Management aid
- Thread starter supercow
- Start date
MJKFarming
Member
Pleased with it? Ours is being installed next month
Block?I’ve stopped with stock bulls and we use good old tail paint on anything we’re not seeing,easy peasy lemon squeezy
I don’t ever talk with salesmen so that solves that.
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Normally I don’t but one of them has something I actually want so I’m having to in this caseI’ve stopped with stock bulls and we use good old tail paint on anything we’re not seeing,easy peasy lemon squeezy
I don’t ever talk with salesmen so that solves that.
- Location
- Northumberland
Smaxtec bolus would be my choice. Not going to loose it, free replacement if stops working for the life of the cow and probably the most important thing a good backup team.
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Very very good salesman for smaxtec, are you going to get that system? Looks brilliant, the monthly subscription after you’ve bought the bolus and software put me off as well aswell as having to wrestle with them putting it in them. It does look brilliant tho
We have been running Alta Cowwatch system here for last 4years, its a nedap system that alta sell under licence, very pleased with the system, we never bother looking for cows bulling by eye anymore we rely 100% on it for heat detection and get some great results, health alert are very handy to have too as will flash up a cow that is off her food a day or so before you notice her buy eye, we can usually give the cow attention before the cow shows any signs of distress, the program its self is very easy to use, we can access it from anywhere in the world via computer or phone which is great for away days,
The major benefit we find with the Alta system is the support we get from Alta its self, if there is any issue with the program they will either remotely sort it or someone will be out within 12hrs and get it back sorted (when we looked at dairy master callers, any problems we had we had to ring a chap in ireland to try and sort it over the phone which we was not keen on) Alta will also assist with moving collars for us if we are short staffed or running out of time before breeding window,
alta cowwatch system is a collar based one which is not the easiest to swop from cow to cow, always remember going to a talk on collars years ago and one farmer asked the rep "how many collars do i need for my herd of all year round calving cows" the rep replied "how do you want me to answer, from a rep point of view or a farmers point of view?" to which the farmer said "as you are a rep you will just say i need one for every cow" the rep then said "no, id tell you that you only need 30 collars but from a farmers view put one on every cow as you wont want to keep moving them" which is very true,
The major benefit we find with the Alta system is the support we get from Alta its self, if there is any issue with the program they will either remotely sort it or someone will be out within 12hrs and get it back sorted (when we looked at dairy master callers, any problems we had we had to ring a chap in ireland to try and sort it over the phone which we was not keen on) Alta will also assist with moving collars for us if we are short staffed or running out of time before breeding window,
alta cowwatch system is a collar based one which is not the easiest to swop from cow to cow, always remember going to a talk on collars years ago and one farmer asked the rep "how many collars do i need for my herd of all year round calving cows" the rep replied "how do you want me to answer, from a rep point of view or a farmers point of view?" to which the farmer said "as you are a rep you will just say i need one for every cow" the rep then said "no, id tell you that you only need 30 collars but from a farmers view put one on every cow as you wont want to keep moving them" which is very true,
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Do you mind me asking the cost per collar as it sounds identical to the allflex collars
To be honest I can’t remember what we paid now as was a while ago and bought it as a package, think the allflex ones are a different make to ours, the Alta ones are the same as a GEA collar
Rep has been pestering me recently about the system although ive not asked for a quote, anyhows £13100 for 140 collars or £265 ish over 60 months.
Does the genus breeder tag only store data for 12hrs? So if you have a collar on a bunch of heffiers out of range you got to get them in twice a day to download the data even if you are serving once a day?
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Yes that’s how the allflex one works. If I have them on the grazing cows it records them when they are in milking
- Location
- M6 Hard shoulder
We have the ld tags on the robots, captures data every hour or so I think and pretty accurate made by scr
If there over a certain range from reader in shed
frederick
Member
- Location
- south west
I love my cm tags. But cows are housed at service.
I have heifers a 1200m away other side of valley and there data is fine but in sight of a reader.
Drop the other side of the hill and they are invisible.
This is where the grazing flaw arrives you will not have an accurate list of cows at the start of milking. So solar powered readers to cover all the farm would be a must if you can't keep them in line of sight.
I have heifers a 1200m away other side of valley and there data is fine but in sight of a reader.
Drop the other side of the hill and they are invisible.
This is where the grazing flaw arrives you will not have an accurate list of cows at the start of milking. So solar powered readers to cover all the farm would be a must if you can't keep them in line of sight.
Our collars store data longer than 24hrs so we get heffiers into yard once a day in the morning when our grazing for data to download and to sort for ai, it doesn’t matter how far they are away from the yard then as no data is lost, if you are wanting to graze with them I’d be looking at collars that store data for longer than 12 hrs then there is no risk of missing anything
Milkcow365
Member
- Location
- Sw Scotland
Not really if I’m honest
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Allflex records every 20 minutes I think
supercow
Member
- Location
- Dumfriesshire
Don’t think collars will help with split legs, 2 in 2 weeks! One getting dried off into the sort pen 2 minutes and she’s down! I’d actually biy anything to give them a chance to recover