Precision livestock production and environmental influences

Abstract

Precision livestock production (PLP) involves the manipulation of livestock activity within the environment to improve production and best utilize spatial variability. The livestock enterprise consists of animal, plant, soil, topography, climate, and human subsystems and is complicated by the various interactions between these. Precision agriculture offers the ability to measure many aspects of the livestock system enabling more precise and timely management decisions to be implemented. Precision farming has become a major driver within the cropping and horticultural industries. In contrast, the livestock industry has only just begun to investigate using these sensor tools to improve production efficiency. Based on the implementation of accurate timing and geolocational tracking devices it may become possible to identify and quantify the individual animal's pasture intake, nutritive value of selected forage, digestibility, grazing intervals, feeding pauses and rate of consumption. PLP also use automated weighing systems which provide a real-time means of relating the plant to livestock production by measuring live-weight change and the rate of change.