Non-contact methods of cattle conformation assessment using mobile measuring systems

Abstract

Examination of body conformation traits and measuring of cattle exterior parameters play a significant role in improvement of animal’s breeding abilities and enhancement of selection efficiency. Non-contact remote measuring through the use of digital technologies means considerable progress towards mitigation of animal’s critical reaction to stress and substantial time reduction in contrast to manual measurements in contact with animals. This article presents a new approach to exterior assessment and provides an analysis of non-contact methods of measuring basic parameters of animals’ body conformation. The values of conformation parameters have been obtained by photo image processing of animals and with depth sensor. Basic body measurements (height at withers, height at rump, chest depth, chest width, rump width, rump length, body length, metacarpus girth) were taken in the production environment. They were determined with the accuracy up to 1 mm and an error about 2 %. Experimental findings show that these techniques may be considered as an innovative method of non-contact measuring of cattle conformation traits.