Group housing capability to provide farmers with actionable insights to make informed decisions and to increase capabilities and efficiencies for herds
MSD Animal Health, a division of Merck & Co., Inc., launched SenseHub™ Dairy Youngstock for pre-weaned calves in individual hutches and group housing, the industry’s first monitoring technology for dairy calves from birth through the first 12 months of life, for herds of all sizes. Launch coincides with new updates to SenseHub Ecosystem and SenseHub Dairy aimed at increasing capabilities and efficiencies for herds of all size.
SenseHub Dairy Youngstock makes it easier for dairy producers to detect and locate calves and heifers that need attention. Proprietary, science-based algorithms constantly monitor animal behaviors through the special SenseHub monitoring ear tag. The technology identifies animals that exhibit behaviors that fall outside their individual norms, indicating they may need attention. The SenseHub monitoring ear tag incorporates a blinking LED light so producers and farmers can quickly and easily locate those animals and apply appropriate interventions.
Calves have a natural tendency to hide symptoms of disease. SenseHub Dairy Youngstock helps to overcome this instinctive behavior by identifying potential signs of illness, often before symptoms are apparent to producers or farmers.
“With SenseHub Dairy Youngstock, dairy producers can now harness objective insights to find calves that may need extra care and then provide early intervention to keep them on a path toward becoming healthy and productive cows” said Juan Pedro Campillo, global lead, SenseHub Dairy Youngstock.
This technology also allows dairy farmers to alleviate the increasing labor shortages on farms and benefit when managing their daily operations from their smartphones. The new SenseHub Dairy Youngstock solution increases well-being conditions for the animals and allows for more sustainable herd health management of the farm. The efficiency associated with the technology allows producers and farmers to adjust the workflow on their operation and more effectively utilize their resources.
Tiago Arantes, associate vice president, Global Livestock lead, MSD Animal Health said “With its recent enhancements, the SenseHub Ecosystem can support farms of all sizes in addressing milk price volatility, input costs, labor shortages and environmental challenges, through customizable and integrated tools that provide data to help make more informed choices.”
SenseHub Ecosystem features include:
- SenseHub Services: a new online resource for SenseHub users designed to empower customers with new self-service capabilities.
- SenseHub Insights: an advanced herd management tool to allow farmers to monitor and track trends in their herd and farm management processes which is accessible via SenseHub Services
- New Third-Party Connections to create a more unified technology experience for farmers like ‘Predicta Guardian’ which helps farmers become aware of potential health issues in animals six to eight weeks before they emerge which allow farmers to take a proactive preventative approach.
Similarly, SenseHub Dairy provides greater capacity to cater for larger dairies alongside such as;
- Scalability: Increased capacity from 5,000 to 15,000 animals means large dairies can now also utilize the benefits of the SenseHub Dairy Ecosystem.
- Batch Group Entry: Report customisable events for individual and multiple animals or by preselected groups for a more seamless SenseHub Dairy experience.
- Heat Report Masked by Group Activity: Enhanced functionality of SenseHub Dairy Behavior Monitoring means that a farm can focus its system on those animals that are truly in heat and block the abnormal group activity.
- Third Party LED Task Management: New capability enables SenseHub Dairy users to activate the LED functionality of the SenseHub Dairy Behavior Monitoring Ear Tag through third party software for a more seamless experience.
- SenseHub Dairy Youngstock: Building on last Summer’s launch of the industry’s first monitoring technology for dairy calves from birth through the first 12 months of life.
