Animal husbandry – Feeding device – Having electronic identification and feed control
Patent
1992-07-24
1994-05-10
Swiatek, Robert P.
Animal husbandry
Feeding device
Having electronic identification and feed control
119 576, A01K 502
Patent
active
053098641
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a method of feeding animals, suitable in particular for feeding livestock, in which the animal can freely move about and freely enter a plurality of feeding stalls, each animal carrying an electric responder which generates a unique code for each animal in an electromagnetic interrogation field.
The invention further relates to apparatus for carrying out this method.
In pig farming, a method for keeping pigs is known in which the pigs are tied up and remain permanently in the same place, except when they farrow down. In that case, they are isolated in a so-called farrowing pen, where they stay until the piglets are big enough and the sows are taken back to their fixed place where they are tied up again.
Such a method has an adverse effect on the well-being of the animals, which in turn might lead to unfavorable farm-economic results. Being tied up in small spaces with limited space to lie in, the animals have little opportunity to move which causes stress, abnormal behavior and diseases of the legs of the animals. Further, with such a housing method, it is very difficult to realize computer-controlled feeding of the animals, particularly if several kinds of feed must be dosed.
According to a variant of the above-mentioned method, use is made of feeding cubicles where the animals are not tied up but permanently locked up in a small space. Here, similar problems are encountered. Sometimes in this system the animals can occasionally move about freely. In that case, feeding the animals individually is a problem because they do not always return to the same cubicle. In this known system, too, it is therefore troublesome to implement automation by means of a computer.
Another known method of keeping livestock is the method of group housing, where the animals, e.g. pigs, can move about freely in the housing space. Here, automatic, individual feeding has been rendered possible by arranging a feeding station in the space where the animals are housed, which is connected to a computer, in which is stored the amount of feed allowed to each pig and by making each animal electronically identifiable. Upon entering a feeding stall, a pig is electronically identified by means of an electronic identification label which it carries about its neck or is attached to an ear, and is read by a transmitter/receiver. The information is transmitted to the computer, whereupon the computer reports the amount of feed to be allotted to the animal identified. The transmitter/receiver controls one or more jackscrew motors which cause the feed to drop into the feeding through in front of the snout of the pig.
Although this method yields a considerable improvement of the well-being of the animals and enables automation of the feed supply by means of a computer, there are still some disadvantages to be noted in some situations. It is troublesome to isolate animals from the group and to check them since they are moving around freely. Further, in a small group, pecking order fights tend to occur at the feeding station, which may involve vulva biting.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the present invention to combine the advantages of the tying-up system, i.e., simple checking of the animals and simple isolation of an individual animal from the group, with the advantages of group housing, i.e., greater well-being of the animals owing to their being allowed to move about freely, and the possibility of automatically feeding an individual animal by means of a computer.
To that end, according to the invention, a method of feeding animals of the type described hereinabove is characterized in that for the feed supply, use is made of a feeding station moving along the feeding stalls, the feeding station comprising a transmitter/receiver for generating an electromagnetic interrogation field adjacent to each feeding stall and identifying an animal that is present in the feeding stall; that with each feed supply, the feed is furnished in two portions, the first portion being of the
REFERENCES:
patent: 4223638 (1980-09-01), Sappington et al.
patent: 4712511 (1987-12-01), Zamzow et al.
Harmsen Jan H.
Kuip Anton
N.V. Nederlandsche Apparatenfabriek Nedap
Swiatek Robert P.
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