Stacey Hendriks

Citation

Thesis Title
Behavior changes in grazing dairy cows during the transition period are associated with risk of disease

Read article at Massey Research Online:

Producers and consumers of milk products have a shared interest in achieving a high standard of cow health and welfare. Dairy cows are at risk of health and welfare compromises due to disease surrounding the time of calving, which can be difficult to detect in practice. Stacey Hendriks investigated whether wearable devices that record cow behaviour could differentiate between cows that were sick or at risk of becoming sick and those that remained healthy. This had not yet been explored for grazing dairy cows, common in New Zealand. She found that there were behavioural differences between cows that developed a health complication, but were not displaying obvious signs of disease, and cows that remained healthy. Her results indicate that the automated detection of behaviour changes could assist farmers to identify sick cows and improve their health outcome.

Supervisors
Professor Danny Donaghy
Dr John Roche
Dr Claire Phyn
Dr Susan Turner
Dr Julie Huzzey
Associate Professor Kristina Mueller