The interest in use of modern sensor technology in dairy cows is rising, mainly due to the larger number of animals in each herd. In addition to pedometers and collars with sensors, ear tags with sensors are appearing on the market. In our research carrying out within the international project 2-ORG-COWS we tested one of these sensors with the aim to confirm the usability of sensor technology in improving the management of dairy herds and timely respond to foreseen and unforeseen events in the herd. Data on the behaviour of dairy cows were collected for two years at 74 dairy cows of three different breeds (Brown Swiss, Holstein and Simmental) at two mountain farms in Idrijske Krnice using Agis sensors. Based on the big number of data (N=24,241 days) collected with these sensors, we found out that cows in average spent 7 hours to rest, 7.5 hours for rumination, 5.5 hours for eating, 2 hours for activity and 2 hours for high activity ('in heat' behaviour). Behaviour changes occur at different events, such as calving, estrus, or the appearance of disease or injury. Before the time of calving cows ruminate less and are more active. Cows are more active during estrus and spend less time for feeding and rumination. The usability of sensor technology for the timely detection of the disease in animals could not be confirmed, mainly due to the small number of animals that became ill during this time. With the use of the statistical model, which included the effect of the breeder, breed, lactation parity, stage of lactation and outdoor/indoor system (pasture/stable), we explained between 9.21% and 15.48% of the variability for the individual behaviours. The differences between classes of different effects were statistically significant (p<0.0001).
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