Publications

© 2017 The objective of this study was to evaluate the system performance of a 3D vision system for automatic locomotion monitoring implemented in a commercial dairy farm. Data were gathered during 633 milking sessions on a Belgian commercial dairy farm. After milking, the cows walked in a single-lane alley where the video recording system with a 3D depth camera was installed. The entire monitoring process including video recording, video ...

Leg deformities and lameness are a major welfare concern in the European poultry industry. This study was focused on the development of a prediction model for gait score in broilers, based on automated measures for flock distribution, bird activity levels and body mass. Data were gathered in five different farms in Europe. Broiler gait was assessed on a discrete [0–5]-scale by trained local human experts. Bird activity was continuously monitored ...

Broiler activity and occupation patterns are of special interest to farmers during visual inspection. However, this is time consuming and precision livestock farming (PLF) technologies can enable the monitoring of such key flock behavioural indicators in a continuous and automated way in the house. The aim is to show how the welfare status of the poultry flock can be evaluated by real-time monitoring of activity and occupation patterns. Four top ...

The objective of this study was to determine if a 3-dimensional computer vision automatic locomotion scoring (3D-ALS) method was able to outperform human observers for classifying cows as lame or nonlame and for detecting cows affected and nonaffected by specific type(s) of hoof lesion. Data collection was carried out in 2 experimental sessions (5 mo apart). In every session all cows were assessed for (1) locomotion by 2 observers (Obs1 and ...

Most farmers do not have the skills and time to utilize new Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) technologies effectively. It is time consuming to combine and analyse the data coming from sensors in different formats and frequencies. As part of the EU-PLF project, the authors have developed a visualisation tool to bring together and analyse the scattered data, and present them in an easy to use format to the end user. The correct use of these data ...

Monitoring the activity and floor occupation patterns of broiler chickens enables the prediction of management problems in the house using the eYeNamic® Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) technology. Such problems include blocked feeder or water lines, power failure or climate control malfunctions. The aim of this study is to illustrate how tracking deviations from normal patterns makes it possible to establish a link with the health and welfare ...

The objective of this study was to evaluate if a multi-sensor system (milk, activity, body posture) was a better classifier for lameness than the single-sensor-based detection models. Between September 2013 and August 2014, 3629 cow observations were collected on a commercial dairy farm in Belgium. Human locomotion scoring was used as reference for the model development and evaluation. Cow behaviour and performance was measured with existing ...

Litter quality has a high impact in the performance of broiler flocks in commercial farms in terms of health, welfare and profitability. Fast detection of changes in litter quality will help farmers to improve their management of the flock and react fast to arising problems. Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) technologies allow monitoring the flock in a continuous and automated way in the house. The aim of this study is to show how monitoring the ...

Lameness is still an important problem in modern dairy farming. Human observation of locomotion, by looking at different traits in one go, is used in practice to assess locomotion. The objectives of this article were to determine which individual locomotion traits are most related to locomotion scores in dairy cows, and whether experienced raters are capable of scoring these individual traits consistently. Locomotion and 5 individual locomotion ...