Abstract: Artificial intelligence and machine learning play a critical role in plant disease detection and management. This study proposes an approach for diagnosing and segmenting cactus diseases using Random Forest (RF) and compares its performance with SVM, ANN, KNN, CNN, and U-Net models. A dataset of 20 cactus images (10 cochineal and 10 black bacterial soft rot), resized to 720×720 pixels, was used. Experimental results show that U-Net achieved the highest accuracy, reaching 98% for cochineal and 94% for black bacterial soft rot. RF also demonstrated strong performance, achieving 92% and 91%, respectively, outperforming several traditional machine learning models. These results confirm the effectiveness of U-Net for accurate segmentation and the suitability of RF for reliable disease detection with limited datasets, supporting their application in precision agriculture.

Keywords: Image processing, Image segmentation, Machine learning, Deep learning, Cactus disease

Pages: 564-579