Sensors 2018, 18(9), 2906; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18092906
A Sound Source Localisation Analytical Method for Monitoring the Abnormal Night Vocalisations of Poultry
1
College of Water Conservancy & Civil Engineering, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100083, China
2
Key Lab of Agricultural Engineering in Structure and Environment, Ministry of Agriculture, Beijing 100083, China
3
Network Center, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100083, China
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 17 July 2018 / Revised: 28 August 2018 / Accepted: 31 August 2018 / Published: 1 September 2018
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sensors in Agriculture 2018)
Abstract
Due to the increasing scale of farms, it is increasingly difficult for farmers to monitor their animals in an automated way. Because of this problem, we focused on a sound technique to monitor laying hens. Sound analysis has become an important tool for studying the behaviour, health and welfare of animals in recent years. A surveillance system using microphone arrays of Kinects was developed for automatically monitoring birds’ abnormal vocalisations during the night. Based on the principle of time-difference of arrival (TDOA) of sound source localisation (SSL) method, Kinect sensor direction estimations were very accurate. The system had an accuracy of 74.7% in laboratory tests and 73.6% in small poultry group tests for different area sound recognition. Additionally, flocks produced an average of 40 sounds per bird during feeding time in small group tests. It was found that, on average, each normal chicken produced more than 53 sounds during the daytime (noon to 6:00 p.m.) and less than one sound at night (11:00 p.m.–3:00 a.m.). This system can be used to detect anomalous poultry status at night by monitoring the number of vocalisations and area distributions, which provides a practical and feasible method for the study of animal behaviour and welfare. View Full-TextKeywords:
sound analysis; sound source localization; Kinects; chicken; animal behaviour
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Du, X.; Lao, F.; Teng, G. A Sound Source Localisation Analytical Method for Monitoring the Abnormal Night Vocalisations of Poultry. Sensors 2018, 18, 2906.
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