A DAIRY farmer says data recorded on ear tag sensors alerted him that cows in his Holstein Friesian herd were at high risk of rumen acidosis.

Stephen Morse had changed the feed ration of his high yielding herd on the advice of a nutritionist; this resulted in a reduction in fibre intake. At that time, he was trialing an electronic ear tag sensor system which records cow movement associated with eating, ruminating, walking and estrus activity.

“We thought the change in diet was the right one at that time but the cows responded badly,’’ recalled Mr Morse, of Capel Farm, near Carmarthen.

“The system alerted us that the eating pattern had changed and we knew we had a problem. We immediately switched back to the original diet. Within seven days we had two or three cows that did go down with acidosis but it could have been far more serious had we not acted when we did. We caught the cows early and were able to treat them promptly.’’

Mr Morse runs a fully housed system with his parents, Roger and Jean, partner, Nicola, and sons, Morgan and Joseff. The herd calves all the year round.

The family was keen to improve heat detection rates and trialled the Agis CowManager SensOor. This double temperature sensor takes multi-point measurements and also records movement specific to eating and ruminating as well as walking and estrus activity.

Routers gather data from the sensor and relay it back to a central coordinator, delivering that information to Mr Morse’s computer.

Following a two-month trial, the Morses invested £14,000 to install the new system, fitting the herd with ear tag activity monitors. Every animal is tagged as soon as she has calved for the first time.

Mr Morse said he is already seeing significant benefits from electronically monitoring cow health. “Often cows will come into heat overnight and are only on heat for a couple of hours. Previously those cows were being missed,’’ he explained.

Although Mr Morse can’t put a figure on the improvement in heat detection rates he is confident that they have improved considerably. He also spends less time observing cows.

The system allows farmers the option of buying modules for fertility, health and feeding separately. Mr Morse chose to buy all three. He says he can keep a close eye on the health of the herd because he can quickly identify sick cows.

The sensor allows him to see how often a cow chews her cud. He can monitor how the herd reacts to changes in the ration and make adjustments faster than waiting for a milk response.

By combining temperature with activity, Mr Morse can see if the cow is lying down and chewing her cud or has a temperature while lying down without ruminating.

“If a cow is running a bit of a temperature we can catch her before it gets too high,’’ he said. “Also, if a cow isn’t ruminating, we can treat her immediately which means she is less likely to get a displaced abomasum and need an operation.’’

Previously, a drop in milk yield might have alerted Mr Morse that a cow was unwell but this was not always spotted.

Before he installed the system, he had been in charge of every milking but he now employs a new member of staff to milk in the mornings.

“The new system definitely helps from a management point of view, I can rely on it to give me the information I need when I am not in the parlour. It allows me to identify potentially sick cows before visible symptoms appear and it means they are treated earlier. Because of this, we can often avoid a drop in yield.’’

The system keeps a graph of the eating pattern and if this changes he knows he has a problem.

If there are deviations from the herd’s normal pattern, an alert is sent to Mr Morse’s computer. The warnings are flagged up in three colours with red alerting the farmer that a cow needs immediate attention.

“If I had a smartphone, the alert could be sent to that also,’’ said Mr Morse. “Today the system has flagged up the health status of one cow as ‘suspicious’ on a yellow colour coding. This was a cow that we had been treating for lameness so we had been aware of her. If the warning had come up as red we would have known there was a more serious problem.’’