Optical electronic seed sowing system

Abstract

A seed sowing system and method employing photoelectric sensing equipment to detect singulated seeds and to actuate stepping equipment that ensures separate delivery of seeds to individual planting loci. The seed may come to the sensing equipment via a singulator and a low-pressure air stream. The photoelectric sensor is actuated each time the air stream carries a seed past a certain locus, and the sensor, in turn, actuates a cyclic stepping device by which each seed in a cycle is delivered into a different delivery tube and from there is deposited in a separate receptacle of a shutter. The stepping device is interconnected electronically with shutter indexing mechanism, by which the shutter is advanced and reindexed after each row of its seed-receiving openings has received its seeds, which may come from a single cycle or from a plurality of cycles. When the shutter is filled, the shutter moves over a planting location, beneath which may be a flat or a rack of seed-receiving capsules, held in a receiving position below a distributing assembly. The shutter releases the seeds from the shutter into a distributing assembly, from which they fall into the flat or the capsules. The system is very rapid and has the advantage of being able to handle a wide variety of seed types of different shapes, sizes, and weights.