compete with corn for limited resources such as water, nutrients, light, and space. Weeds can change the quality of light received by corn (Rajcan et al 2004)
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