Review: Sensor techniques in ruminants: more than fitness trackers

Knight, Christopher H.

doi:10.1017/s1751731119003276

Cited by 45 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…Further on-farm government or industry funded research, collaborating with small to large producers would help alleviate cost burden to the producer and incentivise uptake [ 35 , 62 , 74 ]. Potential ownership models of PLF technologies using a ‘service provider’ model whereby the service provider owns, installs, updates and runs the multi-sensors for producers for a fixed annual fee could be considered [ 78 ], particularly if future PLF use requires that sensors and data are expected to be utilised beyond the farm gate and along the value chain. Producers will require assurance of training or access to the skills to maintain and repair systems to avoid business interruption [ 41 ]; a critical requirement for those in remote locations.…”

Section: Challenges To Adopting On-animal Sensor Technologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Legal Complexities of Animal Welfare in Australia: Do On-Animal Sensors Offer a Future Option?

Manning

Power

Cosby

2021

Animals

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The five freedoms and, more recently, the five domains of animal welfare provide internationally recognised frameworks to evaluate animal welfare practices which recognise both the physical and mental wellbeing needs of animals, providing a balanced view of their ability to cope in their environment. Whilst there are many techniques to measure animal welfare, the challenge lies with how best to align these with future changes in definitions and expectations, advances in science, legislative requirements, and technology improvements. Furthermore, enforcement of current animal welfare legislation in relation to livestock in Australia and the reliance on self-audits for accreditation schemes, challenges our ability to objectively measure animal welfare. On-animal sensors have enormous potential to address animal welfare concerns and assist with legislative compliance, through continuous measurement and monitoring of an animal’s behavioural state and location being reflective of their wellbeing. As reliable animal welfare measures evolve and the cost of on-animal sensors reduce, technology adoption will increase as the benefits across the supply chain are realised. Future adoption of on-animal sensors by producers will primarily depend on a value proposition for their business being clear; algorithm development to ensure measures are valid and reliable; increases in producer knowledge, willingness, and trust in data governance; and improvements in data transmission and connectivity.

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Section: Challenges To Adopting On-animal Sensor Technologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Legal Complexities of Animal Welfare in Australia: Do On-Animal Sensors Offer a Future Option?

Manning

Power

Cosby

2021

Animals

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“…This envisaged a service provider placing appropriate technology onto farms and collecting data that informed the farmer of cows needing special attention and simultaneously used that data to inform businesses servicing the farmer as well as downstream stakeholders in the dairy foods chain, right through to consumers and policymakers. It is described in detail elsewhere (Knight, 2020). How far have we come towards that Vision?…”

Section: The Visionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Historical development of sensors for dairy animals I can be very brief in this section, because the topic has been reviewed before. For a general appreciation of the subject, see Knight (2020) and for a detailed account of technologies that were available at the time of the DairyCare COST Action, see Caja et al (2016). The following discussion is not in any way exhaustive.…”

Section: The Visionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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DairyCare ‘blueprint for action’: husbandry for wellbeing

