Radar-based evaluation of lameness detection in ruminants: preliminary results

This paper presents preliminary results on using radar systems and micro-Doppler signatures to evaluate lameness in ruminants. Lameness is regarded as a major welfare and economic problem for animals such as cattle and sheep. As evaluation methods are typically based on time-consuming, subjective scoring by trained veterinary clinicians, there is scope for automatic methods that can improve repeatability and reliability. Our initial results on a relatively large sample of 51 dairy cows and 75 sheep show promising performance, with accuracy above 80% for cows and above 90% for sheep in the most favorable cases.