Smart Farming - Beef Producers

The Digital Farmhand: How AI is Solving the Agricultural Labor Crisis

Wed, 13 May 2026 12:00:36 GMT

Agriculture is facing a historic labor shortage at the same time artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping how the world operates. Some fear AI adoption will result in job loss and businesses being left behind due to rapidly evolving technology. Others say AI is the digital farmhand agriculture needs right now to handle repetitive data tasks while humans focus on high-value animal husbandry or field work.

Either way, one thing is true – AI is not going anywhere.

“Whether AI replaces jobs or not depends on how the industry chooses to use it,” says Angel Andaya, manager of digital solutions for Silver Support, a managed development center supporting operations, finance, digital solutions, information technology and automation services.

If AI is seen purely as a replacement, she says that is likely the direction it will take. But it could also become a powerful tool to help farm operations thrive despite labor challenges.

The “Why Now” of AI: Accessibility and Adoption

While AI has existed for years (think Netflix recommendations and GPS), the launch of ChatGPT marked a paradigm shift that made the technology conversational and accessible to everyone, says Tracy Soper, senior director of data excellence at Keystone Cooperative.

“At 100 million [users] in two months, ChatGPT’s growth is unheard of – nothing has grown that fast,” Soper said at the National Pedigreed Livestock Council’s annual meeting. “Why? Because it was conversational and easy to access. It was something all of us could touch and could relate to, like, ‘Oh, this is a thing. It makes my life easier.’”

In the past, technology adoption took years. Now, it happens in months, creating a sense of “AI hysteria” and a need for clear strategy, he adds.

Problem First, People Always

Rather than viewing AI as a replacement for human expertise, it should be viewed as an amplification tool, he says. The strategy is to avoid expensive shelfware by starting with specific business problems.

“It can do a lot of things, but how are we going to use it?” Soper asks. “For us at Keystone, AI is not about replacing people; it’s making people better.”

Years ago, Soper says his job was to look over all things related to information technology (IT). Today that looks like AI and automation solutions as the cooperative’s scale has grown.

“For us, it’s starting very specifically with what problem we’re trying to solve today and then asking, ‘Why can’t we solve it with what we’ve got?’” he says.

Keystone takes a four-step approach:

1. Start with the problem, not the technology.

“AI only creates value when it’s solving a real business challenge. Companies that buy a tool, hand it to IT and expect magic end up with expensive shelfware,” Soper says.

2. Data readiness before algorithms.

“Any insight is only as good as the data feeding it,” he says. “We invested significant time building a modern data foundation before ever pursuing AI.”

3. Amplify expertise – don’t replace it.

“AI is not replacing agronomists, breed managers or the people closest to the animals. It’s amplifying their experience and sharpening their decision timing,” Soper explains.

4. Your data is the competitive edge.

“The competitive gap will be built on data readiness as much as algorithms,” he says.

In the future, Keystone is working actively in predictive machine learning and generative AI, using them to improve decision timing, streamline operations and better serve the producers who depend on the cooperative.

Shorten Time-Consuming Tasks

AI helps experts ask better questions sooner, Soper says. With data flowing more freely across the value chain, he believes there is great opportunity where AI and animal data converge.

For example, computer vision for body condition scoring, lameness detection and welfare monitoring is moving from research into practice in many barns. He’s also excited about how AI-assisted genomic prediction and health monitoring are advancing across species and can help make progress more quickly.

Andaya encourages farmers to think about the daily realities on the farm. What tasks are essential, but time consuming and repetitive?

“Even small improvements in how they are managed can free up valuable time and improve decision-making on the ground,” Andaya says.

If these processes are supported through AI, she believes it will enable farmers and their employees to focus more on animal welfare, planning and improving overall farm productivity.

“In this sense, AI is less about replacement and more about giving farmers and livestock teams the space to focus on what truly matters,” she says.

4 Tips for Successful AI Implementation

Agriculture and livestock operations are full of valuable data from daily logs to finances, Andaya explains.

“What’s changing is how effectively this information can be used,” she says.

Soper says Keystone has learned four important lessons in their journey to use AI more efficiently.

1. Data quality is everything.

Start with the data you own. Then budget time for discovery and cleanup.

2. Build for the people doing the work.

The tool needs to make someone’s job easier or it won’t get used. AI should amplify good discipline.

