Tootfinder

Vision-based Navigation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Orchards: An Imitation Learning Approach
Peng Wei, Prabhash Ragbir, Stavros G. Vougioukas, Zhaodan Kong
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.02617

Vision-based Navigation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Orchards: An Imitation Learning Approach
Autonomous unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) navigation in orchards presents significant challenges due to obstacles and GPS-deprived environments. In this work, we introduce a learning-based approach to achieve vision-based navigation of UAVs within orchard rows. Our method employs a variational autoencoder (VAE)-based controller, trained with an intervention-based learning framework that allows the UAV to learn a visuomotor policy from human experience. We validate our approach in real orchard en…

🥭 From orchard to fridge: Helping mangoes stay sweet for longer
#fruit

From orchard to fridge: Helping mangoes stay sweet for longer
In good news for mango lovers, new research from Edith Cowan University (ECU) has identified a way to extend the storage life of the popular tropical fruit.

🐀 Rats! More than 100,000 acres of almond orchards across Central California are infested
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/rats-more-than-100-000-acres-of-almond-orchards-across-cent…

More than 100,000 acres of almond orchards in Central California are infested
Almond growers across Central California are battling a surging rat infestation across more than 100,000 acres of orchards, resulting in economic hardship and damage.

Is anyone familiar with The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher? I picked one up at a book swap, by total fluke the first in the series, and so far it's actually quite good. Given the premise I wasn't sure which way it would go.
This was an emergency book as I'd left my *actual* book in my work bag: Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard by Kiran Desai, which I'm really enjoying #books

Me he configurado #orgroam para empezar a tomar apuntes de cosas. Cosas que estudio, cosas que leo y no quiero olvidar o, si las olvido, tenerlas retenidas... Cuando lo lleve rodado un tiempo caerš entrada en el blog.

Nos reíamos de que Reagan preguntara a una vidente decisiones de política durante su presidencia. Pues en Suecia estšn con la versión 3.0 de consultar a un oršculo: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/aug/05/chat-gpt-sw…

Learning to Prune Branches in Modern Tree-Fruit Orchards
Abhinav Jain, Cindy Grimm, Stefan Lee
https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.23015 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2507.…

Learning to Prune Branches in Modern Tree-Fruit Orchards
Dormant tree pruning is labor-intensive but essential to maintaining modern highly-productive fruit orchards. In this work we present a closed-loop visuomotor controller for robotic pruning. The controller guides the cutter through a cluttered tree environment to reach a specified cut point and ensures the cutters are perpendicular to the branch. We train the controller using a novel orchard simulation that captures the geometric distribution of branches in a target apple orchard configuration.…

Any recommendations for an Android app to read (only) and search through ten mid-size to large #orgdown files I currently sync via Syncthing?
#Orgzly revived does kill captured data (in my setup situation) and #Orgro

This obscure 2025 Pennsylvania Supreme Court retention election has massive implications.
Losing this 2025 court race will cost Dems the 2026 midterms and 2028 presidential.
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗲𝗻𝗻𝘀𝘆𝗹𝘃𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗮 𝗦𝘂𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗲 𝗖𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗻𝗹𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗮𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗠𝗔𝗚𝗔’𝘀 𝗺𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗱𝗲𝗽𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗱 𝘃𝗼𝘁𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗺𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀
𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘄𝗲 𝙬𝙞𝙡𝙡 𝗹𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝘂𝗻𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗗𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗰𝗿𝗮𝘁𝘀 𝗾𝘂𝗶𝗰𝗸𝗹𝘆 𝗺𝗼𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘇𝗲.
We know every Democrat in the country is hitting you up right now
-- but this race 𝙣𝙚𝙚𝙙𝙨 𝙩𝙤 𝙩𝙖𝙠𝙚 𝙥𝙧𝙞𝙤𝙧𝙞𝙩𝙮.
T𝙝𝙞𝙨 …

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SDE-DET: A Precision Network for Shatian Pomelo Detection in Complex Orchard Environments
Yihao Hu, Pan Wang, Xiaodong Bai, Shijie Cai, Hang Wang, Huazhong Liu, Aiping Yang, Xiangxiang Li, Meiping Ding, Hongyan Liu, Jianguo Yao
https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.19990

SDE-DET: A Precision Network for Shatian Pomelo Detection in Complex Orchard Environments
Pomelo detection is an essential process for their localization, automated robotic harvesting, and maturity analysis. However, detecting Shatian pomelo in complex orchard environments poses significant challenges, including multi-scale issues, obstructions from trunks and leaves, small object detection, etc. To address these issues, this study constructs a custom dataset STP-AgriData and proposes the SDE-DET model for Shatian pomelo detection. SDE-DET first utilizes the Star Block to effectivel…