On-Farm Robotics, both ground and air, have over the last decade demonstrated significant potential in the ability to ease labour concerns, reduce chemicals, and support farm operations for improving yield. Whilst the focus has been on the re-application of robotics and technologies from other industries, there is a growing interest in extending their capabilities to support, or even completely undertake, agronomy practice. This implies extending AI capabilities into real-time as well as advancing into higher levels of situational awareness on farm, but also ensuring that these are tightly coupled to field robotic platforms working within a biophysical domain. In this talk I will present a historical capture of our on-farm robotics R&D at the ACFR, as well as current activity, with an eye to how we might address extending their capabilities such as understanding crop growth and improving yield dynamically, or the behaviour of livestock around pasture and how to improve health.
