Precision Livestock Farming '05 presents the latest scientific results from worldwide research, field studies and practical application.

Features:

• Contains peer-reviewed papers that were presented at the 2nd European Conference on Precision Livestock Farming
• Details animal welfare; food quality (including traceability of origin) and environmental pollution (including treatment of animal waste)

Contents

• Field effect transistors in precision agriculture
• A review of spectroscopic methods and their suitability as analytical techniques for farm testing
• Is precision livestock farming an engineer�s daydream or nightmare, an animal�s friend or foe, and a farmer�s panacea or pitfall
• Evironmental effects of precision livestock farming
• Reduced nitrate leaching from livestock in a large lake catchment in New Zealand
• Environmental effects of pig house ventilation controlled by animal activity and CO2 indoor concentration
• Impact of protein feeding on odour emissions
• Flushing litterless fattening houses with biologically treated slurry (SBR plant) - effects of flushing rate, percentage of treated slurry and seasons on gaseous emissions (methane, ammonia, nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide and odour)
• Effect of low crude protein level in different phase feeding strategies on ammonia emission rates of finishing pig facilities
• Precise manure handling
• Origins of blockages during the spreading of liquid manure
• Study of organic substrate production by composting swine manure with wood shavings
• Rapid analysis of liquid hog manure using near-infrared spectroscopy in flowing condition
• Development and evaluation of a precision solid and semi-solid manure land applicator
• Potential for on-site and on-line analysis of hog manure using visual and near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy
• Analysis of milk quality
• Milk analyses: a comparison between a simple IR-instrument for use on farm level and available IR-methods
• Evaluation of ions sodium and potassium in milk as criteria of changes in the blood-milk barrier: a lactation study
• On-farm-analysis of milk: a promising challenge
• Automatic milking
• Adaptability of teat cups to different udder forms in automatic milking systems and conventional milking systems
• Usability of web-based cameras to observe cows in an automatic milking system
• Influence of social rank on animal behaviour of cows milked by an automatic milking system: implementation of automated procedures to estimate the rank and the length of stay in the feeding area
• Monitoring cow health in a milking robot
• Survey of the sustainability aspects of Automatic Milking Systems (AMS) in organic dairy production
• Working time studies in conventional and automatic milking systems with one or two AMS units
• Feeding technology and feed quality
• The feed level controlled mash feeder vs. conventional tube mash feeder: Performance and eating behaviour of young weaned piglets
• Precision protein and energy feeding of dairy cows during transition time
• Computer-controlled milk feeding of calves; the effect of precise milk allocation
• Protein reduced, sensor-controlled feeding of fattening pigs
• Economic response of site-specific management practices on alfalfa production quantity and quality
• Image analysis to assess livestock composition
• Automatic determination of body condition score of cows based on 2D images
• Monitoring live pig weight with a mobile imaging system
• Improving the accuracy of automatic broiler weighing by image analysis
• Emerging technology for assessing the composition of livestock
• Precise management and modelling in livestock systems
• A system analytic approach to model animal responses as a basis for precision livestock farming
• Representation of fat and protein gain at low levels of growth and improved prediction of
• variable maintenance requirement in a ruminant growth and composition model
• The future role of robotics systems in Precision Livestock Farming
• Lying behaviour of dairy cows under different housing systems and physiological conditions
• Information management within Australian precision dairy systems
• Control charts applied to individual sow farm analysis
• Precision livestock farming in developing countries: creating order where uncertainty prevails
• Identification of animals
• Electronic identification (RFID technology) for improvement of traceability of pigs and meat
• Automatic identification and determination of the location of dairy cows

Index

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