A. J. Channon, BSc, A. M. Walker, BSc, T. Pfau, MEng, PhD, I. M. Sheldon, BVSc, PhD, MRCVS and A. M. Wilson, BSc, BVMS, PhD, MRCVS Veterinary Record 2009 164 388-392 The gait scoring system developed by Manson and Leaver was used by five experienced observers to assess the gait of 83 milking Holstein-Friesian cows in a live recording session, and video recordings were made. The agreement between the scores of the observers at the live session, and between each observer's scores at the live session and a video session, were compared at three levels of stringency. The scores of the observers were highly variable at all but the least stringent threshold - whether a cow had a score of less than 3 or 3 or more, that is, whether it was not lame or lame.