Development of methods and means of livestock control in cattle breeding to manage the physiological state of the herd

Abstract

Monitoring the temperature and pH of the contents of the rumen can be useful for assessing the health status and detecting physiological heat in cows. The purpose of the research was to develop methods and means of livestock control in cattle breeding to manage the physiological state of the herd based on mathematical models for detecting the heat, upcoming calving, initial signs of diseases, monitoring the level of feeding and water intake. The work was carried out under the production conditions of farms using existing hardware and software. The measurements were carried out using a non-invasive control method using special sensors-boluses designed to monitor the health of cows. Boluses were placed orally in the rumen of the cows under research. As a result of the research, algorithms and mathematical models were compiled to identify the heat, upcoming calving, diseases, as well as monitoring the level of feeding and water intake. The source data was imported from a standard file format compatible with other applications (csv table). Correlations between the temperature and pH of the rumen, as well as the motor activity of cows were also analyzed. As illustrations, graphs of the main indicators of vital activity, as well as graphs of mutually correlative functions and an illustration of the working console of the program have been given. Table of the results of the program for each cow, average values and standard deviation have been given. A mathematical model is a set of algorithms and calculation results. In order to implement it, a program code was created in the Matlab R2019b software package. This mathematical model can be used to process and interpret data placed in the animal’s rumen of measuring elements (boluses).