4 ms·

Since you're here: where could good software help you run your cattle operation?

leroy_masochist 7y ago
A cheap ear tag based tracking system that gives me real time locational awareness of where every cow in the herd is. Ideally low radiation, in other words not looking to put a GSM antenna on every animal A mobile-friendly CRM for managing slaughter schedules and other livestock related stuff, that also incorporates something Asana-like for delegating and tracking farm tasks A predictive analytics platform that takes data from ground-implanted sensors and weather services and does some analysis and gives me input on when we should plan to hay, which I will probably ignore anyway if we're being honest I'll respond again if I think of anything else. Thank you for asking!
- war1025 7y ago
  A couple guys I went to high school with started a smart-ag business related to livestock tracking. Not sure how it relates to what you do, but seemed potentially related enough to pass along. http://www.performancelivestockanalytics.com/ http://www.performancelivestockanalytics.com/
  - leroy_masochist 7y ago
    Thanks! This looks like a feedlot management tool; we graze cows through pasture and also hay the same fields, so our needs would be a bit different.
- maliker 7y ago
  Regarding tracking, I work for rural electric utilities, and we're looking at LoRaWAN for tracking. $30 chip, 15+ mile range in rural environments. Plus it's low power (can run for a year on a battery), and it should meet your low radiation requirement since it doesn't transmit often. Just food for thought.
  - leroy_masochist 7y ago
    Thanks for the heads-up! Do you know what the locational accuracy is?
    - maliker 7y ago
      I don't think anyone has used the LoRa radio signals for triangulating position, but GPS chips are getting really cheap now too. I've been playing around with a $40 GPS module[1] that claims a pretty standard 3 meter accuracy. [1] https://www.adafruit.com/product/746 https://www.adafruit.com/product/746
- leroy_masochist 7y ago
  Just realized I meant ERP, not CRM. But maybe some CRM functionality for managing my CSA and things of that nature
- captainredbeard 7y ago
  Thank you! How large of an area would you need location tracking?
  - leroy_masochist 7y ago
    220 acres of pasture, contained by physical fencing (could be used to mount hardware but does not have 110VAC access). The pastures are interspersed within a larger area that also contains woods and swamps. The biggest pain point that good location tracking would solve for us would be the 6-8 calves we lose each year when they wander off and get hunted, killed and eaten by coyotes. If I could a) get an app-driven alert when an animal leaves the area of pasture she's supposed to be in and b) have a mobile app that shows me where she is in relation to me so I can more easily find a 30-pound dark brown calf hunkered down in the woods at night, I'd be pretty stoked. By the way, there is good LTE coverage where I am, and a lot of farms don't necessarily have great cell coverage, so bear that in mind if you're trying to get a feel for what the larger market might want. What I mean is, there's a mobile-only use case here and there's also a use case where you have a combination web-based UI (farmer's desktop) and an OEM handheld homing device for finding loose animals. If you want to get really fancy you do a Twilio integration and trigger a robocall to the farmer's landline so she wakes up in the middle of the night and logs into the web app to see what's going on.
    - captainredbeard 7y ago
      Do you confirm them to grazing paddocks or are they open range on the 220?

A cheap ear tag based tracking system that gives me real time locational awareness of where every cow in the herd is. Ideally low radiation, in other words not looking to put a GSM antenna on every animal A mobile-friendly CRM for managing slaughter schedules and other livestock related stuff, that also incorporates something Asana-like for delegating and tracking farm tasks A predictive analytics platform that takes data from ground-implanted sensors and weather services and does some analysis and gives me input on when we should plan to hay, which I will probably ignore anyway if we're being honest I'll respond again if I think of anything else. Thank you for asking!

war1025 7y ago
A couple guys I went to high school with started a smart-ag business related to livestock tracking. Not sure how it relates to what you do, but seemed potentially related enough to pass along. http://www.performancelivestockanalytics.com/ http://www.performancelivestockanalytics.com/
- leroy_masochist 7y ago
  Thanks! This looks like a feedlot management tool; we graze cows through pasture and also hay the same fields, so our needs would be a bit different.
maliker 7y ago
Regarding tracking, I work for rural electric utilities, and we're looking at LoRaWAN for tracking. $30 chip, 15+ mile range in rural environments. Plus it's low power (can run for a year on a battery), and it should meet your low radiation requirement since it doesn't transmit often. Just food for thought.
- leroy_masochist 7y ago
  Thanks for the heads-up! Do you know what the locational accuracy is?
  - maliker 7y ago
    I don't think anyone has used the LoRa radio signals for triangulating position, but GPS chips are getting really cheap now too. I've been playing around with a $40 GPS module[1] that claims a pretty standard 3 meter accuracy. [1] https://www.adafruit.com/product/746 https://www.adafruit.com/product/746
leroy_masochist 7y ago
Just realized I meant ERP, not CRM. But maybe some CRM functionality for managing my CSA and things of that nature
captainredbeard 7y ago
Thank you! How large of an area would you need location tracking?
- leroy_masochist 7y ago
  220 acres of pasture, contained by physical fencing (could be used to mount hardware but does not have 110VAC access). The pastures are interspersed within a larger area that also contains woods and swamps. The biggest pain point that good location tracking would solve for us would be the 6-8 calves we lose each year when they wander off and get hunted, killed and eaten by coyotes. If I could a) get an app-driven alert when an animal leaves the area of pasture she's supposed to be in and b) have a mobile app that shows me where she is in relation to me so I can more easily find a 30-pound dark brown calf hunkered down in the woods at night, I'd be pretty stoked. By the way, there is good LTE coverage where I am, and a lot of farms don't necessarily have great cell coverage, so bear that in mind if you're trying to get a feel for what the larger market might want. What I mean is, there's a mobile-only use case here and there's also a use case where you have a combination web-based UI (farmer's desktop) and an OEM handheld homing device for finding loose animals. If you want to get really fancy you do a Twilio integration and trigger a robocall to the farmer's landline so she wakes up in the middle of the night and logs into the web app to see what's going on.
  - captainredbeard 7y ago
    Do you confirm them to grazing paddocks or are they open range on the 220?