Pressure-Sensitive Mat for the Detection of Hoof Diseases in Dairy Cows

Claw diseases emerged significantly worldwide in recent decades. After infertility and udder diseases, claw diseases are the third most common cause of culling. Huge economic losses are not only caused by the premature culling of the animal, but also by the high treatment costs, reduced milk yield, pregnancy and fertility. Indirectly, claw diseases can also lead to feed-related metabolic diseases, udder health problems and fertility disorders, which cause further culling and economic losses.A pressure-sensitive mat was developed to detect claw diseases based on the walking pattern of a cow. This is used directly in the animal barn. A video was recorded in parallel to assign the individual hooves to the walking pattern. With the help of computer-aided image analysis, the hooves were registered and assigned to the pressure imprint of the mat. The deviation from the normal walking pattern was recorded and stored in a digital twin for each animal. While the one-time occurrence of an anomaly is ignored, the system signals incorrect behavior of the corresponding animal. At the same time, an ANN is trained with clinical pictures and associated tread characteristics in order to enable classification at the same time.Here we show the technical part of a pressure-sensitive tread mat for the detection of hoof diseases in dairy cows.