CATTLE MONITORING SYSTEM USING SMART SENSORS FOR

HEALTH MONITORING and CATTLE MANAGEMENT

Department of Electrical Engineering

School of Engineering

University of Management and Technology Lahore

January 2024

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CATTLE MONITORING SYSTEM USING SMART SENSORS FOR HEALTH MONITORING and
CATTLE MANAGEMENT

Submitted to the faculty of Electrical Engineering Department of the University of

Management and Technology Lahore in partial fulfillment of the requirement
of the degree of

Bachelor of Science
In
Electrical Engineering

Director Undergraduate Studies

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 Department of Electrical Engineering
School of Engineering

University of Management and Technology

Declaration :
We declare that the work contained in this thesis is our own, except where explicitly stated
otherwise. In addition, this work has not been submitted to obtain another degree or professional
qualification.

Signed:

Signed:

Date:

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 SDG Mapping

Project Title:
Cattle Monitoring System Using Smart Sensors for Health Monitoring and Cattle Management

Project Aim:
The aim of this project is to leverage sensor network and IoT to develop a robust system for management
and control of diseases in cattle. Through the integration of WSN, IoT and smart programming , the project
seeks to create a reliable tool capable of accurately detecting various diseases affecting our cattle. By
providing timely and precise identification, the system aims to empower farmers with actionable insights to
effectively manage and mitigate the impact of disease and infections , thereby enhancing the quality and
quantity of the milk produced.

Sustainable development goals:

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a set of global objectives adopted by the United Nations
General Assembly in 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The SDGs consist of
17 interlinked goals designed to address a range of pressing global challenges, including poverty, inequality,
climate change, environmental degradation, peace, and justice. These goals aim to provide a blueprint for
countries and organizations to work towards a more sustainable and equitable future by addressing social,
economic, and environmental dimensions simultaneously. The SDGs are intended to be achieved by 2030
and serve as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all.

Sr.no Sustainability SGD’s Explanation

1 Zero Hunger
2 Good Health and Well-Being
3 Sustainable Cities and Communities
Our project aims to help farmers efficiently produce milk and
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meat so it can be distributed across all sectors of society
By monitoring the health of the animals we aim to to keep the
m healthy and prevent any outbreak of disease that
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effect the safety our food chain.As well as safety of the people
Who are interacting with these animals
This project aims to efficiently manage the space available for
11 farming in the cities to have proper housing for the animals
in urban areas

_______________
Project Advisor

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Contents
Acknowledgement-----------------------------------------------------------------------4
Sustainable Development Goals--------------------------------------------------------5
Abstract----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------11
1. Introduction
1.1 Background--------------------------------------------------------------------------------12
1.2 Motivation--------------------------------------------------------------------------------12
1.3 Report layout-----------------------------------------------------------------------------13
2. Literature Review-------------------------------------------------------------------------14
2.1 Disease effecting cattle and how they relate to various sensors---------------------14
2.2 Methodology---------------------------------------------------------------------------15
2.3 Hardware Implementation-------------------------------------------------------------16
3. Problem Statement------------------------------------------------------------------------18
4. Refrences-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------19

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List of tables
Table1:Various disease in cattle with their symptoms and sensor that are used to detect them------------14-15

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List of figures
Figure1 -Proposed Solution in courtesy to Kadali Umesh Chandra-----------15
Figure 2Various sensors used for monitoring the health of the animal courtesy of Jehangir Arshad-----------17

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 Abstract:
Diseases negatively impact the production of milk and meat in cattle. The challenge lies in the early
detection and treatment of sick cows, due to the lack of timely monitoring and the limited knowledge of the
workers about various illnesses it can lead to delayed treatment that can lead to death of animal. To counter
this problem new and efficient digital systems are being developed. These system contains non-invasive
sensors that communicate using IoT and Lora-wan. These systems though very convenient for the farmers
but they are too expensive for a typical Pakistani farmer despite their benefit. The objective of our work is to
develop a cost-effective health monitoring system that assists farmers in effectively managing their livestock
and improving productivity. The proposed health monitoring system will utilize non-invasive sensors to
monitor critical factors such as temperature variations, movement patterns, eating habits, rumination, and
resting periods. These sensors will be integrated into a collar, which will be securely fastened around the
animal's neck. To enable real-time monitoring, the system will leverage IoT (Internet of Things) technology.
The data collected by these sensors will be transmitted to a central hub. Only essential data, providing
insights into the animal's health condition, will be forwarded to the software platform. By developing this
cost-effective health monitoring system and leveraging advanced technologies, our project aims to empower
Pakistani farmers by equipping them with valuable tools for livestock care and enhancing their overall
output.

