New Business idea

FarmJames

Hi Guys,

I am currently building a new product that can track animals in a shed using an app for your smartphone and tags. I am wondering if this is something that you would purchase for your farm and if so if there are any options you would like to see included. Tried putting a poll up but for some reason its not working

My questions are, would you be willing to purchase a device and app to allow you track what medicine had been given to what animal, when they are due if expecting a calf or lamb, etc. What would you expect to pay for such a product. What else would you like see the product do? Thanks for the replies guys.

Tora Bora

FarmJames wrote: »

Hi Guys,

I am currently building a new product that can track animals in a shed. I am wondering if this is something that you would purchase for your farm and if so if there are any options you would like to see included. Can you please take some time and vote on the poll above for me. Thank you all.

What to you mean track an animal in a shed? If they are in the shed surely they don't need tracking:rolleyes:
If you could track one which had gone walkabout in the next door neighbours place, or had been russled in the dead of night by nefarious characters, with small angle grinders etc, to cut your gate locks etc, it might be of more interest.

FarmJames

Tora Bora wrote: »

What to you mean track an animal in a shed? If they are in the shed surely they don't need tracking:rolleyes:
If you could track one which had gone walkabout in the next door neighbours place, or had been russled in the dead of night by nefarious characters, with small angle grinders etc, to cut your gate locks etc, it might be of more interest.

Yes it would do that also, alert you if the animals have moved from the shed also. Its a device that monitors animals whilst in an enclosed shed.

pakalasa

Maybe explain a little more.
It only tracks animals within a shed or confined area, like a stand-off pad right?
Could it be used to track movement on a continous basis? This could be used to detect heat. Cows walk around more during 'heat'.

FarmJames

pakalasa wrote: »

Maybe explain a little more.
It only tracks animals within a shed or confined area, like a stand-off pad right?
Could it be used to track movement on a continous basis? This could be used to detect heat. Cows walk around more during 'heat'.

Okay, sorry, yes, I'll explain a little more. The idea is using a tag on the cows ear to track the position of the cow in the shed or fixed range of 1000 meters. It would allow the farmer see where the cow is at all times within this zone.

The benefits would be that a farmer would know instantly if an animal has escaped/been stolen.

The farmer can input what medicine he/she is given to an animal and each animal that is moved from one area to the 'crush' or where-ever the medicine is administered would be assigned the medicine automatically and then recorded.

if an animal is due a calf - the farmer can let the application know when the cow is due and alert the farmer automatically nearer the time or if the farmer knows when (in the case of artificial insemination) the cow received the calf, it can calculate when it is due and alert farmer to same.

It would advise where the cow is within a certain area, if the animal is moved etc.
The tags would need to go on every animal. It does not rely on heat to detect the animal, just the tag and a reader where the info is stored and sent wirelessly to the smartphone.

pakalasa

No, sorry, by 'heat' , I mean when a cow is 'bulling' or 'oestrus' to use the technical term;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulling_(cattle)

You say a 1000 metres, that would cover most farms, diary anyway. I would seriously look at 'heat detection' though, as that would be the most beneficial to farmers. Cows walk around a lot more when in 'oestrus', so this application could be used as an aid to detect this.

yossor

The application is limited when it can only be used in a shed. Some thing stuck in an animals ear can be easily removed by rustlers and even pullled from the ear by the animal. All you have to do is look at the number of tags that get lost from ears.

I struggle to see the benefit

Tora Bora

That kind if technology seems like something, which should be imbedded in the standard ear tag. I'm sure an electronic ear tag or implant is only a few years away, as compulsory and standard dept issue.
Maybe its the dept of agriculture you should be talking to. They have the power to make an idea like this happen as standard practice.

FarmJames

Yes, now I know what you mean. My parents call it ''matching'' for some reason. Technically this is also possible but with an add on of a pad for the shed would be required in which it would detect an increase in weight on a once off basis. :P

FarmJames

Tora Bora wrote: »

That kind if technology seems like something, which should be imbedded in the standard ear tag. I'm sure an electronic ear tag or implant is only a few years away, as compulsory and standard dept issue.
Maybe its the dept of agriculture you should be talking to. They have the power to make an idea like this happen as standard practice.

Already been in touch with them. They said Europe had control over tags and couldn't recommend one particular type but that's not to stop me using other tags for another purpose.

Tora Bora

FarmJames wrote: »

Already been in touch with them. They said Europe had control over tags and couldn't recommend one particular type but that's not to stop me using other tags for another purpose.

