SIP1
Visual Scouting for Disease Detection, Yield Estimation, and Precision Spraying in Vineyards
SIP Leader: Eden Library
Sector: Viticulture/Vineyards
Country of the pilot: Greece
Partners involved: EDEN (SIP Leader, ADS) / AUA (Scientific models, DIH offering advisors and farmers)/ Tselepos winery and Kyr-Gianni winery (third parties)
Target group: Farmers, advisors of Chania (3rd party) – 7 farmers + advisor
The Challenge: Optimizing Vineyard Management for Higher Yields & Sustainability
Greek wineries, particularly in regions with high-quality wine production, face increasing pressures to maintain sustainable and efficient vineyard management practices. The key challenges include:
- Early disease and pest detection: Conventional scouting methods rely on human observation, making them labor-intensive and prone to inconsistencies. Late detection of diseases or pests can result in significant crop losses.
- Optimizing spraying efficiency: Vineyards often use blanket spraying methods, leading to excess pesticide use, higher costs, and potential environmental harm.
- Resource management: Proper allocation of labor, equipment, and financial resources is essential to optimize vineyard operations while maintaining high productivity and sustainability standards.
How the ADS Works
To address these challenges, SIP1 introduces the Viewer, a tractor-mounted visual scouting system designed to enhance vineyard management. The system enables precise monitoring and real-time assessment of disease presence, canopy density, and yield estimation.
The Viewer operates as an advanced scouting and analysis tool, mounted on a tractor or autonomous vehicle. As it moves through the vineyard, the system:
- Captures high-resolution images of vine canopies, scanning for symptoms of disease, stress, or pest infestations.
- Processes imagery using trained visual analysis models, identifying patterns and problem areas.
- Analyzes canopy density, allowing for precision spraying—adjusting pesticide application based on plant health rather than applying treatments uniformly.
- Maps vineyard conditions using GPS data, providing geotagged disease and yield estimates that vineyard managers can access via a digital platform.
- Generates automated reports, allowing vineyard operators to assess trends over time and optimize seasonal treatment plans.
By reducing reliance on manual inspections, the Viewer ensures faster disease response, minimizes pesticide waste, and provides vineyard managers with continuous, high-resolution monitoring of vineyard health.
ADS Models
This SIP explores two different models of the ADS:
- Cloud-Based ADS: Captures images and GPS coordinates, then uploads data via a Wi-Fi connection for remote processing and yield estimation.
- Mixed (Cloud-Edge) ADS: Processes image streams in real time using pre-trained visual models, allowing for immediate in-field decision-making while reducing reliance on cloud connectivity
OpenAgri OS Services
SIP1 integrates the following OpenAgri OS services:
- Weather Data Service: Provides real-time and historical weather insights to enhance disease and pest risk analysis.
- Digital Farm Calendar: Enables logging of field scouting activities and integrates with yield forecasts.
- Reporting Service: Generates automated reports on vineyard conditions based on visual scouting.
Real-World Benefits & Impact
The Viewer ADS brings multiple benefits to vineyard management:
- Early disease detection prevents widespread infections and reduces grape loss.
- Precision pesticide spraying optimizes chemical usage, reducing costs and environmental impact.
- Yield estimation tools help wineries plan logistics, workforce allocation, and market supply more effectively.
- Continuous vineyard monitoring provides valuable long-term insights into climate impact and disease trends.
- Reduction in manual labor costs, as sensor-assisted scouting enables fewer, but more targeted, manual interventions.
