Help us develop a smart app to manage wheat pests

[Brid @ ADAS]

ADAS have recently started working on a Defra/UKRI Farming Innovations Pathway research project in collaboration with Sheffield University and Mutus Tech Ltd. The aim of this project is to develop a “smart app” to help farmers with the identification and treatment of invertebrate pests in wheat.

We want the final product to be able to:

• Detect invertebrates in or on the crop canopy from photographs;
• Determine whether the invertebrates present in the image are one of the specified pests
• Count the number of pests in the image and equate this to economic thresholds;
• Where thresholds are exceeded, provide the user with management advice

The focal pests will include:

• Aphids, winter: The grain aphid, the bird cherry-oat aphid
• Aphids, summer: The grain aphid, the rose-grain aphid
• Wheat bulb fly
• Slugs
• Orange wheat blossom midge
• Wireworm
• Leatherjackets
• Frit fly
• Gout fly

We want to create a practical product that helps you in the field so please do take our 5-minute survey so we can understand and best meet your needs. Thank you!

• Farmer survey link: https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/N6GE4R/
• Agronomist survey link: https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/DVQU5P/

 

[teslacoils]

An app? Really? How about eyes, skill and experience?

 

[Devon Gurfallo]

What's the budget for this little project?

 

[farenheit]

What's the budget for this little project?

£135,232 was the UKRI grant.

 

[yellow belly]

you know what it is but there is not a lot that you can do about because of no inscecticide that are more effective than protecting the beneficials

We need money spent on resistant varieties

 

[Skater]

How do you detect wireworms, from a picture of the crop canopy?
And what is the threshold in potatoes?
I need a camera like that.

 

[Rob Holmes]

@Brid @ ADAS, Why not make Manner NPK as an app for Android and Apple?

 

[Brid @ ADAS]

@Brid @ ADAS, Why not make Manner NPK as an app for Android and Apple?

We would love to do as an app (we've had this request a few times) but it all comes down to funding unfortunately. We put a proposal to Defra in 2019 to update PLANET & MANNER to web-based but it stalled. Still hopeful one day we get the funding to make it happen!