Is precision livestock farming an engineer's daydream or nightmare, an animal's friend or foe, and a farmer's panacea or pitfall?

A validation of technologies monitoring dairy cow feeding, ruminating, and lying behaviors

“…These technologies provide benefit to producers and researchers by frequently monitoring dairy cattle without disturbing natural behavioral expression (Müller and Schrader, 2003). Dairy producers purchase precision dairymonitoring technologies to improve individual animal, pen, and whole-farm management, increasing overall farm production efficiency (Wathes et al, 2008). However, for precision dairy-monitoring technologies to increase labor and production efficiency, they must easily and accurately quantify meaningful physiological or behavioral parameters (Senger, 1994).…”

Measuring the drinking behaviour of individual pigs housed in group using radio frequency identification (RFID)

“…Recent evolutions in sensor technology have created ways to automate this monitoring, thus providing more objective and repeatable data (Meiszberg et al, 2009). Sensor-based monitoring can be done continuously, in real time and without disturbing the pigs (Wathes et al, 2008). This automated monitoring can support the farmer to make interventions faster and more accurate, leading to reduced economic losses, more responsible use of antibiotics and increased health and welfare of the pigs.…”

The utility of sensor technology to support reproductive management on dairy farms

“…Sensors can help farmers to manage their herd more precisely with regard to production, cow health, and environment , Wathes, et al, 2005. This precision is possible because sensors and robots are capable of routinely monitoring behavioral and physiological parameters of dairy cows 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, whereas a farmer or employee could never observe these parameters in such detail.…”

“…PLF is claimed to provide unprecedented accuracy of information for managing livestock (Wathes, et al, 2005). Although this potential is widely accepted, the added value is not emerging in practice, and PLF is therefore not currently living up to expectations (Lehr, 2011).…”

“…This thesis aimed to evaluate the utility of sensor technology to support reproductive management on dairy farms. The potential of sensor technology to enable more precise management of dairy farms could improve farm profitability, animal health and welfare, environmental impact, and risk management, and reduce (manual) labor requirements (Berckmans, 2008, Lehr, 2011, Wathes, et al, 2005. Although the potential is widely acknowledged, only a few applications have been commercialized successfully (Banhazi, et al, 2012).…”