Determination of ewe behaviour around lambing time and prediction of parturition 7 days prior to lambing by tri-axial accelerometer sensors in an extensive farming system

Abstract

Context. Lamb loss and dyctocia are two major challenges in extensive farming systems. While visual observation can be impractical due to the large sizes of paddocks, number of animals and high labour cost, wearable sensors can be used to monitor the behaviour of ewes as there might be changes in their activities prior to lambing. This provides sufficient time for the farm manager to nurse those ewes that are at risk of dyctocia. Aim. The objective of this study was to determine whether the behaviour of a pregnant ewe could predict the time of parturition. Methods. Two separate trials were conducted: the first trial (T1), with 32 ewes, included human/video observations, and the second trial (T2), with 165 ewes, conducted with no humans present, to emulate real extensive farming settings. The ewes were fitted with tri-axial accelerometer sensors by means of halters. Three-dimensional movement data were collected for a period of at least 7 and 14 days in T1 and T2 respectively. The sensor units were retrieved, and their data downloaded using ActiGraph software. Ewe behaviour was determined through support vector machine learning (SVM) algorithm, including licking, grazing, rumination, walking, and idling. The behaviours of ewes predicted by analysis of sensor data were compared with behaviours determined using visual observation (video recordings), with time synchronisation to validate the results. Deep learning and neural-network algorithms were used to predict lambing time. Key results. The concordance percentages between visual observation and sensor data were 90 ± 11, 81 ± 15, 95 ± 10, 96 ± 6, and 93 ± 8% ± s.d. for grazing, licking, rumination, idling, and walking respectively. The deep-learning model predicted the time of lambing with 90% confidence via a quantile regression method, which can be interpereted as 90% prediction intervals, and shows that the time of lambing can be predicted with reasonable confidence approximately 240 h before the actual lambing events. Conclusion. It was possible to predict the time of parturition up to 10 days before lambing. Implications. The behaviour of ewes around lambing time has a direct effect on the survival of the lambs and therefore plays an important part in animal management. This knowledge could improve the productivity of sheep and considerably decrease lamb mortality rates.

Quantification of behavioural variation among sheep grazing on pasture using accelerometer sensors

“…Classifier algorithms developed at the Centre for Technology Infusion (CTI), La Trobe University, using Support Vector Machine (SVM) procedures, were used to process the motion sensor data (Sohi et al 2021).…”

“…For our data, SVM was a good classifier as data were not linearly separable. The SVM models to classify accelerometer data streams into animal behaviour data were developed using human-verified (labelled data) that was collected from previous commercial farm studies (Sohi et al 2021). The placement and orientation of sensors attached to the sheep were the same as the validation study Sohi et al (2021).…”

“…The SVM models to classify accelerometer data streams into animal behaviour data were developed using human-verified (labelled data) that was collected from previous commercial farm studies (Sohi et al 2021). The placement and orientation of sensors attached to the sheep were the same as the validation study Sohi et al (2021). In order to improve the accuracy of classification a number of features from the data were evaluated to determine which were the most useful in discriminating between the models.…”

Exploring the Potential of Machine Learning Algorithms Associated with the Use of Inertial Sensors for Goat Kidding Detection

“…The learning model’s effectiveness was limited by the size of the dataset, as seen in prior works with larger datasets gathered in sheep [ 20 , 21 , 22 , 25 , 72 ]. Comparing results before and after the data unbalancing process confirmed a trade-off between accuracy and recall, a common outcome in such procedures, as indicated by the initial and final confusion matrix values illustrated in Figure 8 and Figure 13 .…”

Rumination Detection in Sheep: A Systematic Review of Sensor-Based Approaches

“…Sensors have been applied in a variety of contexts to categorize and quantify sheep behavior for different purposes. For example, sensors can be used to monitor change in ewe behavior during parturition events (licking, grazing, rumination, walking, standing, and idling) [3][4][5]. Numerous studies have demonstrated the factors that impact the accuracy, precision, recall (also known as sensitivity), F-score, and specificity of behavior classification when using sensors.…”