James Powell of Gwarcwm operate all year-round calving, high input, high output farm. They are currently milking 173 cows, averaging a milk yield of 11,000 litres.
James started using Breeder Tag System early in January 2021 and is already experiencing many benefits in addition to accurate heat detection.
“We installed the system primarily to help with heat detection and I’m really happy that Breeder Tag system is picking up more bulling heifers that might have been missed previously. However, we have also been finding the health and welfare alerts really useful too,” comments James. “The system has detected a few lameness cases, allowing us to spot and treat the problems early. As the system hasn’t been in long, we haven’t had any other problems, such as cases of mastitis, but we are finding it useful as an extra pair of eyes on the farm. When we spot a heat or a health problem whilst busy around the farm, it can be easy to forget the cow’s number. It is reassuring to know that this data will be there on the computer when we get back to the office.”
James also finds the system easy to use. “It takes a couple of days to get used to it, but its user friendly and easy to navigate. It’s simple to find bulling cows and welfare alerts, and all the information about the cow is there to see. It’s also straightforward to enter events such as services, calvings and PDs. I have also found it very easy to retrieve PD lists for the vet.”
James is equally as impressed with the customer support and back up. “We have regular visits to check the system is working as it should and to answer any questions. We were also very impressed on the day of setting up. A team came in, installed the electronics and entered all the cow data onto the computer for us. It worked well and was done in a day, no hassle. We recently had an issue with the tag data not being picked up by the computer. Having reported the problem we had a visit to check the system and the problem was promptly resolved by the Breeder Tag team.”
James concludes, “This year we have decided to use more sexed semen on first service cows followed by beef on subsequent services. Breeder Tag System is a helpful tool to show cows with regular, strong heats, that may be more suitable to serve with sexed semen. We also aim to get all our heifers in calf to sexed semen.”
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