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The aim of this study was to examine the time budgets of 20 lactating primiparous Italian Holstein cows and to determine the relationships between lying and standing behaviour, milk production and Body Condition Score in the first stage of lactation. Parturition period ranged from 15 September to 31 March and in the first seven lactation days all cows were equipped with individual 3-axes acceleration and angular displacement loggers, throughout 150 days for lying and standing behaviour measuring. Body Condition Scores (BCS) were estimated weekly, while milk production (in both morning and evening milking) and humidity and temperature air data were collected daily. Average individual milk yield was 27.3 ± 6.24 kg/d and milking time was 4.95 ± 1.94 min. Individual BCS was on average 3.46 ± 0.30 and standing daily time was 13.5 ± 2.26 h/d. Primiparous cows with BCS at parturition

Animal welfare is a fundamental pillar for livestock farming, and it can be endangered by a series of aspects, among which is the presence of undesired microclimates. This condition can be monitored by measuring the temperature-humidity index (THI), an index able to inform about the emergence of heat-stressing conditions in the barns. The THI can be influenced by the external environmental conditions and the barn structure, orientation, thermal buoyancy, and roof insulating materials. In order to evaluate these structural aspects of buildings and the consequent microclimate, in this study, a survey was carried out in 8 dairy cattle barns located in the northern part of Italy that were monitored continuously during thermoneutral, warm, and cold periods. Experts observed the structural aspects ,and the environmental parameters were measured with sensors. From the results emerged that the barns had structural characteristics that considerably affect the internal microclimate, with openings, roof height, forced ventilation, and building orientation playing a significant role in estimating of the THI in the barn. The more critical period was the warm one when the structures could not mitigate the external conditions, and THI exceeded the threshold of 72 for a big share of the period in all monitored farms (range between 50-80% of observations). In the best situation, the cooling systems were able to maintain the external conditions. The results confirm the importance of the barn design and of an appropriate ventilation to improve air exchanges.

Attention on animal behavior and welfare has been increasing. Scientific knowledge about the effect of behavior and welfare on animals' production augmented and made clear the need of improving their living conditions. Among the variables to monitor in dairy cattle farming, lying time represents a signal for health and welfare status as well as for milk production. The aim of this study is to identify the relationship among the lying behavior of dairy cows and milk production, body condition score (BCS), weather variables, and the temperature–humidity index (THI) in the barn from a dairy farm located in Northern Italy. One-year data were collected on this farm with sensors that allowed monitoring of the environmental conditions in the barn and the activity of primiparous lactating cows. Principal components analysis (PCA), factor analysis (FA), generalized linear model select (GLMSelect), and logistic analysis (LA) were carried out to get the relationships among variables. Among the main results, it emerges that the effect of weather parameters is quite restrained, except for THI > 70, which negatively affects the lying time. In addition, the most productive cows are found to lie down more than the less productive ones, and the parameters of milk production, lying time, and BCS are found to be linked by a similar trend.

Dairy cow behavior is affected by external and endogenous factors, including time of year, barn microclimate, time of day and housing. However, little is known about the combined effects of these factors. Data were collected on eight farms in Northern Italy during summer, winter and a temperate season. The temperature-humidity index (THI) was recorded using environmental sensors, whereas cow behavior was monitored using leg accelerometers and cameras. Period, time of day and their interaction all significantly affected lying, standing and feeding behavior. However, although THI had a significant negative effect on lying and a positive effect on standing during daytime (all p < 0.001), during nighttime, it only had a significant negative effect on lying duration and mean lying bout duration (p < 0.001 for both). There was also significant variation between farms in all behavioral parameters, as well as interactions with period and time of day. For instance, farm differences in lying duration were more pronounced during daytime than during nighttime. These findings show how housing can interact with other factors, such as period of the year and time of day, and illustrate the influence of barn structure and farm management on cow behavior and, consequently, their welfare.

Among environmental issues related to intensive livestock activity, emissions to air from manure management are of increasing concern. Thus the knowledge of the effect of treatment application on subsequent emissions from manure is required to assess the environment impact of management solutions. This work addresses the effect of anaerobic digestion and phase separation on emissions during storage by studying nitrogen losses from lab-scale stores and field pilot-scale stores of a co-digestate cattle slurry and its respective separated fractions. Lab-scale experiment was carried in temperature-controlled room where each fraction (untreated, separated liquid and separated solid) was stored in duplicate for a period of 32 days in 30 L vessel. Pilot-scale experiment was carried out both during the cold season and during warm season for 90 days of storage. In both experimentations samples of the manure were analysed periodically for total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN), total ammonia nitrogen, dry matter and volatile solids and pH. These analyses allow estimating nitrogen losses in different storage conditions. Effects of mechanical separation and season were assessed by ANOVA (Wilcoxon test, P

Monitoring cow behaviour has become increasingly important in understanding the nutrition, production, management of the well being, and overall health of dairy cows. Methods of assessing behavioural activity have changed in recent years, favouring automatic recording techniques. Traditional methods to measure behaviour, such as direct observation or time-lapse video, are labour-intensive and time-consuming. Automated recording devices have become increasingly common to measure behaviour accurately. Thus, the development of automated monitoring systems that can continuously and accurately quantify feeding behaviour are required for efficient monitoring and control of modern and automated dairy farms. The aim of this study was to evaluate the possible use of a 3D accelerometer to record feeding behaviour of dairy cows. Feeding behaviour (feeding time and number of visits to the manger) of 12 lactating dairy cows was recorded for approximately 3 h with 3D-accelerometer data loggers (HOBO Pendant G logger). The sensors were positioned in the high part of the neck to monitor head movements. Behaviour was simultaneously recorded using visual observation as a reference. Linear regression analysis between the measurement methods showed that the recorded feeding time (R2=0.90, n=12, P2=0.31, n=12, P

