Vocalizations carry emotional, physiological and individual information. This suggests that they may serve as potentially useful indicators for inferring animal welfare. At the same time, automated methods for analysing and classifying sound have developed rapidly, particularly in the fields of ecology, conservation and sound scene classification. These methods are already used to automatically classify animal vocalizations, for example, in identifying animal species and estimating numbers of individuals. Despite this potential, they have not yet found widespread application in animal welfare monitoring. In this review, we first discuss current trends in sound analysis for ecology, conservation and sound classification. Following this, we detail the vocalizations produced by three of the most important farm livestock species: chickens ( Gallus gallus domesticus), pigs ( Sus scrofa domesticus) and cattle ( Bos taurus). Finally, we describe how these methods can be applied to monitor animal welfare with new potential for developing automated methods for large-scale farming.

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Automated bioacoustics: methods in ecology and conservation and their potential for animal welfare monitoring

Vocalisations are commonly expressed by gregarious animals, including cattle, as a form of short- and long-distance communication. They can provide conspecifics with meaningful information about the physiology, affective state and physical attributes of the caller. In cattle, calls are individually distinct meaning they assist animals to identify specific individuals in the herd. Consequently, there is potential for these vocalisations to be acoustically analysed to make inferences about how individual animals or herds are coping with their external surroundings, and then act on these signals to improve feed conversion efficiency, reproductive efficiency and welfare. In the case of dairy farming, where herd sizes are expanding and farmers are becoming more reliant on technologies to assist in the monitoring of cattle, the study of vocal behaviour could provide an objective, cost effective and non-invasive alternative to traditional measures of welfare. The vocalisations of cattle in response to calf separation, social isolation and painful husbandry procedures, alongside changes to feeding and oestrous activity are here reviewed. For future application of sound technology, research is first necessary to analyse the acoustic structure of cattle vocalisations and determine the specific information they encode. This review draws together the latest research in field of cattle bioacoustics highlighting how the source-filter theory and affective state dimensional approach can be adopted to decode this information and improve on-farm management.

Invited review: The evolution of cattle bioacoustics and application for advanced dairy systems

Individual identification of Holstein dairy cows based on detecting and matching feature points in body images

Detection of cow mounting behavior using region geometry and optical flow characteristics.

| Early pregnancy diagnosis is essential for effective management of pregnant animals and early submission of non-pregnant animals for subsequent breeding to reduce calving to conception interval. The present study assessed the accuracy in early pregnancy diagnosis by ultrasonography and estimated the loss due to delayed identification of non-pregnant animals. Transrectal ultrasonography was used to diagnose the pregnancy in dairy animals (n=47) at 30 and 45 days post breeding. The sensitivity and specificity was found to be 92.30% and 97.05%, respectively, on day 30 and reexamination was done at day 45 for confirmation of pregnancy. Animals found positive for pregnancy by ultrasound scanning on day 30 post-breeding had significantly high concentrations of plasma progesterone (> 3ng/ml) on day 20 post-breeding. It was found that pregnancy diagnosis using ultrasonography 30 days after AI can reduce number of open days by 15 days and 30 days compared to per rectal examination, which is generally done on day 45 and day 60 post-breeding, respectively. It was found that one day increase in open period resulted in loss (rearing and milk costs) to the tune of INR 281 and INR 368 in Sahiwal and Karan Fries cows, respectively. It was calculated in Karan Fries cows that if the calving interval is reduced by 1 month due to early pregnancy diagnosis, the expected gain of life time productive days would be around 132 days, which in turn would lead to benefit of about INR 48466. It can be concluded that use of ultrasonography at an early date (at 30 days) post breeding is an effective method for accurate identification of non-pregnant animals to reduce the calving to conception interval in dairy animals. MuzaMil abdullah1, Tushar KuMar MohanTy1, aruMugaM KuMaresan1*, ashoK KuMar MohanTy2, aMbadas raKhaMaji MadKar3, rubina KuMari baiThalu1, MuKesh bhaKaT4 Early Pregnancy Diagnosis in Dairy Cattle: Economic Importance and Accuracy of Ultrasonography Editor | Kuldeep Dhama, Indian Veterinary Research Institute, Uttar Pradesh, India. Received | July 29, 2014; Revised | September 10, 2014; Accepted | September 11, 2014; Published | September 27, 2014 *Correspondence | Arumugam Kumaresan, National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal-132001, Haryana India; Email: ogkumaresan@gmail.com Citation | Abdullah M, Mohanty TK, Kumaresan A, Mohanty AK, Madkar AR, Baithalu RK, Bhakat M (2014). Early pregnancy diagnosis in dairy cattle: economic importance and accuracy of ultrasonography. Adv. Anim. Vet. Sci. 2 (8): 464-467 DOI | http://dx.doi.org/10.14737/journal.aavs/2014/2.8.464.467 ISSN (Online) | 2307-8316; ISSN (Print) | 2309-3331 Copyright © 2014 Abdullah et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. 1Livestock Research Centre, Livestock Production Management, National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal – 132001, Haryana India. 2Animal Biotechnology Centre, National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal – 132001, Haryana, India. 3Livestock Production Management, Indian Veterinary Research Institute, Izatnagar, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh 243122, India. 4Artificial Breeding Research Centre, National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal – 132001, Haryana, India.