3. Scope tight, prove value first.

Prove it works before you scale. The business has to own the problem – IT enables, but stakeholders drive adoption and define success.

4. Governance can’t wait.

Policies around approved tools, data and data protection need to exist before people experiment. Once people start using AI on their own, it’s harder to rein in.

Re-imagining the Ranch: How Virtual Fencing is Turning "Moonscapes" into Profitable Pastures

Fri, 08 May 2026 12:53:26 GMT

U.S. beef producers are using virtual fencing to create pastures this summer where none existed last year. They also are using the tool to create business opportunities for themselves.

Canda Mueller is a third-generation cow-calf producer in western Oklahoma. Growing up in the business, Mueller has the experience and the space to raise cattle. Whether she could do so profitably was another question. Years of weather extremes have taken a toll on the land and the quality of forage available. Some areas on her 640 acres looked more like a moonscape than a pasture, Mueller explains.

“We’ve seen so many things happen in the extreme weather of western Oklahoma,” she says. “Using virtual fencing, we’re reimagining how we fence cattle and how we move them from place to place. We’re able to correct or improve how we did things in the past when we didn’t have the tools or the knowledge we have now.”

Five years ago, Mueller started being more intentional about where she placed bales on the quarter of the property she lives on. She placed bales on areas with poor soil quality to draw cattle to the sites despite the lack of forage. As the cattle eat the bales, bits of uneaten hay become mulch for the soil, and their manure provides nutrients. Even their saliva feeds the soil microbiome to improve it for future forage growth.

“Anything they leave behind is good cover and protection for the soil,” Mueller says. “I’m creating a plan so I don’t have to apply fertilizer. The cows put as much back into the ground as I’m taking out.”

Mueller could see improvement in the areas she was bale grazing, so she kept at it. Two years ago, she started intentionally rotational grazing across her property to rest the pasture she had been working on.

“I realized virtual fencing made more sense than moving hot wires or investing in traditional barbed fencing,” Mueller says. “Hot wire, in particular, wasn’t working because the ground was too dry for the cattle to pay attention to it.”

Instead of fencing, Mueller draws paddock boundaries using an app on her phone or a platform on her laptop. Her cows wear GPS-enabled collars that deliver audio cues to encourage them to return to the herd if they approach the boundaries. If a cow continues to the boundary, the collar delivers a mild electrical pulse to reinforce the audio cue. After a seven- to 10-day controlled training period, the majority of cattle respond to the audio cues and never need the pulse.

Virtual fencing also made another forage improvement tactic possible: multispecies grazing. Mueller has been impressed with the results. Grazing goats alongside her cattle has made it faster and easier to improve forage quality. The goats eat small elm trees and other problematic brush that cows won’t eat, and they help in the ongoing battle against cedar trees, which consume a lot of water, Mueller says. The goats’ smaller hooves create divots that help pull water into the dry ground in the case of rain.

“They have made a big difference on the ground and improving the soil to improve grazing for the cattle,” Mueller says.

Melanie Jacobs, owner of Heritage Hooves, raises Pinewoods cattle on 200 acres north of Birmingham, Ala., and markets beef to consumers. She uses Nofence virtual fencing to grow her grazing program without adding physical fences and to rotate cattle through paddocks or bring them to a corral for handling.

(Nofence)

New Business With an “Old” Breed

Across the country, Melanie Jacobs is also reimagining what raising beef cattle can look like. Jacobs and her husband, Johnny, raise Pineywoods cattle on 200 acres about 60 miles north of Birmingham, Ala., and market beef directly to consumers. They did not plan to get into the beef business when they bought the property.

“We always said we would not have cattle,” Jacobs says. “Dad’s cows were always getting out, and there were so many challenges. I had no interest in doing that kind of work.”

However, the Jacobses agreed to take two Pineywoods cows and a donkey when they took over the property. Despite themselves, they fell in love with the livestock.

Virtual fencing helped turn that love into a business. Pineywoods cattle are hardy and low maintenance, which is a good fit for the rocky, hilly property. They are a heritage breed tied to the history of the Southern U.S., and Jacobs has joined a network of Pineywoods breeders who share what they learn with each other.

Jacobs was preparing to graze cattle rotationally in a large pasture and wanted to graze them for a short time in a wooded area to help manage brush. A neighbor’s harvested cornfield kept catching her attention, and she wanted to find a way to include it in her grazing plan.

