6 ms·

This is a lot more wholesome than my project. I detect birds and automatically spray them with a sprinkler to keep away from pool area. code: https://github.co

by sahn44 16d ago

This is a lot more wholesome than my project. I detect birds and automatically spray them with a sprinkler to keep away from pool area. code: https://github.com/mattsahn/bird-away https://github.com/mattsahn/bird-away Writeup: https://mattsahn.github.io/bird-away-blog/ https://mattsahn.github.io/bird-away-blog/

lukan 16d ago
I guess you can combine it? Identify what the bird was you sprayed away ..
- peddling-brink 15d ago
  And measure reaction time, classify across species.
  - sahn44 15d ago
    I have a few learnings. Pigeons scram instantly. 7-bird takeout: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-08-18/event-20260818T203743Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2... Ducks don't care: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-08-08/event-20260808T123552Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2... Whatever these are, they just walk away: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-07-25/event-20260725T151018Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2...
ddmf 15d ago
I've been wanting to do something like this to stop cats shitting on my grass for ages, will have a look at this, thanks.
world2vec 15d ago
My first ever "e2e" ML project during early covid quarantine was a crude vision model to detect pigeons on my balcony (and pigeons only) and play a loud random sound. It almost worked sometimes.
- lukan 15d ago
  "It almost worked sometimes." I will borrow that.
- ompogUe 15d ago
  Did a similar thing where I had a neighbor who raised dobermans and rottweilers - it's a bit difficult to code with 8 or 9 large dogs barking in the yard outside your window. Set up an amp and speakers that would pump out ultrasonic noise when it heard the barking, sending them running to the other side of their house.
atestu 15d ago
I've been meaning the same thing to stop deer from eating from my garden... would you do anything differently if you were to do it again?
- sahn44 15d ago
  I've been pleasantly surprised how well it has worked and how robust it is. It's installed at my parent's house and I am many states away so I was paranoid about making it resilient since i'm usually not there and have to fly to get there. So, i really tried to think of everything I could. I thought it might overheat the first afternoon or have other problems, but it's been running for months now uninterupted. Sometimes the OpenRouter credits run out and it stops catching birds , but it still runs normally and after I re-up the credits, it continues working normally. No need to restart even.
  - boringg 15d ago
    whats the spend roughly on an ongoing basis?
    - sahn44 15d ago
      I had been using gemma-4-31B-it llm for cost/accuracy and it was super cheap, about $0.65/month. I had also downscaled the size and back tested on bird/no-bird images from my camera. But, then I noticed that it was missing birds that were at the back of the pool and I needed to use higher resolution and better models and cost went up 10x. Now, it's to high for my liking and I need to do more model testing to get it down to a few dollars a month that seems reasonable. I can also reduce frequency, I'm doing every 2 mins during daylight hours.
      - stirfish 15d ago
        I'm curious if you could free yourself of the ongoing llm cost by using YOLOv8 or opencv or something like that
artemis_aep 15d ago
I am deeply moved by your anti-bird crusade xD
- sahn44 15d ago
  I'm glad it's not just me.
kjs3 15d ago
Reminds me of the "Militarizing Your Backyard with Python: Computer Vision and the Squirrel Hordes" talk from 14 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPgqfnKG_T4&t=2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPgqfnKG_T4&t=2s
boringg 15d ago
How about deer?
- sahn44 15d ago
  Deer would be easy and cheaper. You could run lower resolution and cheap model and not miss a deer.
jasontucker 15d ago
[dead]

by sahn44 16d ago

lukan 16d ago

I guess you can combine it? Identify what the bird was you sprayed away ..

peddling-brink 15d ago
And measure reaction time, classify across species.
- sahn44 15d ago
  I have a few learnings. Pigeons scram instantly. 7-bird takeout: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-08-18/event-20260818T203743Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2... Ducks don't care: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-08-08/event-20260808T123552Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2... Whatever these are, they just walk away: https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2026-07-25/event-20260725T151018Z.mp4 https://pub-27e5170d67ab43d8a22019a94eac1572.r2.dev/events/2...

ddmf 15d ago

I've been wanting to do something like this to stop cats shitting on my grass for ages, will have a look at this, thanks.

world2vec 15d ago

My first ever "e2e" ML project during early covid quarantine was a crude vision model to detect pigeons on my balcony (and pigeons only) and play a loud random sound. It almost worked sometimes.

lukan 15d ago
"It almost worked sometimes." I will borrow that.
ompogUe 15d ago
Did a similar thing where I had a neighbor who raised dobermans and rottweilers - it's a bit difficult to code with 8 or 9 large dogs barking in the yard outside your window. Set up an amp and speakers that would pump out ultrasonic noise when it heard the barking, sending them running to the other side of their house.

atestu 15d ago

I've been meaning the same thing to stop deer from eating from my garden... would you do anything differently if you were to do it again?

sahn44 15d ago
I've been pleasantly surprised how well it has worked and how robust it is. It's installed at my parent's house and I am many states away so I was paranoid about making it resilient since i'm usually not there and have to fly to get there. So, i really tried to think of everything I could. I thought it might overheat the first afternoon or have other problems, but it's been running for months now uninterupted. Sometimes the OpenRouter credits run out and it stops catching birds , but it still runs normally and after I re-up the credits, it continues working normally. No need to restart even.
- boringg 15d ago
  whats the spend roughly on an ongoing basis?
  - sahn44 15d ago
    I had been using gemma-4-31B-it llm for cost/accuracy and it was super cheap, about $0.65/month. I had also downscaled the size and back tested on bird/no-bird images from my camera. But, then I noticed that it was missing birds that were at the back of the pool and I needed to use higher resolution and better models and cost went up 10x. Now, it's to high for my liking and I need to do more model testing to get it down to a few dollars a month that seems reasonable. I can also reduce frequency, I'm doing every 2 mins during daylight hours.
    - stirfish 15d ago
      I'm curious if you could free yourself of the ongoing llm cost by using YOLOv8 or opencv or something like that

artemis_aep 15d ago

I am deeply moved by your anti-bird crusade xD

sahn44 15d ago
I'm glad it's not just me.

kjs3 15d ago

Reminds me of the "Militarizing Your Backyard with Python: Computer Vision and the Squirrel Hordes" talk from 14 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPgqfnKG_T4&t=2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPgqfnKG_T4&t=2s

boringg 15d ago

How about deer?

sahn44 15d ago
Deer would be easy and cheaper. You could run lower resolution and cheap model and not miss a deer.

jasontucker 15d ago

[dead]