As the spring calving season approaches for many producers, tools like barn cameras have helped decrease labor of checking cows and lower calf mortality due to catching issues sooner. With a variety of options and features, cameras allow producers to check cows and calves from their phone, iPad, computer or TV.
Norman Angus Ranch in Crawford, Neb., is a commercial and registered Angus operation with a focus on selling weaned steer and heifer calves in October and yearling bulls in their April bull sale. With about 300 cows calving between January and March, they began using CowCam cameras for calving more than four years ago.
With their barn set up, cameras are mounted to ensure there aren’t any spots that can’t be seen. They also have cameras mounted to view the outside pens.
“We did the first set of cameras here at the home place and then a year or two years later we asked the guy if there was a way we could sync our cameras to our other place that’s just south of our house like an eighth of a mile,” Erin Norman says. “We set up a bunch of cameras there too.”
Erin also notes the cameras are especially beneficial in the fact you can monitor a cow calving without disturbing her by walking into the barn.
“When you put something in the barn that’s calving, it kind of speeds up the process instead of checking every 30 minutes by walking out there and getting an animal up and disturbing her,” she says.
Luke Norman likes being able to replay the cameras and closely monitor calves for complications.
“We can see the sack the over the nose or if she won’t stand up and break the sack off the calf, and so we can make a mad dash out there and get her up in time and get the sack off the nose and save the calf, which has totally already paid for the cameras themselves.”
These specific cameras have zoom features, black and white or color features, and the ones in the barn have audio. For more rural ranches, the downside to these cameras is the need for stronger internet service.
Chris Clark, Iowa State University field beef specialist, says he would venture to guess that some of the unknown causes of death, some of the infectious diseases and injuries would go back to calving-related and weather-related problems.
“So to me that that really speaks to the point that if we do a good job of managing the calving process, and if we can protect those neonatal calves from weather extremes, we should be able to save a tremendous number of calves, and, especially in today’s market, that brings great value,” Clark says.
Approximately 10% of heifers require assistance when calving, and 4% of cows require assistance according to the National Animal Health Monitoring System. They also reported most producers check cows two times per day.
“That’s where camera technology may become helpful,” Clark explains. “Can we make it easier and more efficient to check those females so that you can do it more frequently?”
What to Look for When Buying a Camera
What Clark recommends considering when looking at camera brands is the type of area will you be monitoring, how big that area is, how many pens, how many head and if it is an indoor or an outdoor area.
Then, he says to evaluate your goals for the camera system. Do you want just a livestream or a system where you can playback the footage?
“Maybe you want a very simple live-stream-only system where you just want the ability to periodically check in, and maybe it’s just for doing night checks so you don’t have to get up and get dressed and get out into the cold, but you can log on to the office computer and get that snapshot in time, assess what’s happening right now and then come back and check again in a few hours,” Clark says.
He adds if you happen to log on and find a female in Stage 2 of labor, but you don’t know exactly how she’s been progressing over the last hour or two, could you go back and watch footage from that previous time frame and kind of see exactly where we’re at in her calving process.
“Maybe we want to know if a calf has nursed,” he says. “So we want to know if the calf has received colostrum. I think there are things like that that can be really useful and valuable.”
Benefits Beyond Calving Season
Barn cameras don’t have to be used just for calving. While monitoring calving is the the most popular reason for installation there are many other benefits. Once a system is installed, they can be used year-round for heat detection, monitoring feeding habits, monitoring behavior, health management and security.
Your Next Read:
Your Calving Prep Starts Here: The Essential Checklist
What You Should Know About the 3 Stages of Calving
9 Tips to Ensure Calving Season Success
