{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,6]],"date-time":"2026-05-06T04:45:04Z","timestamp":1778042704268,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":36,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"11","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,6,3]],"date-time":"2020-06-03T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1591142400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Sensors"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The proper spatial distribution of chickens is an indication of a healthy flock. Routine inspections of broiler chicken floor distribution are done manually in commercial grow-out houses every day, which is labor intensive and time consuming. This task requires an efficient and automatic system that can monitor the chicken\u2019s floor distributions. In the current study, a machine vision-based method was developed and tested in an experimental broiler house. For the new method to recognize bird distribution in the images, the pen floor was virtually defined\/divided into drinking, feeding, and rest\/exercise zones. As broiler chickens grew, the images collected each day were analyzed separately to avoid biases caused by changes of body weight\/size over time. About 7000 chicken areas\/profiles were extracted from images collected from 18 to 35 days of age to build a BP neural network model for floor distribution analysis, and another 200 images were used to validate the model. The results showed that the identification accuracies of bird distribution in the drinking and feeding zones were 0.9419 and 0.9544, respectively. The correlation coefficient (R), mean square error (MSE), and mean absolute error (MAE) of the BP model were 0.996, 0.038, and 0.178, respectively, in our analysis of broiler distribution. Missed detections were mainly caused by interference with the equipment (e.g., the feeder hanging chain and water line); studies are ongoing to address these issues. This study provides the basis for devising a real-time evaluation tool to detect broiler chicken floor distribution and behavior in commercial facilities.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/s20113179","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,6,4]],"date-time":"2020-06-04T04:36:09Z","timestamp":1591245369000},"page":"3179","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":65,"title":["A Machine Vision-Based Method for Monitoring Broiler Chicken Floor Distribution"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"20","author":[{"given":"Yangyang","family":"Guo","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"},{"name":"College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Northwest A&amp;F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Lilong","family":"Chai","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7550-1681","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Samuel E.","family":"Aggrey","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-8659-7068","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Adelumola","family":"Oladeinde","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"},{"name":"U.S. National Poultry Research Center, USDA-ARS, Athens, GA 30605, USA"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Jasmine","family":"Johnson","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Gregory","family":"Zock","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Poultry Science, College of Agricultural &amp; Environmental Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,6,3]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Ben Sassi, N., Aver\u00f3s, X., and Estevez, I. 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