4 ms·

Once you get them together, sure, but it appears from TFA that this is about gathering them from mountain meadows or other far flung environs. A herd could be s

Once you get them together, sure, but it appears from TFA that this is about gathering them from mountain meadows or other far flung environs. A herd could be spread over thousands of acres, canyons, mountains, all sorts of places to be out of site. These are operations that don’t use fences. The article mentions this is a NZ company, but the American West would have a similar issue where ranchers can run cattle on land leased from BLM. I would imagine Australia would have a similar problem to solve.

alterom 6mo ago
> A herd could be spread over thousands of acres, canyons, mountains, all sorts of places to be out of site [sic]. Are you.. mansplaining how herds work to a cow farmer, because you've read an article on HN?
- bombcar 6mo ago
  This is probably peak HN. Defending a startup device against its very customers! Knowing the perversity of the world it’ll sell millions for unknown reasons. (An argument that it could Defence the west would be a better one, removing herd fences could have value for wildlife).
  - alterom 6mo ago
    >An argument that it could Defence the west would be a better one Ah! It just hit me: of course! This is just another one of Peter Thiel's defence ventures! :D
bryanlarsen 6mo ago
It's called a herd for a reason. Usually if you've found one cow you've found them all. In the wild any cow with genes for aloofness quickly got culled by predators. The exceptions are the lame & sick ones, but no fancy gadget is going to bring them in; you've got to take a truck to them.
- cogman10 6mo ago
  The herd does fracture and split up. Cows aren't usually alone but they will split into smaller groups. That said, when they see the whole group moving they want to join in. On bigger open ranges you do have to count and go explore to find the two rebels that decided they wanted to be on the other side of the mountain :)
cogman10 6mo ago
We put our cows out to pasture in the mountains in the spring/summer. Without the fancy tech it takes about a day to gather them all up. But you have to realize, this is a job we do once a year. Gathering the cows from the winter pasture is easy because it's a lot smaller. This is why I said the location information could be useful. But, we used horses and anywhere the cows can go a horse can go. > These are operations that don’t use fences. Nope, ranchers own (or lease) the land they put their cows out to pasture on. It's all fenced. > but the American West would have a similar issue where ranchers can run cattle on land leased from BLM. I'm in the american west. And BLM land that is used for grazing is fenced. In fact, that's part of what you are paying for when you buy a lease from the BLM is to maintain the fence.
- deleted 6mo ago
  [deleted]
- defrost 6mo ago
  I'm also rural. Livestock theft, agricultural gear theft, is a real thing in AU/NZ as I suspect it is where you work. One advantage (but is it economic?) to GPS collars on animals is tracking and warnings should they all suddenly accelerate to road transport speeds. There's potential for heartbeat monitoring to warn of fallen / removed collars or predator takedowns. > this is a job we do once a year. And these collars are principally targeted to dairy operations that move herds about on a daily basis. > I'm in the american west. And BLM land that is used for grazing is fenced. I'm from the Kimberley .. what's a fence? * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur5EQ1NZN6A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur5EQ1NZN6A
  - cogman10 6mo ago
    > Livestock theft, agricultural gear theft, is a real thing in AU/NZ as I suspect it is where you work. I mean, I don't want to jinx it, but it's not really been an issue for us. The main theft we've had to deal with is feed theft and that was solved by switching from 50lbs bales to 1 ton bales. > And these collars are principally targeted to dairy operations that move herds about on a daily basis. Yeah, makes sense why it'd doesn't make sense to us. We didn't raise dairy cattle. We did have a couple of dairy cows, but that was more for my family and a few members of the community. Not for any sort of actual real production. I could see how it'd be a time saver in that case as you do have to twice daily gather the cows to get milked.

alterom 6mo ago

> A herd could be spread over thousands of acres, canyons, mountains, all sorts of places to be out of site [sic]. Are you.. mansplaining how herds work to a cow farmer, because you've read an article on HN?

bombcar 6mo ago
This is probably peak HN. Defending a startup device against its very customers! Knowing the perversity of the world it’ll sell millions for unknown reasons. (An argument that it could Defence the west would be a better one, removing herd fences could have value for wildlife).
- alterom 6mo ago
  >An argument that it could Defence the west would be a better one Ah! It just hit me: of course! This is just another one of Peter Thiel's defence ventures! :D

bryanlarsen 6mo ago

It's called a herd for a reason. Usually if you've found one cow you've found them all. In the wild any cow with genes for aloofness quickly got culled by predators. The exceptions are the lame & sick ones, but no fancy gadget is going to bring them in; you've got to take a truck to them.

cogman10 6mo ago
The herd does fracture and split up. Cows aren't usually alone but they will split into smaller groups. That said, when they see the whole group moving they want to join in. On bigger open ranges you do have to count and go explore to find the two rebels that decided they wanted to be on the other side of the mountain :)

cogman10 6mo ago

We put our cows out to pasture in the mountains in the spring/summer. Without the fancy tech it takes about a day to gather them all up. But you have to realize, this is a job we do once a year. Gathering the cows from the winter pasture is easy because it's a lot smaller. This is why I said the location information could be useful. But, we used horses and anywhere the cows can go a horse can go. > These are operations that don’t use fences. Nope, ranchers own (or lease) the land they put their cows out to pasture on. It's all fenced. > but the American West would have a similar issue where ranchers can run cattle on land leased from BLM. I'm in the american west. And BLM land that is used for grazing is fenced. In fact, that's part of what you are paying for when you buy a lease from the BLM is to maintain the fence.

deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]
defrost 6mo ago
I'm also rural. Livestock theft, agricultural gear theft, is a real thing in AU/NZ as I suspect it is where you work. One advantage (but is it economic?) to GPS collars on animals is tracking and warnings should they all suddenly accelerate to road transport speeds. There's potential for heartbeat monitoring to warn of fallen / removed collars or predator takedowns. > this is a job we do once a year. And these collars are principally targeted to dairy operations that move herds about on a daily basis. > I'm in the american west. And BLM land that is used for grazing is fenced. I'm from the Kimberley .. what's a fence? * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur5EQ1NZN6A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur5EQ1NZN6A
- cogman10 6mo ago
  > Livestock theft, agricultural gear theft, is a real thing in AU/NZ as I suspect it is where you work. I mean, I don't want to jinx it, but it's not really been an issue for us. The main theft we've had to deal with is feed theft and that was solved by switching from 50lbs bales to 1 ton bales. > And these collars are principally targeted to dairy operations that move herds about on a daily basis. Yeah, makes sense why it'd doesn't make sense to us. We didn't raise dairy cattle. We did have a couple of dairy cows, but that was more for my family and a few members of the community. Not for any sort of actual real production. I could see how it'd be a time saver in that case as you do have to twice daily gather the cows to get milked.