Performance Evaluation of UAVs in Wheat Disease Control

Abstract

Plant protection unmanned aircraft vehicles (UAVs) were developed rapidly in China. The operation performances of different models of UAVs were different. This paper systematically studied droplet deposition distribution; pesticide-mixture utilization rate; operational efficiency; wheat-disease control efficacy; and a comprehensive score of three types of UAVs, a boom sprayer, and a knapsack sprayer. The results showed the descending order of the droplet penetration rate of the pesticide application equipment (PAE) was boom sprayer; UAVs; and knapsack sprayer. The pesticide-mixture utilization rates of the UAVs and boom sprayer were more than 50% while that of the knapsack electric sprayer was only 27.8%. The UAVs’ average labor productivity was 5.75 ha per man-hour, which was slightly less than that of the boom sprayer and 21.3 times that of the knapsack sprayer. The control efficacy of each machine on wheat Fusarium head blight was more than 90%. The average performance comprehensive score of the UAVs was 0.812, which was slightly lower than the score of 0.929 for the 3WPZ-700 self-propelled boom sprayer but much higher than the score of 0.399 for the 3WBD-18 knapsack electric sprayer. The results clearly showed the potential of UAVs for improving the pesticide-mixture utilization rate and operational efficiency, as well as the wheat Fusarium head blight control efficacy.