The goals of the project are: (i) to develop animal-mounted sensor systems that capture beef cattle feeding behaviour patterns and integrate this information with a feeding systems that accurately estimates feed intake at the individual animal level and (ii) to develop techniques for monitoring, in a commercial environment, the performance efficiency of individual animals. The aim is to integrate both input (feed) and output (growth/yield) measurements at the individual animal level, allowing beef farmers to make appropriate management decisions to improve the overall efficiency of beef production. The decision support platform will inform the livestock producer of the correct and balanced amounts of nutrients to be administered to individual beef animals in order to maximise production and profitability.

There are considerable animal health challenges in modern dairy farming, all with a profound impact on production output and efficiency. The early detection of metabolic diseases such ketosis, acidosis and lameness and intervention at the pre-clinical stage provides valuable information upon which the farmer can decide on the most appropriate interventions. Thus the project will integrate a number of new dairy livestock sensing systems in real-time, including animal-mounted and product in-line monitoring, to provide a robust decision support system for metabolic disease detection at pre-clinical stages. The solution will be capable of integration within existing technologies on commercial farms to enhance the value of the farmer's investment, and the information presented to the livestock-keepers will be in an easily accessible and digestible fashion delivered over multiple channels viz. smartphones, tablets or PCs.

The consortium will develop a health and condition monitoring platform, a foundation to creating decision support applications in order to catalyse improvements in production efficiency and a concomitant reduction in waste and losses in the ruminant protein supply chain. The solution will encompass reliable and continuous monitoring and sensing of specifically defined, important variables and signals in beef and dairy cattle in commercial agricultural settings including challenging physical environments. As well as providing valuable management and labour saving tools, these solutions offer distinct efficiency advantages for commercial producers.

Awaiting Public Summary