Tech makes joining easier

With 600 cows and four calving seasons, James Parish embraced technology to simplify joining, improve health monitoring, and lighten the daily workload.

The Parishes have a pasture-based system but they feed a lot of grain, batch hay and buy local hay in the area to feed the cows and young stock.

They calve four times a year — in February, May, August and November.

The family relies on shared data and connected tools to stay on top of things.

“Every milking cow has a sensor. My brother uses the platform and so does my father; we all keep a close eye on the cows together,” James said.

With constant joining and a heavy focus on animal health, they needed a system that would give reliable insights and real-time alerts.

“We started using the CowManager system two years ago. We chose the CowManager sensors for the back-up support and because we prefer ear tags over collars,” James said.

“The Fertility Module is important because we’re joining all year round, and we just use AI. And the Health Module is important as well for seeing how the cows are eating, and if we have any sick cows,” he said.

“"You get notifications from the app all day so if something happens and it needs your attention, you’ve got all information straight away.”

James said CowManager integrated seamlessly with their dairy software.

“We use Jantec in the dairy and it was as simple as ringing up Jantec to make sure it all works properly. We haven’t had any issues since.

“The benefit of them being integrated is that all the CowManager alerts go straight into Jantec. So, all of the heat and health alerts automatically come up when we want to draft.”

He said one of the biggest benefits had been heat detection.

“We were using stickers beforehand, but after two weeks of using both stickers and CowManager, the stickers disappeared. We just rely on the CowManager system now for heats — it’s more accurate.”

James said all the data in the system was easy to find and very easy to understand.

“You can look up individual cows to find pretty much anything. The reports on the PC are really handy as well. It gives you early indications of how many you’ve got in calf, any suspect aborted cows that you can get rechecked.”

The added control of sexed semen timing means more strategic decisions.

“We use the Insemination Window to select the right cows for sexed semen. If they’re not in the right window and they’re too early, then we’ll not join them in the morning and wait ’til the pm to join them.”

Frequent calving can increase the risk of health issues, but CowManager’s alerts are helping them act earlier and faster, according to James.

“The health alerts from CowManager are really good. They pick on rumination and eating and can tell you how the cows are performing.

“But for sick alerts, the temperature alert is the best. It gives you very quick information on whether a cow is actually sick and needs treating.

“Just because we’re calving so often, the temperature alert from CowManager picks up a lot of cases of milk fever. We can see from the phone straight away if a cow is down and needs treating.

“You get an alert, and you know which cows to look out for. Whereas before CowManager, we were checking every cow individually to make sure that she wasn’t sick.”

With the whole family now involved in managing the herd through a single platform, there’s more confidence in every decision.

“I’d recommend CowManager to anyone who asks what system we’re using, or if anyone has any doubts about getting a system,” James said.

From CowManager.