novel approaches to expression and detection of oestrus in dairy cows

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1.1 Trends in the UK dairy industry 1
Table 1.2
Table 2.1
Table 2.2
Table of behavioural scores relating to particular oestrous
behaviour 36
Table of variables investigated for their effect on the increase in
activity at oestrus 54
Effect of lactation number, parity, oestrous number and oestrous
season on activity at oestrus 58
Table 2.3 Effect of milk yield on activity at oestrus 58
Table 2.4
Table 3.1
The effects of the interaction between milk yield and parity on the
activity increase at oestrus 59
SNPs on genes investigated for their associations with an increase
in activity at oestrus 70
Table 3.2 PCR reaction reagents 74
Table 4.1
Table 4.2
Table 5.1
Table 5.2
Table 5.3
Table 5.4
Problems and solutions concerning equipment set up for
monitoring of dairy cows using UWB 98
Table showing results of 12 hour trial UWB monitoring cows in
oestrus 100
Results from POC 2 showing each cow’s mounting behaviour
identified from the UWB data, expressed as a percentage of the
total mounts by visual observation 117
Results from POC 3 showing each cow’s mounting behaviour
identified from the UWB data, expressed as a percentage of the
total mounts by visual observation 117
Efficiency and accuracy of the optimised script at identifying
mounts from POC 2 on day of oestrus 119
Efficiency and accuracy of the optimised script at identifying
mounts from POC 3 on days of oestrus 119
Table 5.5 Number of mounts declared by the script per day in POC 2 121
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