“The physical fences around the field were in poor condition, and it felt like wasted opportunity,” Jacobs says. “Using virtual fencing, we added that cornfield into our rotation without having to build a new fence. We improved how we graze without adding inputs.”

Flexibility Empowers Success

Mueller and Jacobs appreciate how the virtual fencing system sends alerts to changes in cattle behavior. They can see when a cow separates herself from the herd and stops grazing, indicating she might be starting to calve. Jacobs also uses the virtual fencing system to bring cattle to the corral when needed.

“We just cinch their virtual pasture down and bring them in close so we can get them into the corral,” she says.

Mueller can’t say enough about the value of being able to move cattle without having to dedicate time or needing to be physically present.

“I’m a consultant and travel a lot for my other job. It is so helpful to get alerts when I need to check on a cow,” Mueller summarizes. “I can move the (virtual) fence while I’m traveling. I was in Mexico last week for work, changing the boundaries and texting my significant other to check on a cow. It’s such an incredible change in how I can work, and it gives me peace of mind that my cattle are OK.”

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Spot check: Small Actions Can Unlock Pasture Profitability

Wed, 06 May 2026 12:08:44 GMT

If you feel like you didn’t have enough time to prepare pastures this spring, you’re not alone. Many producers feel that once the grass starts growing, they don’t get to stop for a breath until June.

The good news is, producers still have time to make positive changes this year. Forage management is a year-round practice, and producers can do plenty of things now in early summer to improve forage performance and, in turn, cattle performance.

Forage Quality and Quantity

What looks like a beautiful, lush early summer pasture might really be too lush to provide quality nutrition. New growth forage lacks fiber. It’s high in protein, which is great for putting weight on calves, but the lack of fiber reduces the animal’s ability to absorb nutrients.

Greg Brann, a livestock producer and grazing consultant from Adolphus, Ky., encourages producers to leave a few paddocks with six inches or more of grass over winter.

(Nofence)

“In a perfect world, you would have a few paddocks that you didn’t graze hard in the fall where you left 6 inches or more of grass over winter,” says Greg Brann, a livestock producer and grazing consultant from Adolphus, Ky. “In that case, you’d have some older grass with higher fiber that can slow down the rate of passage of the fresh, new grass through the animal and allow them to absorb more nutrients.”

If last fall you weren’t able to plan to create a mix of mature and fresh grass, now is the time to make plans to do so for next year. It’s also a good time to observe the overall quantity and quality of forage in your pastures.

Observe cattle grazing patterns to monitor forage quantity. Selective grazing indicates enough forage is available that cattle can pick and choose their favorites. If cattle continue to graze during the heat of the day rather than in the morning or evening, it’s an indication that they are not getting enough forage to meet their needs.

Watch their manure to observe the forage quality, which is defined by the mix of protein and fiber. Runny manure is not desirable, nor is manure that stacks, Brann says. Manure the consistency of pumpkin pie filling indicates adequate fiber for cattle nutrition.

Looking Ahead to June

It’s early yet, but as the season progresses, Brann typically gets a lot of questions about mowing. Mowing is a useful practice to manage weeds and improve pasture quality, but it costs money, especially when fuel prices are high.

An alternative to mowing is high-density grazing by holding 40,000 lb. or more of livestock in one paddock. This tactic knocks down grass to shade out weeds, similarly to how mowing would. And it has the added benefit of fertilizing the soil with manure.

“A common practice is to control vegetation when weeds make up 20% or more of the forage mix in a pasture,” Brann says. “When I mow, I prefer to do so after grazing and not mow more than 20% of the total pasture acreage at one time.”

Brann can make quick adjustments to stocking density to meet the nutritional needs of the cattle and the growing speed of the forage because he uses virtual fencing, a tool that allows producers to manage where cattle graze without the use of physical fences.

Brann creates paddock boundaries using an app on his phone or a platform on his computer. His livestock wear GPS-enabled collars that deliver audio cues to encourage them to return to the herd if they approach the boundaries.

If an animal continues to the boundary, the collar delivers a mild electrical pulse to reinforce the audio cue. After a seven- to 10-day controlled training period, the majority of cattle respond to the audio cues and never need the pulse.

Beyond Containment

Virtual fencing does more than contain cattle. It gives producers time back in their day because they don’t have to move or repair physical fences. It also gives them data they can use to refine their pasture management plans.

For example, reviewing cattle grazing patterns in the virtual fence app or platform can help identify areas of a pasture that are being over- or under-grazed so producers can determine the cause and how to address it.

