The non-invasive and automated detection of bovine respiratory disease onset in receiver calves using infrared thermography

Abstract

Bovine respiratory disease complex (BRD) causes considerable economic loss and biosecurity cost to the beef industry globally and also results in significant degradation to the welfare of affected animals. The successful treatment of this disease depends on the early, timely and cost effective identification of affected animals. The objective of the present study was to investigate the use of an automated, RFID driven, noninvasive infrared thermography technology to determine BRD in cattle. Sixty-five calves averaging 220 kg were exposed to standard industry practices of transport and auction. The animals were monitored for BRD using conventional biometric signs for clinical scores, core temperatures, haematology, serum cortisol and infrared thermal values over 3 weeks. The data collected demonstrated that true positive animals for BRD based on a gold standard including core temperature, clinical score, white blood cell number and neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio displayed higher peak infrared thermal values of 35.7±0.35 °C compared to true negative animals 34.9±0.22 °C (P<0.01). The study also demonstrated that such biometric data can be non-invasively and automatically collected based on a system developed around the animal's water station. It is concluded that the deployment of such systems in the cattle industry would aid animal managers and practitioners in the identification and management of BRD in cattle populations.

First investigations to refine video-based IR thermography as a non-invasive tool to monitor the body temperature of calves

“…This difference could be due to different devices and study designs. However, similar to the findings of our study, Schaefer et al (2012) also advocated a firmly installed IR system.Regarding the method, studies on rabbits concluded that rectal measurements cannot be replaced in animals without clinical findings (Chen and White, 2006). This was confirmed by our study.…”

Use of infrared thermography to evaluate the influence of the of Climatic Factors in the Reproduction and Lactation of Dairy Cattle

“…No presente estudo, devido à maior temperatura ambiente, a temperatura média do tórax foi superior à mé-dia descrita por autores em clima mais frio [15,21]. Com relação às temperaturas médias do abdômen, os resultados foram similares à média de 28,2 ± 0,5°C para o flanco direito em temperatura ambiente entre 9 e 28°C [17].…”

A Review of Methods to Measure Animal Body Temperature in Precision Farming

“…It is the key to obtain comparable and repeatable data within a period of time. Researchers (Hoffmann et al, 2012;Schaefer et al, 2012) have adapted automatic devices for temperature recording using a software comparing pictures in order to obtain reliable data.…”

“…Consequently, body temperature is a criterion of great interest and needs to be monitored as closely as possible, in an attempt to increase early detection and treatment of a number of economically important illnesses, such as cattle foot and mouth disease (Rainwater-Lovett et al, 2009), bovine respiratory disease (Schaefer et al, 2012), horse lameness (Eddy et al, 2001), classical swine fever virus (Lohse et al, 2010) or poultry bumblefoot (Wilcox et al, 2009).…”