New Breakthrough In Shiitake Mushroom Harvesting

Shiitake mushrooms are one of the most widely cultivated, most produced and most consumed edible fungi in China. They have high nutritional, medicinal and health care values ​​and are known as the “Queen of Mushrooms”. Factory production of shiitake mushrooms is an inevitable trend for high-quality and large-scale development of the industry. However, at present, the mushroom picking process still relies heavily on a large amount of labor, is time-consuming, labor-intensive, high-cost, and has an unfriendly working environment with high temperature and humidity, which has become a bottleneck for the large-scale production of mushrooms in factories. On the other hand, shiitake mushrooms cultivated on mushroom sticks grow intensively, and the picking operation space is extremely limited, and the picking needs to be completed in a short time. It is extremely difficult to mechanize harvesting, which has become a bottleneck technology for the large-scale development of the shiitake mushroom industry.
In response to the demand for mushrooms that grow intensively, are prone to damage during picking, and are picked at high speeds, Shandong Agricultural University pioneered a new model of mechanized mushroom picking and innovatively designed a new type of mushroom harvesting terminal actuator to achieve low damage and efficient picking. Through mechanical analysis and finite element analysis of the dynamic process of the picking process, the separation mechanism of the terminal actuator components – shiitake mushrooms – mushroom sticks during the harvesting process was clarified, and the structural design and operating parameters of the terminal actuator were optimized, which is important for improving picking performance. theoretical guidance.
In addition, based on the optimized image processing algorithm, information such as the number of mushrooms, their size and roundness, and the proportion of qualified mushrooms are obtained to evaluate the growth status of the mushroom rods. In this study, a batch harvesting machine for shiitake mushrooms was constructed and a picking test was conducted in a shiitake mushroom production factory. The test results verified that the new mechanized picking mode and the mushroom batch harvesting machine can improve picking efficiency and are highly effective and feasible. Based on this, the research team designed batch harvesting equipment suitable for the mushroom production line.
This technology is expected to provide important core equipment for improving the factory production of mushroom picking, provide constructive solutions for building smart factory production and green development of edible fungi, and play an important leading role in the development direction of the international mushroom industry.