Relation of broilers’ activity and occupation pattern deviations to their welfare and health

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 status of the flock. For this study, the Fancom eYeNamic® system, comprising four top-view cameras, was installed in a commercial broiler farm in The Netherlands. This system visualized the floor area and continuously recorded time-lapsed images during the light periods of the cycle via activity and occupation indices captured each minute. An algorithm was developed to forecast the evolution of these indices. This tracking provides the capacity to raise alerts when deviations from the predicted levels are higher than 20%. These deviations are expressed as the percentage of time the birds spent in an alert situation along the growing cycle. This percentage shows a statistical relevant correlation (p<0.05) with the welfare quality assessment scores.

Jaar van publicatie:2016

Toegankelijkheid:Closed