Visual Guidance and Egg Collection Scheme for a Smart Poultry Robot for Free-Range Farms

Free-range chicken farming allows egg-laying hens to move freely through their environment and perform their natural behavior, including laying her eggs. However, it takes time to gather these eggs manually, giving rise to high labor costs. This study proposes a smart mobile robot for poultry farms that can recognize eggs of two different colors on free-range farms. The robot can also pick up and sort eggs without damaging them. An egg feature extraction method with automatic thresholding is employed to detect both white and brown eggs, and a behavior-based navigation method is applied to allow the robot to reach the eggs while avoiding obstacles. The robot can move towards the position of each egg via visual tracking. Once the egg is within the collection area of the robot, it is gathered, sorted and stored in the tank inside the robot. Experiments are carried out in an outdoor field of size 5 m x 5 m under different climatic conditions, and the results showed that the average egg recognition rate is between 94.7% and 97.6%. The proposed mobile poultry robot is low in production cost and simple in operation. It can provide chicken farmers with automatic egg gathering on free-range farms.