The reason I got to thinking about drones is our sweet corn
Bird damage is our number one cause of damaged corn unfit for sale
We have bird bangers, a person walking the fields morning and nite with a shot gun plus bird bangers, all of which need to be moved as harvest progresses
The best devise is a tape that plays the dangest sound of a bird in distress
That really works the best, but we have to continually move it, as the corn approaches harvest
We generally fill 10 semi loads/day
I got to thinking if we could attach the screech tape to a pre-programme drone and a pre-determined flight path, we might have something
Our birds seldom do much damage after dark, so the bangers would work when the birds mostly roost in near by trees
We would need to know how long a drone would fly, and other info, but I think it might work
For some reason we have a history with black birds in this area
I suppose I will wait until things settle down and then see what the brain trust thinks various problems might be
Too late for this yr as 12-16 hr days tend to focus on the job at hand and not experimental time consuming new stuff
We expect to finish sweet corn at the end of August plus trucking corn from bins on into September and getting ready for fall harvest of corn and beans
Not much spare time around here, except for me as I am just the gofer, getting flat tires fixed, parts run etc.
Wayne,
I never realized that birds did that much damage to corn.
Funny story. Before moving to this house, 20 years ago, I lived in an area that did not have as much woods..........or raccoons. I had a massive vegetable garden. Maybe a 10th of an acre. So I could grow anything without worrying about space.
At this house, I did not have nearly the space in the backyard, so I couldn't grow as much corn or spaghetti squash and stuff like that.
First year here, I did have a decent amount of sweet corn, even though it took up half of the garden. It was doing great(I can irrigate) and come late July, was within a week of being ready to pick.
One morning I went out there only to find that almost every plant was flattened. WTH! I didn't even hear the surprise storm that must have come thru with the high winds. This had happened before at the other place and meant I would need to spend a few hours uprighting the plants again.
Getting closer, I noted something much different. All the ears were gone from most of the plants and half of them were scattered around, half eaten............raccoons!!! many, many raccoons!
Obviously I was not going to be able to grow corn at this new place unless I got rid of these raccoons.........that now knew about this new garden with the best food that they ever had.
Over the course of several years, I caught 15+ raccoons and moved them to the Blue Grass Wild Life reserve around 10 miles from here.
I did manage to have a few good crops of corn but finally gave up and stopped growing corn since it was taking up too much space in my small garden.
Raccoons like other vegetables too and they also like bird seed, so I couldn't feed the birds anymore. One of them almost killed our indoor cat(that doesn't have front claws and gets outside every once in awhile).
I can't garden anymore but now the problem is deer They devour my landscaping plants. Ate every hosta to nothing but a stub and most of the hydrangea's are leaf less.
Wild life is wonderful if only they would stay in the woods, or their natural environment
But easy to access and plentiful food is just too much of a temptation, I suppose
We don't have a garden ever since I accidently killed my wife's garden with the field sprayer
We go to a road side stand and support the kids trying to make some summer money