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Northwest Nazarene University associate professor Duke Bulanon, is developing two robots that can help orchard owners have a better harvest. One of the robots is called the IdaBOT, and it can move around the vineyards on its own.

The other one has a multi-spectral camera, which can capture several colored wavelengths that enables it to count fruit blossoms and thereby approximating the total crop yield. Bulanon envisioned the idea when he had a chat with Williamson. The conversation took place in April around the blossom season. He took images of the blossoms with the aid of a drone which he flew over the orchard. The images were clearer because he used a drone rather than the normal camera.

The robot counts the blossoms instead of the ripe fruits and by so doing yields can be easily estimated. Williamson said the idea was a fantastic one and it would be very useful to estimate his yield. He further added that fine yard and orchard owners would find out that this robot is very useful in estimating their yield, which would in turn help them produce and market better products.

Bulanon intends to make the camera small. The reason is that he intends to attach it to a cell phone so that it can work with an app. Bulanon is working with a team of researchers and they intend to capture images of blossom and fruits from different angles so that they can be able to estimate yield accurately.

Presently, the method used by Williamson and other workers to estimate the yield, is to count the fruits on each branch and then multiply it by 24-acre orchard. Bulanon’s designed some robots in Florida which is also used in harvesting. He is currently an associate professor NNU (Northwest Nazarene University) in physics and engineering.