Using Unmanned aerial vehicles to save plants
2022.12.10 01:27
Using Unmanned aerial vehicles to save plants
By Ray Johnson
Budrigannews.com – Ben Nyberg was looking over the leafy recesses of the adjacent red rock ridges as he stood on a ridge with a sharp edge on Hawaii’s Na Pali Coast. If not for the faint buzzing of a drone flying among flocks of curious white-tailed tropicbirds, the scene would have been quiet.
Nyberg used the iPad in his hands as a viewfinder as he steered the drone closer to the opposite ridge. He then noticed it: Hobdyi’s Wilkesia
It looked like something out of a Dr. Seuss book because its tufts of bright green leaves stood out from the other plants that were clinging to the cliff.
W. hobdyi—also known as dwarf iliau—was once common on the Hawaiian island of Kaua’i. It is a member of the sunflower family. However, the plant nearly went extinct when goats were introduced to the island by Europeans in the late 1700s.
W. hobdyi had never developed defenses against hungry livestock like bitter leaves or sharp thorns because it was isolated from continental landmasses.
Intrepid botanists risked their lives by rappelling down perilous cliffs on ropes for decades to locate such difficult-to-reach plants and gather samples.
However, because of this daring approach, it was simple to overlook plants. On steep cliffs, there were few clip-ins, and bushes frequently blocked sightlines. Ropes could only go so far.
Scientists now have the ability, thanks to new technologies, to reach dangerous locations and search for any remaining survivors before it’s too late.
At the National Tropical Botanical Garden, Nyberg is the GIS and drone program coordinator. In 2016, she helped start an aerial program that uses drones to look for rare species.
There were reportedly less than 600 individuals of W. hobdyi growing along the Na Pali Coast. The steepest cliffs, which goats cannot reach, are where many of Kauai’s endangered plants grow. However, there were now more than a hundred plants covered in foliage before Nyberg. In order to verify his findings in the laboratory, he flew the drone within 5 meters (16 feet) of the vegetation and took high-resolution photographs.
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Working with the Division of Forestry and Wildlife of the State of Hawaii, Nyberg and the National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG) team discovered larger populations of numerous other critically endangered species with populations smaller than 100 individuals and rediscovered three species from Kauai that were thought to be extinct or locally extinct.
After years of searching, the drone would eventually locate 5,500 new individuals in just a few months, representing a more than 900% increase in the plant’s known population.
Nyberg stated, “It was just excitement” regarding such discoveries. A few plants, if any, would be a huge success. We might have a little more time left before we die now.
In the world today, two out of every five plant species are in danger of extinction. On islands that are cut off from potential refuges and have a high rate of endemism—species that grow nowhere else in the world—the situation is frequently even more dire.
There are 250 plant species on Kauai that are unique to the island.
Many of Hawaii’s plants are in danger from invasive species like feral pigs, loss of habitat, and landslides caused by heavy rains.
According to a 2020 assessment for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species, approximately 10% of the plants on Kauai are already extinct or extinct in the wild, and an additional 87% are endangered.
Nina Ronsted, the assessment’s director of science and conservation at NTBG, stated, “Things are really special here because we’re so far away from everything.” Each plant assumes an unmistakable part” in the climate.
The island’s bog-dwelling species of na’ena’e (Dubautia waialealae) are critically endangered. An entire ecosystem’s equilibrium can be upset by the disappearance of just one species.
Ronsted stated, “It’s a little bit like a tower of cards.” It will fall if too much is removed.
PRECIOUS CARGO Only half of the battle entails finding rare plants in the wild. Botanists must collect seeds and genetic material, which they can cultivate in greenhouse nurseries, in order to safeguard species over time. This contributes to the provision of extinction protection.
In 2020, Nyberg and Canadian researchers from Outreach Robotics started working on a unique robotic arm that they could attach to a drone to carefully remove parts of dangerously growing plants.
The robotic arm, which is called Mamba (Multi-Use Aerial Manipulator Bidirectionally Actuated) and hangs below a drone on a cable, has eight propellers and a cutting mechanism. Pilots can control it from a mile away.
By isolating the Mamba from the robot, it can move rapidly and definitively in blustery conditions and dodges the gamble of the robot colliding with precipice walls.
The Mamba can reach the target plant from as far away as 4 meters (13 feet) when fully extended.
Scientists who are able to control the Mamba’s dynamic clippers and agile metal wrist can operate it remotely. Even the tiniest and most delicate plants can be carefully sampled by the Mamba, which is programmed to do so with care. It takes less than ten minutes to collect.
Mamba has so far gathered 29 cuttings or seeds from 12 threatened species for COMING FULL CIRCLE. These include samples of the rare violet wahine noho kula, which the surveying drone only recently rediscovered and thought to be extinct on Kauai.
At the NTBG nursery, cuttings and seeds are currently growing, and some seeds are being kept in the seed bank for use in future conservation efforts.
Nyberg stated that the robot “can be the difference between extinction and survival.”
However, in order for a species to fully recover, they must still be released into the wild. Within the next year or so, it is the hope of scientists that they can return to their cliffside habitat.
They might even drop collected seeds into fertilizer balls that can stick to steep cliffs using drones to bomb them down.
However, it’s possible that they won’t even need to be dropped in such perilous terrain. According to Nyberg, “these plants occurred on flat lands before we had goats here.”
