Super Monster Wolf
Electric fences will be a thing of the past: the Super Monster Wolf is on the scene to protect valuable agriculture from curious and often destructive wild animals, while also doing no harm to the animals themselves. Ota Seimitsu at the Hokkaido University and Tokyo University of Agriculture designed a robotic wolf specifically for agriculture in 2017. This robotic wolf is kitted with fur, white fangs, and flashing red eyes, and is only slightly smaller than a wolf at 2.2 ft long. Wolves native to japan went extinct in the early 1800s because of a state-sponsored eradication program, which caused a massive population spike in wild boars and deer, who prey on Japanese crops thus causing a lot of costly damage. The robots have a set patrol route around a field and upon detection of an animal (or human), the robot wolf can make a number of loud and jarring sounds to scare them away, such as a howl or a gunshot. The wolf is kitted with rechargeable solar batteries, so it can hypothetically maintain itself for a long period of time. Super Monster Wolf finished a successful pilot in Kisarazu City in Japan’s eastern region of Chiba, and successfully deterred predators that were as far as a mile away. Super Monster Wolf is now being commercially produced, but for the hefty cost of almost $5000 USD for one unit. The cost could certainly be viewed as inhibitive, and, of course, the robot would not have been necessary had the native wolf population not been decimated. However, considering the damage done by wild animals, the cost may be worth it for some.
Creighton, Jolene. “This Terrifying Robot Wolf Is Protecting the Crops of Japanese Farmers.” Futurism, March 8, 2018. https://futurism.com/terrifying-robot-wolf-japan-farmers
Categories
Artificial Life, Ecological Monitoring, Industry/Natural Commodities, Monitoring, Regulation
More Ideas
Air Pollution Robot
The dangers of air pollution to human health are well documented, though the traditional methodology of collecting and reporting on sample lags behind the need to keep abreast and regulate air pollution in a meaningful amount of time. The use of drones and robots have been identified by researchers as resources that can be tweaked […]
Artificial Life, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Ecological Monitoring, Industry/Natural Commodities, Lifestyle, Monitoring
Telematic Rivers
Erica Kermani’s artwork seeks to answer a central question: if rivers were seeing an equal, living entity, would humans take issues like climate change threatening them more seriously? In his year-long art exhibition in 2017, Kermani, in collaboration with Diana Salcedo & Jeana Chesnik, created a new forum of interaction between humans and rivers to […]
Climate Change, Ecological Monitoring, Lifestyle, Monitoring, Pollution, Visual Technologies
Co-occupied Boundaries
Art is easily found in nature but rarely is what considered art today inherently natural. The concept of co-occupied mediums that serve to be both functional for nature and aesthetically pleasing to people is being actively explored by Asya Ilgun and Phil Ayres, from the CITAstudio at The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. In […]
Climate Change, Ecological Monitoring, Lifestyle, Monitoring, Pollution, Visual Technologies