High-Level Control of Robots for Row Crops

A flexible high-level control language is an important element in the continued task of introducing mobile agents to new application domains. One such new application domain is the use of a small mobile agent in a agricultural row crop field performing intra-row weeding. This paper defines requirements and scope of a process and behaviour based scripting language needed to control the weeding agent in an agricultural row crop. The basis is the transparent and tactical SMR-CL (Small Mobile Robot Control Language). SMR-CL is a realtime control language for mobile robots modified to include necessary motion commands and a supplemental supervisory function to record the progressing coverage of the field. The control language is applied to a case presenting typical field conditions for row crops. The case stresses the importance of including goal-directing modules like the Supervisory Field Coverage Monitor (SFCM) to coordinate the behaviours. The applicability of the modified SMR language has been successful demonstrated through the vehicle test in an artificial row crop. The analysis of the operational performance of the SMR has revealed its field capacity and rendered probable the scenario of equipping and implementing small weeding agents with a micro-spraying system requiring less than 10% of normal herbicide dosage.