a robot that wanders the farm sucking up cow dook. i would build it as a domelike critter, so that if the cows stepped on it their hooves would slide off of its back. it would probably get called a "dung beetle" by folks around a farm...you could probably use a variant of this thing to gather pecans, dog poo, leaves...
-- bobenhotep, Jul 02 2004

(?) cow pats and bush flies http://www.kidsmedi...pesky_bushflies.htm
[cromagnon, Oct 21 2004]

Build your own Dung Beetle Robot: http://www.robotstorehk.com/base.html
see the bottom of that page [Amos Kito, Oct 21 2004]

I always thought they were called cowpats. Desperate Dan is the guy to talk to about cow pie...
-- david_scothern, Jul 02 2004


I like it when high technology meets dung.
-- django, Jul 02 2004


too many robots. lets have a robot gathering cow pat.
-- etherman, Jul 02 2004


Can it filter, clean, dry, and store the hallucinogenic mushrooms?... damn, this would be hot with the kids!
-- daseva, Jul 02 2004


I had a similar thought about cleaning up after dogs in the back yard. Idea Googled, found and abandoned.
-- half, Jul 02 2004


I am assuming that this would be powered by some sort of methane powered steam turbine and if it ran out of power it would wait for the methane to build up to critical levels producing a long lasting power source. This is very good. I like it!
-- PainOCommonSense, Jul 02 2004


I assume this means it continues to fuel itself using the very products of its labor--elegant. I like it and am voting + unless [half] comes up with a link.
-- Etymon, Jul 02 2004


What I found was someone that was building one or thinking of building one. That's sufficient for me not to post an idea here, but probably wouldn't qualify as widely known to exist.
-- half, Jul 02 2004


There is certainly a market for your dung gathering automaton, in Australia at least. Cleaning up cowpats would make a huge difference to the bush fly population.[link]
-- cromagnon, Jul 02 2004


Anything that puts those high-falutin' robots back in their place, I'm for.
-- shapu, Jul 02 2004


The robot should wear a cowboy hat.
-- spiritualized, Jul 02 2004


I saw an automatic cow pie gatherer at an experimental farm. They may be common as I'm a city dude. A long two by four that rakes the pen very slowly by a chain drive attached at each end. The lumber gathers the poop to a trough at either end and a screw conveys it to a can or digester or whatever. The drives have a limit switch on each end that reverse the direction. And it travels so slow that the cows don't seem to mind it at all, when it bumps into their hoof the just step over it. Very clever I thought.
-- Spare parts, Jul 03 2004


which the cows or the robot
-- q2cannonfodder, Jul 03 2004


It's a shitty job but...
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Jul 03 2004



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