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 Chapter 1
Introduction:
Since the dawn of civilization, agriculture and livestock farming have been the lifeline of the society. As the
world population continues to grow rapidly, conventional farming methods are struggling to meet the
growing demand for food. Historically, the solution to increasing food production has often involved the
establishment of massive farms in rural areas, aimed at accommodating large numbers of animals to satisfy
the needs of an ever growing population . However, this approach has given rise to new challenges,
amplified by unchecked industrialization and urbanization. In response to these complex challenges, both
farmers and scientists are working together to enhance animal agriculture's efficiency and sustainability. One
innovative solution that has emerged is the implementation of smart health monitoring systems. These
systems enable farmers to oversee the well-being of their livestock without direct physical contact, marking
a significant improvement from traditional methods. The foundation of a smart health monitoring system
comprises an array of sensors designed to capture the vitals like body temperature,heart rate, movement and
eating patterns. All these activities are related to animal health. This data is then processed by the micro-
controller and transmitted to a centralized network, where the results are displayed to the farmers device,
offering real-time insights into the condition of their animals. This transmission is done by usage of IoT and
Lora-wan . The advancements in these technologies has really created a positive impact on the dairy and
meat farming industry granting farmers the ability to maintain continuous vigilance over their animals, a
task previously thought to be challenge. In Pakistan still farmers are using traditional methods because of
lack of knowledge and resources. This has led to significant problems for the farmers over the last two
decades. In 2019 Pakistani farmers produced 47 million tons of milk but due to urbanization and
uncontrolled inflation Pakistani farmers have faced many financial losses. Due to this food security of
Pakistan has gotten worse and artificial milk and meat has entered the market. With our project we aim to
use readily available sensors in the market and design a monitoring system that is affordable to the farmers
and accurate enough to help them continuously monitor their animal.

1.1 Background:
Precision farming has always been under discussion by the farmers and engineers.Use of biosensors for
monitoring the health of human body has always been in research by the engineers around the world. This
has led to many development in the field of wearable health devices. Taking a spark from this technology
engineers have started developing systems for monitoring cattle like cows and bulls. First these sensors were
invasive but due to constant pushing from the UN and animal rights groups these sensors evolved into
noninvasive health monitoring sensors. These sensor included collars, Rf tags and much more. The adoption
of this technology rapidly increased due to advent of IoT and Wireless Sensor Network (WSN). Now almost
all modern farms in the developed countries are using these sensor tags.

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1.2 Motivation:
Cattle farming is an essential part of the agricultural sector. In this hyper competitive world health of the
livestock is crucial for maintaining productivity and profitability. However, monitoring the health of the
cattle manually is a challenging and daunting task for farmers. Therefore, there is a need for an automated
system that can continuously monitor the vital parameters of the cattle and provide real-time information to
the farmer. Due to increased urbanization and inflation typical farmers are finding it difficult to raise their
cattle. This has greatly slashed their profits and the food quality has also gone down in Pakistan. Keeping
these problem in view we want to design a system using readily available sensors that can help farmers
better manage their animals and have a high yield

1.3 Layout of the paper:

In this paper, we will see all the aspects of smart farming in detail. In part 1 we will discuss what is smart
farming. In the second part we will see in detail what are different disease that occur in animals and what are
their financial impacts along with the sensors we can use to detect these problems in the third part we will
discuss in detail the different communication protocols that we can use to transfer our sensor data. Then in
fourth part we will discuss how we are going to design the hardware as well as the firmware closing off with
our findings and results.

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 Chapter 2

Literature review:
The literature review of this paper is divided into parts. Starting from a brief review of the diseases that
effect the animals, then we will review the methodology adopted for these sensor based systems in the final
part we will review various hardware sensors that can be use full for the detection of various diseases.

2.1 Disease effecting cattle and how they relate to various sensors:
There are estimated 2.5 million dairy farms of various sizes in European Union. To increase per animal milk
production of these cows there is a need for a sensor based system. In this study different disease and their
physical effect on the animal is analyzed. Then these disease are co-related various sensors using ontological
approach to disease that are most common in the cattle.[1]

