ASSESSING THE ACCURACY OF A BODY CONDITIO N SCORING IN EWES UNDER FIELD CONDITIONS

The accuracy of the body condition scoring for ewes using lumbar palpa tion was assessed by mean of an,experiment conducted under conditions close to those occurring everyday on farms. Thirteen operators evaluat ed the body condition score twice in a sample of 48 Lacaune breed dair y ewes, using a semi-quantitative grid (from 0 to 5points, with a 0.25 point precision). Under the experimental conditions, the repeatabilit y of the method, i.e. the comparison between the scores given by the s ame operator to the same animals for the two successive scoring notati ons, was good and even very good (Kappa test), if a 0.25 point precisi on is tolerated. On the other hand, the reproducibility, i.e. the comp arison between the scores given to the same animals by differents oper ators was poor. Therefore, this method is easy to master for the manag ement of a given flock by a single person. However in order to make co mparisons between flocks, in reference to body condition standards set up for different farming systems, this method needs greater precision . Some of the application conditions required for this are discussed. (C) Inra/Elsevier, Paris.