Leave a Nest Co., Ltd. has filed a patent application for a “mechanism for dropping seed balls (made by covering plant seeds with soil) from a drone,” which is one of the research results of the LVNS Forest Project. This technology allows for the dropping of fragile seedballs from a drone. This technology makes it possible to send out fragile seed balls one by one without breaking them, and to drop them at equal intervals when used in combination with a drone.

【What is the LVNS Forest Project?】

This is a project led by Leave a Nest Co., Ltd. to integrate technologies from all fields and implement development with the vision of “Realizing an autonomous social system between forests and people”. The project has six development themes: Soil Development, Seeding Technology Development, Forest Management Technology Development, Valuables development, Valuation System Development, and Education and Cultural Development, a start-up company in the Philippines, as well as venture and academic partners.

【Background of this development】

As part of the development of seeding technology, this research was conducted with the aim of planting trees in former mine sites by using drones to spread tree seeds from the sky. In order to germinate seeds even in environments where germination is difficult, seeds are dropped in a state called a “seed ball,” in which the seeds are covered with soil around them, supplying the seeds with a minimum amount of nutrients. Because seeds need to germinate after being dropped, seed balls cannot be hardened and are brittle. Until now, it has been difficult to handle fragile seed balls one at a time, and the mechanism has been to drop them all at once. Therefore, we developed a mechanism that enables seed balls to be dropped one at a time for effective seed dispersal.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)