Diseases Symptoms Behavioral Changes Sensors

Mastitis  Visual Changes in the Udder
 Abnormal milk
 Temperature and Vital Signs
 Pain and Discomfort:
 Changes in Behavior
 Udder Texture
 Swelling of the Teats
Lameness  Limping
 Decreased mobility
 Swelling or heat:
 Altered posture
 Reduced milk production
 Reluctance to bear weight
 Audible signs of pain
 Pus or discharge
Production issue  Decreased Milk Production
 Poor Body Condition
 Reduced Feed Intake
 Lethargy and Weakness
 Reproductive Issues
 Dehydration
 Respiratory Distress
Milk fever  Lethargy
 Lowered Body temperature
 Twitching Muscles
 Reduced Appetite
 Low Milk Production
 Restlessness  Using Accelerometer around (Neck
 Less grazing &feet)
 Constant moving  Load sensor under the feet
 Less lying  Microphone
 Non-uniform weight distribution  Using Accelerometer around(Neck, feet
 Less Grazing & udder)
 Abnormal back arch  Load sensor under the feet
 Standing or sitting for long time  Camera placed in the barn
 Restlessness and increased activity  Accelerometer (neck, feet, near tail)
 Less/more grazing  Microphone(neck)
 Mooing  Temperature(neck)
 Temperature changes
 Electrical Conductivity
 Excitement/stiffness  Accelerometer (neck)
 Mooing  Load sensor under feet
 Weakness/weight shifting  Temperature sensor(neck/ear)
 Temperature  Heartbeat sensor(vein/neck)
 Pulse  ECG

Displaced abomasum  Reduced Appetite  Grazing/rumination  Accelerometer (neck, feet)

 Drop in Milk Production
 Abdominal Distension
 Changes in Manure
 Vocalization and Restlessness
 Decreased Rumen Contractions
 Dehydration and Weakness
Pneumonia  Coughing
 Nasal Discharge
 Laborde Breathing
 Depression and Lethargy
 Chest Sounds
 Drooling
Retained Placenta  Failure to expel Placenta
 Weakness  Microphone (neck)
 Gas/olfactory sensor (Nose)
 High temperature  Temperature sensor(neck)
 Running nose  Accelerometer(neck)
 Coughing sound  Microphone(neck)
 Sound of breathing
 Less grazing
 Excitement/stiffness  Accelerometer (neck)
 Mooing  Load sensor under feet
 Weakness/weight shifting  Temperature sensor(neck/ear)
 Temperature  Heartbeat sensor(vein/neck)

Diarrhea  Loose or Watery Stool  High temperature  Temperature sensor(neck)

 Depression or Weakness  Running nose  Accelerometer(neck)
 Loss of Appetite  Coughing sound  Microphone(neck)
 Weight Loss  Sound of breathing
 Abdominal Pain  Less grazing
 Fever
 Foul Odour

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Ketosis  Reduced Appetite  Grazing/rumination  Accelerometer (neck, feet)
 Decreased Milk Production  Weakness  Microphone (neck)
 Sweet or Fruity Odour.  Gas/olfactory sensor (Nose)
 Depression and Lethargy

Table1: Various disease in cattle with their symptoms and sensor that are used to detect them

For a long time developed dairy farms have been using process based animal diagnosis process. This has
neither increased nor decreased the efficiency of the farm and has been stagnant. Today we need a method in
which we can detect individual dairy cows with low human intervention. To do that AI algorithms are being
used to detect the body condition score that tell the health of an animal based on the amount of fat on
various body parts. This approach visually measures the cow starting from tail to the horns. But this process
is efficient. With advancement in electronic cameras new methods are being developed that are very
efficient these are based on Convolution neural network (CNN) the only limitation to this approach is the
faulty and bogus data that may be fed into into the AI network [2]

2.2 Methodology
More than 50 percent of population in rural India are dependant on farming for their livelihood. These
farmers are not trained and need a simple system for monitoring their animals. The researchers in this paper
proposed a sensor based system based on CAP to monitor their farm animals. Lab View software was used
to easily display the data on the devices of the farmers. The data was stored on a database so that it can be
visualized later for reference.The system consisted of three parts. Data accusation using sensors,
Visualizing and performing computation using Artificial Intelligence in the final step this data was displayed
on software like LabView[3]

figure1: Proposed Solution in courtesy to Kadali Umesh Chandra

In recent years due to global warming the normal values of temperature and humidity have changes
dramatically these changes have caused changes in the optimal body conditions. Wireless Sensor Network is
used to collect important data from the cow. This data is in huge quantity and is transmitted over internet.

