Cow Locator sensor
Lely plays Big Brother in a dairy barn
If you have a large number of cows in the barn, you can spend a lot of time looking for the attention animals. To facilitate this process, Lely introduces the CowLocator.
The CowLocator is a further development of Lely's ISO LD tag. This already provides insight into the eating minutes, the heat detection and the rumination activity. The latter has already been implemented in the sensor, but will only be active in software from next year. The tag communicates its location every 5 seconds.
A network of beacons, which hang at the top of the barn, determine the right place by means of a triangulation. The data is sent to the T4C InHerd app via a central antenna.
Save search time
'A farmer with 50 cows looks over the feed fence and recognizes every animal. With 200 cows that is a lot more difficult', explains product specialist Milking & Cooling Wybren Jongbloed. CowLocator shows directly on your smartphone where the animals are at that moment. This is also a godsend for companies with staff. In addition, it is much quieter for the animals. You don't walk around unnecessarily.'
Big Brother for cows
The determination of the position not only saves searching work, it also takes the administrative work off your hands. 'In the app, the dry cows or animals that are ready for insemination are automatically located and displayed', explains Jongbloed. 'So you no longer have to keep track of that manually.'
According to him, localization is only a first step: 'In the future, this development will allow us to analyze the behavior of each cow. How much does she walk? Where is she often? And how often does she lie down? This gives you an idea of the cow's behavioral pattern, which can be used in management. Incidentally, the InHerd app already works with a health report. Attention animals are immediately brought to the attention of the farmer, by having sensors in the tags and the milking robot work together.'
Spread out investment
A beacon is attached to the top of the barn every 15 meters. Both in length and width. This makes the system relatively expensive, compared to investing in sensors for rumination activity and heat detection alone. Lely is committed to full integration. You are then obliged to use an Astronaut milking robot and T4C software to make the data collection and analysis conclusive.
Jongbloed has an alternative if the investment is too large: 'You can first invest in the tags, so that you can collect the heat status, eating minutes and rumination activity per animal. You already have a central antenna and the tags. You can invest in the beacons at a later date. The location determination is in the tag by default, but not active.'
According to him, there are hardly any limitations to the barn construction. “When the signal is blocked by a steel beam, he picks it up again 5 seconds later. So there are no blind spots.'
1
meter
1 meter accurate
Lely is now offering the system for sale. The registration of the rumination time in this tag will follow next year. This is already available in other Lely tags. One of the first users is Marcel Molenaar from Aarlanderveen in South Holland. He has a farm with 190 dairy cows. According to him, the system saves a lot of time, because you focus on cows. 'It's easy to walk past the attention cows, because you know exactly where they are. The position of the animal deviates a maximum of 1 meter from the location.' The battery of the tags lasts about 10 years. That immediately makes it maintenance-free.'
Alternatives
Lely is not the only manufacturer to use such tags. Leg and collars or an ear sensor, for heat detection, rumination activity and/or standing and lying monitoring, are offered by various manufacturers. Nedap is one of the best-known brands, they also offer position determination. Their system has been on the market since 2015. Lely uses the Nedap beacons and tags for its system. It processes the data itself. Other providers of positioning systems are GEA Cowview, Agis Cowmanager Find my Cow and MKW Smartbow.
The T4C InHerd app immediately shows all cows that need attention. For example because they are drafty. The location is accurate to within 1 meter.
Niels van der Boom
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