When you have prototypes ready send me a few. I'll stick em on a few teenagers we have here, and see how well they can be tracked. :eek:

blue5000

Tora Bora wrote: »

When you have prototypes ready send me a few. I'll stick em on a few teenagers we have here, and see how well they can be tracked. :eek:

fekkin brilliant tb, you made me laugh for the first time today

Any idea what they will cost OP?

FarmJames

blue5000 wrote: »

fekkin brilliant tb, you made me laugh for the first time today

Any idea what they will cost OP?

Still in that stage. The tags are relatively inexpensive - I believe it would cost similar to what existing tags would cost, possibly a euro or two more. The reader would be what would cost. I have been quoted about 700 euro however you would only need one reader for 1000 meters worth of coverage, this is why it would need to be in a confined area like a shed or small field. The idea is for a farm management software that is easy to use and intuitive, making a farmers life easier.

Tora Bora

blue5000 wrote: »

fekkin brilliant tb, you made me laugh for the first time today

Any idea what they will cost OP?

Tis the feckers in college I'd really like to get a track on:cool: Costing a bomb, and learning .......... ??????, I'd say a tenth of what lads like myself (and you too maybe) learned by leaving school, getting an auld job, and working the way up, and running the auld place in the evenings and mornings, and week ends, and still found enough time to drink a few skips:D:D

Tora Bora

FarmJames wrote: »

Still in that stage. The tags are relatively inexpensive - I believe it would cost similar to what existing tags would cost, possibly a euro or two more. The reader would be what would cost. I have been quoted about 700 euro however you would only need one reader for 1000 meters worth of coverage, this is why it would need to be in a confined area like a shed or small field. The idea is for a farm management software that is easy to use and intuitive, making a farmers life easier.

I dont really get this track in a shed or a very limited range. Why not think about GPS tracking ability? That way, I'm at work, and I can log on the internet and check to see if they are all in the same field they were when I left home this morning:) That would be handy. The technology is already available. Used for tracking car and truck fleets. The thing is getting the cost per head down

leg wax

Tora Bora wrote: »

I dont really get this track in a shed or a very limited range. Why not think about GPS tracking ability? That way, I'm at work, and I can log on the internet and check to see if they are all in the same field they were when I left home this morning:) That would be handy. The technology is already available. Used for tracking car and truck fleets. The thing is getting the cost per head down

why not fence the field properly at the start then you wont need the new toys.:rolleyes:

FarmJames

Tora Bora wrote: »

I dont really get this track in a shed or a very limited range. Why not think about GPS tracking ability? That way, I'm at work, and I can log on the internet and check to see if they are all in the same field they were when I left home this morning:) That would be handy. The technology is already available. Used for tracking car and truck fleets. The thing is getting the cost per head down

Yes the technology exists and I looked into it, problem is the cost. Why would you pay 20 euro per month in data charges for each animal as that is what it would cost. The tag would be much bigger so would have to be around the animals neck which can then be lost or damaged. It would not be viable. The reader can have a data card installed which makes that more affordable and can transmit that information anywhere.

dryan

would also be very handy way of alerting a farmer if an animal is sick as they tend to stay away from the other animals in a field laying under a ditch, etc...

Tora Bora

leg wax wrote: »

why not fence the field properly at the start then you wont need the new toys.:rolleyes:

Yearra, I was only giving the lad with the iPad something to be doing;)

I'd have the fencing middeling enough to be fair, .......... odd auld pallet here and there with all the running and burning the two ends of the candle

jerdee

that would be very handy if you looked into that as partimers find it hard to be around exactly when calving...

djmc

What id like to see is a sort of micro chip like they put in pet dogs or horses
inserted under the cattles skin which would contain all the details of animal
like on the blue card which could be read from a scanner
It would make tb testing etc a lot faster.
An added bonus would be if they could be tracked from a distance like cell phones or sim cards etc. The cattle rustlers would get some land.
On a side note I feel someone must be killing stolen animals and selling meat
illegley without passports

FarmJames

djmc wrote: »

What id like to see is a sort of micro chip like they put in pet dogs or horses
inserted under the cattles skin which would contain all the details of animal
like on the blue card which could be read from a scanner
It would make tb testing etc a lot faster.
An added bonus would be if they could be tracked from a distance like cell phones or sim cards etc. The cattle rustlers would get some land.
On a side note I feel someone must be killing stolen animals and selling meat
illegley without passports

I would like to see this myself, however the technology is not small enough at present. Ideally, that type of technology would be a nano device with internal circuitry to transmit the signal and dissolvable. The microchip for dogs also is an animal that does not be eaten so would not end up in the food chain whereas with an animal going for slaughter, it could end up in someones dinner. Unless the microchip was dissolvable or placed in a part of the animals body that was not edible, it wouldn't work I'm afraid.