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The sensors that used to detect the body conditions are pulse sensor, accelerometer, temperature sensor the
data of these sensors is sent to NodeMCU. The data from individual nodes is sent to a storage server and if
else statement are employed on this data to make decision the final result in form of an alert is shown to the
farmer. The benefit of this system is that it is simple and accurately detects the diseases and displays them
on a screen.[4]

2.3 Hardware Implementation

Temperature is the most prominent factor in gauging the health of a cattle. Whenever a cattle gets sick the
biggest factor that changes is the temperature. In this research the researchers measured the body
temperature of the animal using thermal imaging. An animal whenever is hot emits thermal radiation. This
can be detected using infrared imaging. Various body regions have different temperature. The optimum
overall body temperature of the animal was selected to be below 72. The benefit of infrared thermography is
that it is non-invasive and efficient and we can connect the cameras with a computing device to get data.
This data is fed into AI models to train the data and make decisions.[5]

Body pose of a cattle is very important to its health. If a cattle is lethargic it will spend most of its time
laying down. To detect this pose various methods can be used. In this study the researchers have used
MPU6050 accelerometer. This accelerometer is attached to the cows neck with raspberry Pi zero. The data
collected from individual sensor is sent to Lora hub that is placed at an elevated place in the barn. Each
collar has its own specific token that unique to the cow. The data from the accelerometer is measured using
the raspberry Pi and sent to a centralized system where linear regression is applied to the data and final pose
value is determined. Many studies have been conducted on how to measure the pose but none of them tell
them what is the value. According to this study is an animal stays in a position for 15 minutes it is in that
position.[6]

Wireless sensor network has been a key player in promoting cattle care around the world. The WSN detects
the changes in the body of the animal gives a value this value is sent to a IoT enabled micro controller, The
micro controller sends this data to a centralized system on the web. Where AI algorithms are applied on it
and the data is checked for normal and outlier values. If the outlier values are high an alert is sent to the
console on the farmers device. The data gathered from the sensor contains a complete detail of the farmer
and it is necessary to keep this data confidential. To keep this data safe every user has his own user id and
password. Every animal has an authorization token and the data before sending to the cloud is encrypted.
The console is made from labview. The sensors used in the sensor box contains DHT11, MAX3010, LM35,
MPU6050 and KY037 sensor. The data from these sensors is individually analyzed for each animal and any
outlier data creates an alert.[7]

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figure -2 Various sensors used for monitoring the health of the animal courtesy of Jehangir Arshad

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 Chapter 3
Problem Statement:
The main problem Pakistani cattle industry is the lack of trained personal and proper veterinary healthcare in
rural areas of Pakistan they are only available in the main cities of Pakistan. According to statistics there is
only one doctor for every 300 cattle's. Uncontrolled development of housing societies in village areas have
destroyed the natural food source of the animals and due to that farmers are forced to feed their animals
expensive food of sub optimal quality that does not fulfills the animals nutritional needs leading to low milk
and meat production

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References:
1. Awasthi, A., Awasthi, A., Riordan, D. and Walsh, J., 2016. Non-invasive sensor technology for the development of a dairy cattle health monitoring
system. Computers, 5(4), p.23.

2. Yukun, S., Pengju, H., Yujie, W., Ziqi, C., Yang, L., Baisheng, D., Runze, L. and Yonggen, Z., 2019. Automatic monitoring system for individual dairy
cows based on a deep learning framework that provides identification via body parts and estimation of body condition score. Journal of dairy
science, 102(11), pp.10140-10151.

3. Chandra, K.U., Teja, R.S., Arelli, S. and Das, D., 2022, November. CattleCare: IoT-Based Smart Collar for Automatic Continuous Vital and Activity
Monitoring of Cattle. In 2022 International Conference on Futuristic Technologies (INCOFT) (pp. 1-7). IEEE.

4. Ezhilarasan, K., Shilpa, A.N., Sridhar, N. and Lakshmi, V., 2023, September. Smart Cattle Farm Infrastructure and Monitoring Cattle Health Status
Using IOT. In 2023 International Conference on Sustainable Emerging Innovations in Engineering and Technology (ICSEIET) (pp. 757-762). IEEE.

5. Hristov, H., Dimitrov, K. and Penev, T., 2021, May. Use of infrared thermography to monitor the physiological condition of dairy cows. In 2021 12th
National Conference with International Participation (ELECTRONICA) (pp. 1-4). IEEE.

6. Arcidiacono, C., Porto, S.M.C., Mancino, M. and Cascone, G., 2017. Development of a threshold-based classifier for real-time recognition of cow
feeding and standing behavioural activities from accelerometer data. Computers and electronics in agriculture, 134, pp.124-134.

7. Arshad, J., Siddiqui, T.A., Sheikh, M.I., Waseem, M.S., Nawaz, M.A.B., Eldin, E.T. and Rehman, A.U., 2023. Deployment of an intelligent and secure
cattle health monitoring system. Egyptian Informatics Journal, 24(2), pp.265-275.

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