It may not be pretty, but the “Laser Scarecrow Technology” will help farmers protect their corn plants from offensive birds. Developed by a member of the Faculty of Plant Sciences at the University of Rhode Island (URI), a married Brown woman, the new system uses beams from a lightweight, inexperienced optical device to scare birds like starlings and red-winged blackbirds before they get in a mature ear advised. The laser scarecrow is in a plastic bucket to protect it from the elements and is attached to an adjustable pole to position the laser level with the corn tassels scan back and forth on one side and scare the birds.
Birds have been one of the greatest threats to agricultural crops since agriculture began. In 2017, university researchers calculated that a median of 16 percent of the corn plants in the Big Apple state were destroyed by birds, with red-winged blackbirds being the main culprit, and Brown estimates the losses at up to seventy-five. Five percent in some cases. In addition to eating the corn, they tear the husks, smash the tassels, and usually build the ears that will survive the attack.
Laser Scarecrow technology has the advantage that they are relatively easy to align and therefore will not even be noticed by the neighbors, as they are completely silent and the beam is therefore not visible to humans in daylight. “the University of Rhode Island, just like in a very unfortunate message from URI.
Brown’s new variant of the scarecrow swaps clothing-filled suits for a bag for a head for commercially available green LED lasers, which have become relatively inexpensive in recent years and can be operated with batteries or solar panels. It’s not a new idea. These laser deterrents have been around for over 20 years, but have previously been used to warn birds to stay away from indoor commercial and sports centers and have had very limited outdoor use. We think that birds perceive the laser as a solid object that they need to get away from, but we don’t know for sure. We can’t get into a bird’s head, “said Brown.” However, from tests with hand lasers, we know that if the laser is not constantly moving, the birds will ultimately ignore it. It works especially well when there are other food sources nearby that the birds can turn to instead of eating the corn. To make corn less desirable. “It’s probably going to turn out that it’s best deployed as part of a multi-tool approach to bird control, but it definitely seems to be reducing bird damage,” says Brown.