Automated Pig Localization

Background and Objective

The background of this project is the continuing rising trend of the number of pigs per farmer with the consequences of:

• less time for individual animal control by farmers
• continuous increasing demand of society for higher animal welfare in livestock farming

The aims of this project include:

• permanent individual animal monitoring
• online rating of animal welfare
• Optimization of pigsty systems
• increasing social acceptance for livestock farming

Target Group

• Science and Research
• Industrial Companies
• Pig Farmers

Approach

• selection an evaluation of suitable localization systems
• integration of a localization system into a model pigsty
• miniaturization of the localization technology for placing it into ear tags to develop sensor ear tags
• development of an energy supply for the sensor ear tags
• integration of the localization system into a pigsty (at first on a trial operation)
• recording the localization data and developing algorithms to rate the individual animal welfare

Our Research Questions

• Which localization system is the best for locating pigs in pigsties?
• How to integrate the sensor technology into the ear tags for pigs?
• How to ensure the power supply in the sensor?
• Which animal welfare indicators can be derived from the localization data?
• How to convey the optimization possibilities to the pig farmers?