Tora Bora

FarmJames wrote: »

I would like to see this myself, however the technology is not small enough at present. Ideally, that type of technology would be a nano device with internal circuitry to transmit the signal and dissolvable. The microchip for dogs also is an animal that does not be eaten so would not end up in the food chain whereas with an animal going for slaughter, it could end up in someones dinner. Unless the microchip was dissolvable or placed in a part of the animals body that was not edible, it wouldn't work I'm afraid.

Unless you are partial to the occasional Chinese:D

Tackleberrywho

RFID would do what you want, but could be prohibitively expensive.
I have experience with RFID tracking and am aware of their benefits and downfalls.

In cattle/cows an RFID would have to be surgically implanted to be of any use as ears are not the answer, ear tags can fall out and cheap to place if they do.
RFID's not so cheap.
1000 metres is a very large area for RFID technology, you would need a lot of triangulation stations to correlate the signal to give approximate location.

For giving dose Data RFID's would work extremely well.
The cheapest solution for rustling is better security and a good dog

FarmJames

Tackleberrywho wrote: »

RFID would do what you want, but could be prohibitively expensive.
I have experience with RFID tracking and am aware of their benefits and downfalls.

In cattle/cows an RFID would have to be surgically implanted to be of any use as ears are not the answer, ear tags can fall out and cheap to place if they do.
RFID's not so cheap.
1000 metres is a very large area for RFID technology, you would need a lot of triangulation stations to correlate the signal to give approximate location.

For giving dose Data RFID's would work extremely well.
The cheapest solution for rustling is better security and a good dog

It depends on the type of RFID you use, the readers can be the most expensive part, the tags can cost as little as 11 euro if they are passive and can be designed the same as the standard yellow tag that are used for cattle at present. The battery lasts for 5 years. From what the company, I've been talking to, they do RFID readers that can receive a signal from 1000 meters but only one is required. They find the tags, the tags basically 'just put their hands up' so to speak and the reader can identify them. They are used successfully in prisons and old folks homes :P

leg wax

FarmJames wrote: »

It depends on the type of RFID you use, the readers can be the most expensive part, the tags can cost as little as 11 euro if they are passive and can be designed the same as the standard yellow tag that are used for cattle at present. The battery lasts for 5 years. From what the company, I've been talking to, they do RFID readers that can receive a signal from 1000 meters but only one is required. They find the tags, the tags basically 'just put their hands up' so to speak and the reader can identify them. They are used successfully in prisons and old folks homes :P

i want one please , love to be trying to tell my mother that i have to stick this in her ear to track her, new dept rules for the sfp.:D

ceannfort

Is this the same principal as the smart bolus by tenXsys

FarmJames

ceannfort wrote: »

Is this the same principal as the smart bolus by tenXsys

Similar principal as that product yes. I'm hoping to make it more user friendly and offer more services but on the same level of functionality.

ceannfort

In theory could be great depending on cost af course but it would need to do the following.
- Identify cows in heat
- Identify the onset of calving
- Identify early sickness in cows
(apparently body temperature changes can identify all above??)
for me actual physical location of animals wouldnt be that important. however the system would need to work outdoors aswell to have a wide market. would it be possible to say attach the system to a calf creep feeder that moved with the cattle that contains a solar powered reader?

FarmJames

ceannfort wrote: »

In theory could be great depending on cost af course but it would need to do the following.
- Identify cows in heat
- Identify the onset of calving
- Identify early sickness in cows
(apparently body temperature changes can identify all above??)
for me actual physical location of animals wouldnt be that important. however the system would need to work outdoors aswell to have a wide market. would it be possible to say attach the system to a calf creep feeder that moved with the cattle that contains a solar powered reader?

Yes it would be possible using a solar powered reader. I'm envisaging two products, one fixed and one mobile if required.
The body temperture issue is technically possible however how feasible it is, is another story. It would require a probe to be inserted into the animal to test the internal temperture as is not accurate from body heat alone. This could be done but it can add expense to the product and would require testing to ensure it is not uncomfortable to the animal.
Just as an aside, how much would you be willing to pay for a product like this, knowing that the tags are reusable and the reader only needs to be replaced if in the rare case it goes faulty if it comes in a package and can do all you requested it to do.