1. Precision Dairy Farming (PDF)
Mike Coffey, Jeffrey Bewley

2. Future Dairy Operations
Last 20 years has increasingly emphasised animal health, welfare, food quality, choice, differentiation, consumer values
Next 30 will have increased food demand as an additional pressure as well as
Larger dairy operations will remain in business
Narrower profit margins
Increased feed, energy and labor costs
Cows managed by fewer more technically skilled workers
Greater degree of automation 2

3. Farm Information Unlimited on-farm data storage
Web based backup options
Faster computers allow more sophisticated on-farm and real time data processing
Integrated data management and decision support systems
Technologies adopted in larger industries (defence, consumer electronics) reduce costs for applications in smaller industries (agriculture) 3

4. PDF: Definition Automatic out of parlour feeders Pedometers
Current farms can be ‘precise’
Is a continuous scale
Existing examples may include
Automatic out of parlour feeders
Pedometers
In-line electrical conductivity 4

5. PDF: Key Elements
Using technologies to measure physiological, behavioral, and production indicators
Supplement the observational activities of skilled herdspersons
Focus on health and performance at the cow level
Optimise economic, social, and environmental farm performance 5

6. PDF: Key Elements Make more timely and informed decisions
Minimise medication (antibiotics) through preventive health
Pro-active animal health strategy
Precision Dairy Farming is inherently an interdisciplinary field incorporating concepts of informatics, biostatistics, ethology, economics, animal breeding, animal husbandry, animal nutrition and process engineering 6

7. PDF Examples Precision (individual) feeding
Regular milk recording (yield and components)
Pedometers (activity meters)
Pressure plates
Milk conductivity indicators
Automatic estrus detection
Body weight
Temperature

8. Recent or Future Technologies
Lying behavior
Ruminal pH
Heart rate
Global positioning systems
Feeding behavior
Blood analyses
Respiration rates
Rumination time
Locomotion scoring using image analysis

9. Automatic Condition Score

10. Condition Score (Thin Cow)

11. Body Condition Scoring
100% of predicted BCS were within 0.50 points of actual BCS.
93% were within 0.25 points of actual BCS. 11

12. Body Condition Scoring
BCS
2.50
Predicted BCS
2.63
Posterior Hook Angle
150.0°
Hook Angle
116.6°
BCS
3.50
Predicted BCS
3.32
Posterior Hook Angle
172.1°
Hook Angle
153.5° 12

13. IceTag Activity Monitor
On-farm evaluation of lying time:
Identification of cows requiring attention (lameness, illness, estrus) through changes in patterns
Assessment of facility functionality/cow comfort
Potential metric to assess animal well-being 13

14. Future for “fitness” trait recording
Feeding behaviour
Short-term feeding behaviour changes with the onset of disorders
Early disease detection system
Foul of foot, González et al., JDS, 2008

15. Milk spectra data Milk fatty acid and lactoferrin content
Variation within & across breeds
Soyeurt et al.
JDS, 2006
This information could also be used to predict “fitness” (EU funded RobustMilk project)

16. Possible PDF Technologies
Health/oestrus (activity monitors)
Pregnancy (progesterone)
Image analysis for anatomical measurements
Milk fatty acid composition (spectra)
Stress levels (cortisol)
Environment gas levels (i.e. CO2, NH3)
Air born pathogen levels
Pollutants
Zoonoses 16

17. Genomics
Precision Dairy Farming/genomic selection synergies may lead to improvement in health traits
But, need enough high quality phenotypic data to calculate the SNP effects
Maybe contract certain farms to record data
May have to pay for data 17

18. PDF Reality Check
Maybe not be #1 priority for commercial dairy producers (yet)
Many technologies are in infancy stage
Promoted by technophiles
Not all technologies are good investments
Economics must be examined
Sociological factors must be considered 18

19. Conclusions
Exciting technologies now available and more in development
Technologies may have considerable impact on genetic evaluations
Harvesting data
Payments to record collectors
Adoption rates affected by sociological factors and technology development strategies
Will lead to bigger dairy herds but successful implementation relies on software to integrate all available information running on fault free hardware in a hostile environment 19