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Early pregnancy diagnosis in dairy cattle: economic importance and accuracy of ultrasonography.

Effective and accurate discrimination of individual dairy cattle through acoustic sensing

The present investigation was carried out on 2972 lactation records of 977 Karan Fries cows maintained at NDRI, Karnal, spread over a period of 13 years from 1996 to 2008 with the objectives of (i) to assess the influence of genetic and non genetic factors on functional traits in Karan Fries cows (ii) to evaluate the economic losses due to udder and reproductive disorders (iii) to estimate the breeding value of sires using functional traits and its association with breeding value of production traits (iv) prediction of life time performance traits on the basis of production and functional traits using conventional and connectionist model. The overall incidence of indicators for functional traits varied from 0.08 to 0.29 in Karan Fries cows. Incidence of major indicator traits was 0.29, 0. 26, 0.20 and 0.25 for flakes, COD, anoestrous and ROP, respectively. Winter season calvers showed lower incidence value for COD and endometritis; and higher incidence for dystocia. The incidence of ROP showed a decreasing trend over the period. First parity showed lower incidence for all lactation and uterine disorders. Interbred group showed low incidence of COD, endometritis and uterine infection. F1 crosses produced higher TMY & 305 DMY as compared to those of other genetic groups. Heritability values were found low for lactation and reproductive disorders; and medium to high for COD and uterine infection. Average production performance of animals unaffected from lactation disorders was more or less similar to those of affected animals. There was an adverse effect of reproductive disorders on SP, CI and DP. Average milk loss was 33.02 kg per case of clinical mastitis. The estimates of cost of treatment per case of lactation disorder, repeat breeding, anoestrous and retention of placenta (ROP) were Rs 275.17, 401.96, 189.28 and 303.66, respectively. More than 50 % of sires used in the herd had breeding values below herd average of most of the functional traits which was in desirable direction. All functional traits except for still-birth and abortion showed unfavorable correlation with first lactation production traits and positive correlation with first reproductive efficiency traits. Multiple linear regression equations based on first lactation traits could explain the variation to the extent of 2.8 – 3.2 % in herd life, 7.5-8.5 % in number of lactations completed, 5.5 % in productive life, 7.70 -8.15 % in total yield per year of productive life, 15.50 -15.92 % in total yield per year of herd life and 16.30 – 16.46 % in total yield per lactation. Connectionist network showed lower values of RMSE for Feed Forward Levenberg Marquardt function as compared to Regression and Bayesian regularization function.

Genetic evaluation of karan fries cows for functional traits.

The present study revealed that overall incidence of retention of foetal membrane, metritis and endometritis in Karan Fries cows was 18.67, 28.90 and 0.77% respectively for first calvers and 27.34, 38.93 and 1.62 respectively for all calvers. The effect of genetic group was found to be nonsignificant for all the post partum utero-vaginal complications in first calvers while it was significant for metritis in all calvers. The effect of season of calving on all post partum utero-vaginal complications was found to be non-significant in both all calvers and first calvers. Period of calving had significant effect for retention of foetal membrane for both first calver and all calvers. The cows suffered with retention of foetal membrane and endometritis had significant effect on 305 day milk yield and total milk yield while metritis had significant effect on lactation length.

Influence of genetic and non-genetic factors on incidence of post partum utero-vaginal complications in karan fries cows

Biotin, a water soluble vitamin of B complex group, is naturally present in the diet of dairy animals. Though it is synthesized in the rumen of all ruminants but its bioavailability depends upon the type of ration formulated and presented to the dairy animals. Generally, a high proteinacious diet contains more biotin. High forage and low concentrate diet in general favours high biotin synthesis in rumen. Biotin is specially required for production of keratin and the epidermal tissues of hoof-horn as well as it may also have other metabolic effects that could influence milk production. Biotin is a cofactor of three different enzymes needed for synthesis of glucose and one required for synthesis of fatty acids. Thus, biotin supplementation may be helpful in the improvement of hoof health as well as in increasing milk production of dairy animals.

Role of Biotin in Hoof Health and Milk Production of Dairy Cows

In the present investigation, the effect of genetic and non-genetic groups on the incidence of calving abnormalities has been studied. The present study revealed that overall incidence of abortion, still birth and dystocia in Karan Fries cows was 3.31, 4.60 and 3.84%, respectively for first calvers and 7.67, 4.51 and 3.32%, respectively for all calvers. The effect of genetic group was found to be non-significant for all the calving abnormalities in both all calvers and in first calvers. The effect of season of calving on all calving abnormalities was found to be non-significant in both all calvers and first calvers. The cows with abortion had non-significant effect on calving interval, service period and dry period while significant effect was found on 305-days milk yield, total milk yield and lactation length. The effect of still birth on production and reproduction traits was non-significant except lactation length. The effect of dystocia was found to be non-significant for all the production and reproduction traits except on 305 day milk yield.

P.C. Sharma

Papers

Effective and accurate discrimination of individual dairy cattle through acoustic sensing

Genetic evaluation of karan fries cows for functional traits.

Influence of genetic and non-genetic factors on incidence of post partum utero-vaginal complications in karan fries cows

Role of Biotin in Hoof Health and Milk Production of Dairy Cows

Influence of genetic and non-genetic factors on incidence of calving abnormalities in Karan Fries cows.