Knight¹

2020

Journal of Dairy Research

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‘Keep calm and carry on’ was a wartime message to the British public that has achieved renewed fame in the last few years. The strategy was simple: in times of extreme difficulty a cool head combined with stoicism is an appropriate response to ensure a successful outcome. The latest major challenge to society (COVID-19) met with a very different response, and only history will reveal whether ‘Stay home and worry’ will be equally effective. In devising blueprints or strategies it is extremely important to have a clear idea of what you are trying to achieve, whether it be maintaining world freedom or stopping a pandemic. In the case of livestock agriculture, it is helping to feed a rapidly growing global population in harmony with the needs of current and future generations. I hope that I have stated this clearly, and calmly. If so, I ask you to picture a scene. We are on a Calm Farm. Dairy animals go about their daily lives contented, unhurried and focused on the simple feeding and socialising activities that are so important to them. Unstressed, their productive capacities and abilities to avoid and, when necessary, cope with physiological and pathological challenges are maximised. They are not alone: the exact same characteristics also apply to the farmer and husbandry staff that we meet. How is this calm farming approach relevant to the aspirations we had when we established the EU COST Action DairyCare? Our objective was to harness the power of computing technologies to assist our management of dairy livestock. A simple rearrangement leads us to Computing Assisted Livestock Management, CALM. In this short Research Reflection I shall assess how far we have come towards the achievement of sensible goals related to technological assessment of dairy animal wellbeing, and speculate on what more things both can and need to be done to finish the job. It is a personal account. DairyCare was a major collaboration involving several hundred active researchers. To involve them all would be impossible, and I do not pretend to speak for them all. As will become evident, the wide skills base that was assembled was so successful in its primary objectives that different skills, chiefly in economics, are now needed to exploit all of the technological advance that has been achieved. DairyCare succeeded in a second direction. Whilst the focus was technology development, by assembling a large cohort of biologists with animal welfare interests, it soon became apparent that technology should run alongside and help to enable improved management practices. This Special Issue is, therefore, in two sections. The first is dedicated to technology development and the second to a novel management practice that has the potential to significantly improve the wellbeing of cows and calves: cow-calf contact rearing. That section is introduced by my DairyCare colleague, Sigrid Agenäs.

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“…These devices provide specific information to assist decision-making for farm management. In another contribution presented at the 2019 International Symposium on Ruminant Physiology (Leipzig, Germany), the application of biosensors other than rumen sensors is discussed (Knight, 2020); the present review focuses on rumen sensors, which may measure pH, temperature, motility, pressure, redox potential, ammonia and ammonium, dissolved oxygen, conductivity, and several mineral ions. It is expected that rumen sensors will be developed further to measure rumen volatile fatty acids (VFA) and gases including methane.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review: Rumen sensors: data and interpretation for key rumen metabolic processes

Dijkstra

Gastelen

Dieho

et al. 2020

Animal

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Rumen sensors provide specific information to help understand rumen functioning in relation to health disorders and to assist in decision-making for farm management. This review focuses on the use of rumen sensors to measure ruminal pH and discusses variation in pH in both time and location, pH-associated disorders and data analysis methods to summarize and interpret rumen pH data. Discussion on the use of rumen sensors to measure redox potential as an indication of the fermentation processes is also included. Acids may accumulate and reduce ruminal pH if acid removal from the rumen and rumen buffering cannot keep pace with their production. The complexity of the factors involved, combined with the interactions between the rumen and the host that ultimately determine ruminal pH, results in large variation among animals in their pH response to dietary or other changes. Although ruminal pH and pH dynamics only partially explain the typical symptoms of acidosis, it remains a main indicator and may assist to optimize rumen function. Rumen pH sensors allow continuous monitoring of pH and of diurnal variation in pH in individual animals. Substantial drift of non-retrievable rumen pH sensors, and the difficulty to calibrate these sensors, limits their application. Significant within-day variation in ruminal pH is frequently observed, and large distinct differences in pH between locations in the rumen occur. The magnitude of pH differences between locations appears to be diet dependent. Universal application of fixed conversion factors to correct for absolute pH differences between locations should be avoided. Rumen sensors provide high-resolution kinetics of pH and a vast amount of data. Commonly reported pH characteristics include mean and minimum pH, but these do not properly reflect severity of pH depression. The area under the pH × time curve integrates both duration and extent of pH depression. The use of this characteristic, as well as summarizing parameters obtained from fitting equations to cumulative pH data, is recommended to identify pH variation in relation to acidosis. Some rumen sensors can also measure the redox potential. This measurement helps to understand rumen functioning, as the redox potential of rumen fluid directly reflects the microbial intracellular redox balance status and impacts fermentative activity of rumen microorganisms. Taken together, proper assessment and interpretation of data generated by rumen sensors requires consideration of their limitations under various conditions.

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Review: Sensor techniques in ruminants: more than fitness trackers

Cited by 45 publications

References 41 publications

Legal Complexities of Animal Welfare in Australia: Do On-Animal Sensors Offer a Future Option?

Legal Complexities of Animal Welfare in Australia: Do On-Animal Sensors Offer a Future Option?

DairyCare ‘blueprint for action’: husbandry for wellbeing

Review: Rumen sensors: data and interpretation for key rumen metabolic processes

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