Estimation of plant nitrogen content using digital image processing

A manually operated four wheel test trolley was designed and developed for acquiring outdoor color images of plant under controlled illumination to predict crop nitrogen content in field.  This set up consists of a camera to capture the plant image, four lights to control illumination and a laptop for processing the signal.  The developed unit was evaluated rigorously for paddy crop for four observations at fifteen days interval after transplantation.  The results were compared with the chlorophyll content of the crop measured by SPAD meter and the chemical analysis of plant leaf.  The processing of the color plant image was done in MATLAB 7.0 program.  Various features such as R, G, B, normalized ‘r’ and normalized ‘g’ were analyzed for both the processes.  Regression models were developed and evaluated between various image feature and the plant nitrogen content and observed that, the minimum accuracy was found to be 65% with an average accuracy of 75% (Standard Deviation +1.9), actual and predicted values of nitrogen percent were linearly correlated with R2 value (0.948), this showed that the plant nitrogen content can be successfully estimated by its color image feature.   Keywords: precision agriculture, digital image processing, site specific nitrogen applicatio

Range Management and Agroforestry

Not AvailableIndian agricultural bears heavy labour and cost in the straw handling process after harvest. During peak harvesting season, unavailability of labourers and need of timeliness of operation, burning of straw in field have been a conventional practice. Mechanization in this field has been low but loading/unloading of loose straw is a tedious work. These operations can be performed efficiently using a tractor operated pneumatic loader and with less effort. Present study was aimed at optimizing the working of pneumatic loader at varying suction, delivery length and power take-off (PTO) speeds for wheat, soybean and pigeon pea straws. The optimized suction and delivery lengths for all the three straws were obtained as 2 and 10 m, respectively. The PTO speeds of 302, 366, and 373 rpm were identified as optimum for wheat, soybean, and pigeon pea straws, respectively. The operational cost of the machine with tractor was calculated as Rs. 228 for loading one tonne straw which resulted in heavy savings

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Not AvailableThe performance of a seed drill depends on manufacturing quality, precision and performance under field condition. In this study, an overall performance index was developed to compare performance of seed drills manufactured in different regions of Madhya Pradesh state of India for sowing of soybean and wheat crops. The test parameters of seed drills such as inter row variation of seed and fertilizer, seed damage, variation in seed placement, number of seeds dropped per meter, effective field capacity, field efficiency, fuel consumption, working width, type of furrow opener, hardness of furrow opener and weight of machine were selected to calculate precision, performance, machine quality and overall performance indices of seed drills. A completely randomized design was used to analyze test data of selected 90 seed drills. The average precision index of seed drills was 0.70 and 0.64 for wheat and soybean crops, respectively. The average performance index of seed drills was 0.72 and 0.73 for sowing of wheat and soybean crops, respectively. The machine quality index of the seed drills varied from 0.60 to 0.72. The overall performance index of the seed drills was 0.70 for wheat and 0.67 for soybean crops. The overall performance of seed drills manufactured in Malwa plateau of Madhya Pradesh was the best for sowing of wheat (0.74) and soybean (0.72) crops. Significant difference was observed among the seed drills manufactured in different regions of Madhya Pradesh based on precision, performance, machine quality and overall performance indices.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableA manually operated four wheel test trolley was designed and developed for acquiring outdoor color images of plant under controlled illumination to predict crop nitrogen content in field. This set up consists of a camera to capture the plant image, four lights to control illumination and a laptop for processing the signal. The developed unit was evaluated rigorously for paddy crop for four observations at fifteen days interval after transplantation. The results were compared with the chlorophyll content of the crop measured by SPAD meter and the chemical analysis of plant leaf. The processing of the color plant image was done in MATLAB 7.0 program. Various features such as R, G, B, normalized ‘r’ and normalized ‘g’ were analyzed for both the processes. Regression models were developed and evaluated between various image feature and the plant nitrogen content and observed that, the minimum accuracy was found to be 65% with an average accuracy of 75% (Standard Deviation ±1.9), actual and predicted values of nitrogen percent were linearly correlated with R2 value (0.948), this showed that the plant nitrogen content can be successfully estimated by its color image feature.Not Availabl

Metallurgical Requirements of Soil Engaging Component under Conservation Agriculture Practices

In this study, test reports of materials used for soil/crop engaging components of agricultural machinery were collected from some Agricultural Machinery Testing Centres situated in different agro-climatic zones across India. The study revealed that only 39.87% and 37.72% of tested soil engaging components conformed with the standards of Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) for material hardness and chemical composition, respectively. Furthermore, 38.5% fast-wearing components were made of high carbon steel, followed by medium carbon steel (33.0%), low carbon steel (25.0%), and tool steel (3.5%). It was observed that reputed manufacturers used high carbon and tool steel for fabricating critical components, and also heat-treated them for getting desirable product properties. Accordingly, four types of steel (D-2, M-4, EN-31, EN-8 with heat treatments) easily available in market were used for fabricating soil engaging blades suitable for conservation agriculture (CA) machinery. Wear test results showed lowest wear rate for D-2 and highest for EN-8 steel. Furthermore, D-2 also had highest relative life, and found most suitable for manufacturing soil engaging components of conservation agriculture machinery

