Detection of cow hind-leg activity during milking by using a 3-dimensional accelerometer attached to the milking cluster
[Display omitted] •Hind-leg activity during milking in cows is a good welfare indicator•Cow hind-leg movements are transmitted to the milking claw•3D accelerometers attached to the milking claws accurately record cow hind-leg movements Hind-leg activity in dairy cows during milking is considered an...
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| Published in: | JDS communications Vol. 2; no. 2; pp. 55 - 60 |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Elsevier Inc
01-03-2021
Elsevier |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | [Display omitted]
•Hind-leg activity during milking in cows is a good welfare indicator•Cow hind-leg movements are transmitted to the milking claw•3D accelerometers attached to the milking claws accurately record cow hind-leg movements
Hind-leg activity in dairy cows during milking is considered an indicator of a stressful situation or discomfort. Automatic detection of cow hind-leg activity during milking could be used to monitor deficiencies at the cow, milking machine, or human level. We assumed that the milking cluster follows cow hind-leg movements during milking. Therefore, the aim of our study was to estimate the ability of a 3-dimensional (3D) accelerometer attached to the claw's hook of the milking cluster to indirectly measure cow hind-leg activity during milking. The behavior of 45 dairy cows during 1 morning and 1 evening milking in a 2 × 3 auto tandem milking parlor was monitored by using direct visual observations and a 3D accelerometer attached directly to the hook of each milking claw. We recorded when hind-leg foot-lifting or stepping (undifferentiated) and kicking behaviors occurred. Detected activities were obtained after applying a standard deviation filter (over a sliding window of 1 s) on the x (left/right lateral) acceleration axis only. We set the detection threshold at 0.13 g (i.e., 1.27 m·s−2), based on the visual evaluation of 10 “reference” graphs (from 5 randomly chosen cows). Periods of activity were created for each observed or detected activity (and for consecutive activities that were less than 3 s apart) to take into account the milking cluster's rocking motion resulting from a single movement. Observed and detected periods of activity were considered matching when they occurred simultaneously (with a 2-s delay acceptance in the visual observations). In total, 472 periods of hind-leg activity were observed. The detection of hind-leg activity by using a 3D accelerometer attached to the milking cluster was found to have 69% sensitivity, 99% specificity, 75% positive predictive value, 98% negative predictive value, and an overall accuracy of 97%. On average, cows were observed being active 0.94 times per minute and being detected active 0.86 times per minute. The observed and detected periods of activity were found to be correlated (r = 0.657). Therefore, the use of a 3D accelerometer attached to the milking cluster seems promising for reliably estimating cow hind-leg activity during milking. Nevertheless, further investigations are necessary to clarify whether other factors can cause variations in milking cluster movements, regardless of cow hind-leg activity, and to generalize our method to better identify deficiencies in cow–machine–human interactions. |
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| Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
| ISSN: | 2666-9102 2666-9102 |
| DOI: | 10.3168/jdsc.2020-0020 |