Detection of Floricane Raspberry Shrubs from Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Imagery Using YOLO Models

The present study investigated the detection performance of the YOLOv8s, YOLO11s, and YOLO12s models, implemented within convolutional neural network architectures, for identifying floricane raspberry (Rubus idaeus L.) shrubs using RGB imagery and multispectral data acquired in the near-infrared, red-edge, red, and green spectral bands with a DJI Mavic 3 Multispectral drone. Model training and validation were conducted to evaluate both within-modality detection performance and cross-modality transferability. Under all training scenarios, the YOLO-based detectors reached near-saturated accuracy levels. However, cross-domain assessments demonstrated substantial variability depending on the spectral configuration of the input imagery. Overall, the combination of UAV-based multispectral sensing with convolutional neural network detection frameworks establishes a technological basis for automated shrub monitoring and constitutes a meaningful advancement toward intelligent raspberry production systems. This integration further creates new prospects for the technological development of cultivation practices for this crop within the rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence-driven agriculture.