Advances in computer vision are enhancing dairy cattle welfare monitoring by enabling precise detection of posture transitions, such as lying-to-standing movements. A recent study conducted in a Swedish freestall barn housing 183 cows tested a multiview computer vision system to analyze these transitions using 3D pose estimation.
The system demonstrated high accuracy, with 88.2% sensitivity and 99.5% precision in detecting posture transitions. The automated timestamps closely aligned with human observers, showing no significant bias and achieving intraclass correlation values comparable to observer agreement. These results suggest the technology is a reliable tool for monitoring posture-related behaviors, which are crucial indicators of cattle comfort and welfare.
To read the full research article, visit Journal of Dairy Science.