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Not AvailableThe identification of water stress is a major challenge for timely and effective irrigation to ensure global food security and sustainable agriculture. Several direct and indirect methods exist for identification of crop water stress, but they are time consuming, tedious and require highly sophisticated sensors or equipment. Image processing is one of the techniques which can help in the assessment of water stress directly. Machine learning techniques combined with image processing can aid in identifying water stress beyond the limitations of traditional image processing. Deep learning (DL) techniques have gained momentum recently for image classification and the convolutional neural network based on DL is being applied widely. In present study, comparative assessment of three DL models: AlexNet, GoogLeNet and Inception V3 are applied for identification of water stress in maize (Zea mays), okra (Abelmoschus esculentus) and soybean (Glycine max) crops. A total of 1200 digital images were acquired for each crop to form the input dataset for the deep learning models. Among the three models, performance of GoogLeNet was found to be superior with an accuracy of 98.3, 97.5 and 94.1% for maize, okra and soybean, respectively. The onset of convergence in GoogLeNet models commenced after 8 epochs with 22 (maize), 31 (okra) and 15 (soybean) iterations per epoch with error rate of less than 7.5%.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableThe present study was carried out in a dry tract of central plateau region (Banwar village, Madhya Pradesh, India) by a team of trainee scientists inducted for the National Agricultural Research System (NARS), India. Observations recorded in the village indicated the harsh effects of declining water table owing to poor precipitation and the need for water harvesting to sustain people’s livelihood since agriculture being their primary profession. Considering social marketing strategy, the goal was set to recharge groundwater and increase the water availability for irrigation purpose. Visualising groundwater recharge through water harvesting as the end product; organising training programmes, method demonstrations, village level exhibitions and visit to other successful water harvesting regions were set as the promotion strategies to achieve the set goal. Work plan was devised by the trainee scientists and set to act further. Nevertheless, successful social marketing needs the partnership of local government bodies and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that play a significant role in changing the complex social structure of the people—the ultimate beneficiaries of end product.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableApplication of traditional knowledge is considered to be a simple and cost-effective way of immediate protection and well-being of living organisms in the society. However, the technique and its application differ across regions. The main objective of the study was to explore the indigenous techniques applied by the inhabitants of Banwar village, Madhya Pradesh, to protect the health of humans, crops and livestock through ethnomedicines. The investigation has been carried out by a team of trainee scientists inducted for National Agricultural Research System (NARS), India, during 2011-12. Snowball technique has been employed to select the respondents from Banwar. Observations recorded by Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) in the village indicated different indigenous health practices employed by the villagers against various infections. Utilising locally available materials by applying traditional knowledge immensely helped to get immediate relief from the concerned problem. Further, the study revealed that the process is cost-effective, time bound and eco-friendly.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableThe present study was carried out in a dry tract of central plateau region (Banwar village, Madhya Pradesh, India) by a team of trainee scientists inducted for the National Agricultural Research System (NARS), India. Observations recorded in the village indicated the harsh effects of declining water table owing to poor precipitation and the need for water harvesting to sustain people’s livelihood since agriculture being their primary profession. Considering social marketing strategy, the goal was set to recharge groundwater and increase the water availability for irrigation purpose. Visualising groundwater recharge through water harvesting as the end product; organising training programmes, method demonstrations, village level exhibitions and visit to other successful water harvesting regions were set as the promotion strategies to achieve the set goal. Work plan was devised by the trainee scientists and set to act further. Nevertheless, successful social marketing needs the partnership of local government bodies and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that play a significant role in changing the complex social structure of the people—the ultimate beneficiaries of end product.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableApplication of traditional knowledge is considered to be a simple and cost-effective way of immediate protection and well-being of living organisms in the society. However, the technique and its application differ across regions. The main objective of the study was to explore the indigenous techniques applied by the inhabitants of Banwar village, Madhya Pradesh, to protect the health of humans, crops and livestock through ethnomedicines. The investigation has been carried out by a team of trainee scientists inducted for National Agricultural Research System (NARS), India, during 2011-12. Snowball technique has been employed to select the respondents from Banwar. Observations recorded by Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) in the village indicated different indigenous health practices employed by the villagers against various infections. Utilising locally available materials by applying traditional knowledge immensely helped to get immediate relief from the concerned problem. Further, the study revealed that the process is cost-effective, time bound and eco-friendly.Not Availabl