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AI robot farmer keeping Dutch tulip fields healthy

Machine checking plants for diseased bulbs and removing them before disease spreads
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Allan Visser, a third-generation tulip farmer, is interviewed next to Theo the robot, in Noordwijkerhout, Netherlands, Tuesday, March 19, 2024. An artificial intelligence robot is a new high-tech weapon in the battle to root out disease from Dutch tulip fields as they erupt into a riot of springtime color. The robot is replacing a dwindling number of human “sickness spotters” who patrol bulb fields on the lookout for diseased flowers. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)

Theo works weekdays, weekends and nights and never complains about a sore spine despite performing hour upon hour of what, for a regular farm hand, would be backbreaking labor checking Dutch tulip fields for sick flowers.

The boxy robot — named after a retired employee at the WAM Pennings farm near the Dutch North Sea coast — is a new high-tech weapon in the battle to root out disease from the bulb fields as they erupt into a riot of springtime color.

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