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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Sustainable and Intelligent Phytoprotection
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1365275

An experimental study of acoustic bird repellents for reducing bird encroachment in pear orchards

Provisionally accepted
Qing Chen Qing Chen 1,2*Jingjing Xie Jingjing Xie 1Qiang Yu Qiang Yu 1Can Liu Can Liu 1Wenqin Ding Wenqin Ding 3Xiaogang Li Xiaogang Li 4Zhou Hongping Zhou Hongping 1,2
  • 1 College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, China
  • 2 Jiangsu Co-Innovation Center of Efficient Processing and Utilization of Forest Resources, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, China
  • 3 Nanjing Research Institute for Agricultural Mechanization, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanjing, China
  • 4 Jiangsu Key Laboratory for Horticultural Crop Genetic Improvement, Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanjing, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Bird invasion will reduce the yield of high-value crops, which threatens the healthy development of agricultural economy. Sonic bird repellent has the advantages of large range, no time and geographical restrictions, and low cost, which has attracted people's attention in the field of agriculture. At present, there are few studies on the application of sonic bird repellents in pear orchards to minimize economic losses and prolong the adaptive capacity of birds. In this paper, a sound wave bird repellent system based on computer vision is designed, which combines deep learning target recognition technology to accurately identify birds and drive them away. The neural network model that can recognize birds is first trained and deployed to the server. Live video is captured by an installed webcam, and the sonic bird repellent is powered by an ESP-8266 relay switch. In a pear orchard, two experimental areas were divided into two experimental areas to test the designed sonic bird repellent device, and the number of bad fruits pecked by birds was used as an indicator to evaluate the bird repelling effect. The results showed that the pear pecked fruit rate was 6.03% in the pear orchard area that used the acoustic bird repeller based on computer recognition, 7.29% in the pear orchard area of the control group that used the acoustic bird repeller with continuous operation, and 13.07% in the pear orchard area that did not use any bird repellent device. It can be found that the acoustic bird repeller based on computer vision is more effective in repelling birds.

    Keywords: crop protection, Bird Infestation, Sonic bird repellent, pest management, Adaptability studies

    Received: 04 Jan 2024; Accepted: 12 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Chen, Xie, Yu, Liu, Ding, Li and Hongping. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Qing Chen, College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.