Due to its increasing pressure on dairy cows, studies that investigate how to cope with heat stress are needed. The heat stress affects multiple aspects of cows’ lives, among which their behavior and welfare. In this study, a survey was carried out in eight farms located in Northern Italy to monitor and evaluate the environmental aspects of the barns and the behavioral responses of dairy cows. For one year, three periods were monitored: thermoneutral (T_S), hot (H_S) and cold (C_S) seasons. Temperature and relative humidity were measured by environmental sensors, and lying vs. standing time, number of lying bouts and their average duration were collected by accelerometers. The temperature-humidity index (THI) was quantified inside and outside of the barn. Results show that at the increase of the THI, behavioral adaptations occurred in all the farms, especially with a reduction of lying time and an increase of respiration rate. Four of the eight farms need interventions for improving the cows’ welfare. Here, environmental problems should be solved by introducing or improving the efficacy of the forced ventilation or by modifying the barn structure. Monitoring dairy barns with sensors and Precision Livestock Farming techniques can be helpful for future livestock farming to alert farmers on the need for their interventions to respond immediately to unwanted barn living conditions.

Currently, lying behavior can be assessed using continuous observations from sensors (e.g., accelerometers). The analysis of digital data deriving from accelerometers is an effective tool for studying livestock behaviors. Despite the large interest in the lying behavior of dairy cows, no reference was found in literature regarding the prediction of lying behavior as a function of the interaction of environmental parameters. The present study aimed to evaluate the influence of climatic conditions (temperature-humidity index, solar radiation, air velocity and rainfalls) on the lying behavior of a group of primiparous dairy cows, using data from accelerometers, and develop a prediction model to identify and predict the lying behavior of dairy cows as a function of the effects of environmental conditions. Results from the. GLM Procedure (SAS) showed that the model was highly significant (p < 0.001) and the r2 was 0.84. All of the effects in the model resulted in being highly significant (p < 0.001). This model, if validated properly, could be a valid early warning system to identify any deviation from the expected behavior, and to assess the effectiveness of thermal stress mitigation strategies.

Management systems in modern dairy farms is an important issue in relation to animal comfort and welfare. The objective of this study was to determine the effect of feed delivery frequency on the behavior patterns, visits to an automatic milking system (AMS) and on milk production of lactating dairy cows. The study was conducted on a commercial dairy farm with automatic feeding and milking systems. Feeding treatments consisted of two different frequencies, high feed delivery frequency (11 deliveries per day) and low feed delivery frequency (six deliveries per day). Lying behavior of 20 dairy cows was electronically monitored. The results obtained showed that 11 deliveries per day feed delivery frequency decreases the number of long-duration lying bouts, which may indicate that a very high feeding frequency disturbs the cows during their resting periods and thus influences both animal comfort and milk production. High feeding frequency may disturb the duration of lying bouts and alter the pattern of lying behavior throughout the day, affecting mainly the lying time during the 60 min before and following the provision of fresh feed. Delivering feed at a low frequency allow cows to distribute more evenly their lying time over the course of the day and improve their utilization of an AMS.

Research on feeding management in more competitive free-stall settings indicates that frequency of delivery of fresh feed stimulates feed bunk attendance and can affect other aspects of cows’ time budgets apart from feeding such as time spent standing vs. lying down. The objective of this study was to examine how the frequency of feed delivery affects the behavior in two farms, one with a conventional and one with automatic milking system (AMS). The feeding frequency was varied from two to three times per day in the conventional dairy farm; one to two times per day in the AMS farm. The experiment was carried out in two different seasons. All behaviours of the cows were monitored in continuous by video recording. As expected, behavioral indices have been significantly affected by environmental conditions both in conventional farm and AMS farm. The variation in the frequency of feed delivery seems to affect the cow behavioural activity only in a limited way and modify only slightly the daily averages of the time spent in different activities mainly increasing the time cows spend standing (+4- 5%).

The aim of the study was to investigate the effect of feeding frequency on milk production, dry matter intake (DMI) and cow behaviour on two dairy farms with conventional and automatic milking systems (AMS) in different environmental conditions. Cows on two farms were monitored. On the first farm, 96 primiparous cows were milked in a herringbone parlor while on the second a group of nearly 50 cows were milked in two AMS with a forced traffic. On each farm, treatments consisted of two different frequencies of total mixed ration (TMR) delivery (2 vs 3 on the conventional farm; 1 vs 2 on the AMS farm) replicated in two different periods of the year with THI of 72.6 and 60.7, respectively. The behaviour of the cows was monitored by continuous video recording. Statistical analysis was performed separately for the two farms. Increasing the frequency of TMR deliveries did not result in any variation in DMI but significantly improved milk yield on both farms. The increase in feeding frequency at the bunk in the AMS farm mitigated the negative effect of hot conditions on production with a 7.6% increase in milk yield. Feeding frequency did not influence cow behaviour on either farm. Hot conditions showed a depressive effect on DMI (nearly 8% on both farms) compared with thermoneutral conditions but caused a reduction in milk yield (an average 17%) only on the farm with multiparous high-producing cows milked automatically. In the hot period, cows on both farms showed a reduction in daily lying time and an increase in daily standing time.