The study of animal feeding behaviour is of interest to understand feeding, to investigate the effect of treatments and conditions or to predict illness. This paper reviews the different steps to undertake when studying animal feeding behaviour, with illustrations for group-housed pigs. First, one must be aware of the mechanisms that control feeding and the various influences that can change feeding behaviour. Satiety is shown to largely influence free feeding (ad libitum and without an operant condition) in animals, but 'free' feeding seems a very fragile process, given the many factors that can influence feeding behaviour. Second, a measurement method must be chosen that is compatible with the goal of the research. Several measurement methods exist, which lead to different experimental set-ups and measurement data. Sensors are available for lab conditions, for research on group-housed pigs and also for on-farm use. Most of these methods result in a record of feeding visits. However, these feeding visits are often found to be clustered into meals. Thus, the third step is to choose which unit of feeding behaviour to use for analysis. Depending on the situation, either meals, feeding visits, other raw data, or a combination thereof can be suitable. Meals are more appropriate for analysing short-term feeding behaviour, but this may not be true for disease detection. Further research is therefore needed. To cluster visits into meals, an appropriate analysis method has to be selected. The last part of this paper provides a review and discussion of the existing methods for meal determination. A variety of methods exist, with the most recent methods based on the influence of satiety on feeding. More thorough validation of the recent methods, including validation from a behavioural point of view and uniformity in the applied methods is therefore necessary.
Changes in the drinking behaviour of pigs may indicate health, welfare or productivity problems. Automated monitoring and analysis of drinking behaviour could allow problems to be detected, thus improving farm productivity. A high frequency radio frequency identification (HF RFID) system was designed to register the drinking behaviour of individual pigs. HF RFID antennas were placed around four nipple drinkers and connected to a reader via a multiplexer. A total of 55 growing-finishing pigs were fitted with radio frequency identification (RFID) ear tags, one in each ear. RFID-based drinking visits were created from the RFID registrations using a bout criterion and a minimum and maximum duration criterion. The HF RFID system was successfully validated by comparing RFID-based visits with visual observations and flow meter measurements based on visit overlap. Sensitivity was at least 92%, specificity 93%, precision 90% and accuracy 93%. RFID-based drinking duration had a high correlation with observed drinking duration ( R 2 = 0.88) and water usage ( R 2 = 0.71). The number of registrations after applying the visit criteria had an even higher correlation with the same two variables ( R 2 = 0.90 and 0.75, respectively). There was also a correlation between number of RFID visits and number of observed visits ( R 2 = 0.84). The system provides good quality information about the drinking behaviour of individual pigs. As health or other problems affect the pigs' drinking behaviour, analysis of the RFID data could allow problems to be detected and signalled to the farmer. This information can help to improve the productivity and economics of the farm as well as the health and welfare of the pigs.
Abstract. Animal facilities are increasing in size, while the availability of skilled workers is decreasing, thus, making it difficult for the farm laborers to ensure the health and well-being of all animals under their care. Passive Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems have been successfully used in animal facilities and research has identified potential applications in behavior monitoring for automated illness detection. While RFID signals range in frequency from 9 kHz to 5.8 GHz, the three most common frequencies are Low Frequency (LF, 125 kHz or 134.2 kHz), High Frequency (HF, 13.56 MHz), and Ultra-High Frequency (UHF, 865-868 MHz or 902-928 MHz). The objective of this article is to compare and evaluate the application of these three different RFID systems within large research facilities for livestock and poultry in terms of hardware characteristics, system design, and data processing and usage. Differences in tag construction, availability and cost are evident, but also basic differences in reader and antenna function, such as physics of communication, speed of detection, and anti-collision procedures exist. The systems have significant differences in reading ranges and are known to have varying influence of materials, especially water and metal, on the performance of the systems. However, the data streams, as well as methods of data processing and the creation of events (e.g., visits to a feeder), are similar for all systems. The characteristics mentioned do not necessarily identify an ideal RFID technology but reveal positive and negative aspects of each system. The three different RFID systems have been successfully applied in livestock and poultry facilities. Current research is focused on the utilization of the RFID data in prediction and decision models for illness, animal welfare, and management actions. Keywords: Behavior, Cattle, Frequency ranges, Health and welfare, Poultry, Swine, Transponder.
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