‘A 5pc increase in feed efficiency is worth a lot to a dairy farmer’

THE CAINTHUS bovine facial recognition technology has great potential for farmers as the first customers are discovering.

When cows stop eating or reduce their feed intake there is usually a good reason for this that indicates a pending health issue.

If these habits go unidentified for any period of time, farmers lose money in a reduced milk production and higher veterinary costs.

Thus, with facial recognition, cows can be identified easily in the shed or at the feed barrier and their eating habits and other attributes recorded.

“We’ve installs on two farms currently, and yes, they actively use it,” says David Hunt. “A five percent increase in feed efficiency is worth a lot to a dairy farmer, and we can contribute quite a bit more than that simply by letting you know when the cows stop feeding, enabling you to intervene earlier than otherwise possible.

“I think livestock is more readily applicable for robotics as you’re not asking these farmers to replace existing machines with robots, except for milking robots. With tillage, you’re asking a farmer to abandon the tractor or harvester, which is much harder.”

It’s anyone’s guess what a livestock farm will look like by 2050, but David thinks farms will become more mixed enterprise in the future.

“I don’t think that there will be purely livestock farms by 2050. Farms will more likely be mixed use agro-ecology style systems with many different crops and livestock.

Robots

“For a farmer to operate in this environment, well they’ll need to be extremely comfortable with data, statistics, and robots as well as being ecological experts.

“When I think of a 2050 farm, I struggle to see beyond it being one farmer and their machines. But this is true of many industries by 2050.

“The best of farmers will run far larger farms than today, only involving themselves when the machines are damaged or confused and need some human assistance.”