Virtual fencing gives producers something that’s hard to come by in a busy season: the option to use their time differently. Producers can choose to stop and take a breath, refine their grazing strategies or work on another aspect of their business.

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Halter Launches World-First Virtual Fencing Via Satellite

Tue, 28 Apr 2026 17:22:54 GMT

Halter, the leading digital operating system for pasture-based ranches, today announced the launch of direct-to-satellite connectivity for its smart cattle collars — a world-first that removes the need for cell towers or on-ranch infrastructure.

Using Starlink, the new technology enables ranchers to manage cattle anywhere they can see the sky. Combined with a suite of new tools for reproduction, animal behavior and precision pasture management, the release significantly expands what is possible for cattle ranch management.

Beef ranchers in remote and rugged regions that were limited by connectivity can now turn to virtual fencing to run more productive and sustainable operations — at a time when they face rising fuel costs, labor shortages and aging workforce pressures.

Halter’s internal modeling estimates direct-to-satellite capability expands coverage of the U.S. beef cattle market by 2.5x.

Until now, Halter’s solar-powered, GPS-enabled collars relied on Halter’s proprietary long-range radio towers. With direct-to-satellite, the collars can communicate via Starlink, eliminating ground infrastructure entirely.

“Connectivity has been the final barrier to bringing virtual fencing across remote and expansive ranches,” says Craig Piggott, CEO and founder of Halter. “Direct-to-satellite allows ranchers to manage hundreds of thousands of acres in the most remote terrain on the planet. Combined with our new suite of product features, these ranchers can be even more productive.”

HALTER 2026 | High Lonesome Ranch | Loma, CO

(Halter)

Case Study: Managing 225,000 Acres at High Lonesome Ranch

Lloyd Calvert, livestock and agriculture manager at High Lonesome Ranch in western Colorado, has been among the first to deploy the satellite-enabled system across the ranch’s 225,000 acres of complex terrain.

“Halter has changed the game completely,” Calvert says. “Satellite unlocks the ability to run very remote country while still seeing what the cattle are doing, without needing someone with them all the time. We call ourselves Halter junkies now because we can check to see where the cows are any time of day, no matter where I am. It gives me a great deal of assurance and that’s irreplaceable.”

Beyond the Fence: New Tools for Heat Detection and Feed Demand

Alongside the launch, Halter has rolled out its largest-ever product upgrade for beef cattle ranchers. The update includes an all-in-one heat detection tool to identify non-cycling animals before breeding, a new behavior tool providing near real-time insight into how feed allocation and pasture quality are influencing cattle performance and advanced grazing features including high-resolution pasture mapping, pasture metrics, zone and block management and a feed demand calculator.

Since Halter launched in the U.S. in 2024, it has expanded to more than 25 states. Globally, its customers have created nearly 900,000 miles of virtual fencing.

Halter direct-to-satellite will be available to beef operations in the U.S., New Zealand and coming soon to Australia and Canada. Interested ranchers can learn more at halterhq.com/beef

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5 Ways Smart Collars Improve Grazing

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:31:22 GMT

Virtual fencing is suddenly everywhere in ranching headlines — but not every operation is a fit. In a wide-ranging discussion on the “ Future of Beef Show ,” Halter President Andrew Fraser walks through the practical questions producers should ask, from herd size and terrain to water infrastructure, labor and available cost-share programs.

Fraser, originally from New Zealand, with a background in management consulting, mining and tech startups, was the featured guest on episode 20 of the Future of Beef podcast. Halter spent about five years in research and development, and is now commercially active in New Zealand, Australia and the U.S. with more than 750,000 animals on the system.

“If we were being fancy, we would say that it’s an operating system for a farmer. But really at the heart of it, we are a collar for cows,” Fraser explains.

Beyond grass and fencing, Fraser sees Halter as a tool for addressing some of ranching’s most pressing human challenges: labor and succession. By automating low-value tasks like shifting poly wire and checking distant pastures, Halter lets employees focus more on animal care and land stewardship.

A Collar, an App and Virtual Fences

Halter’s system centers on a lightweight, above-neck collar and a phone app. Ranchers use the app to draw virtual fences or breaks on a map. The collars then hold or move cattle using sound and vibration cues, with a very mild pulse as a back-up.

When an animal approaches a virtual boundary, it hears a directional beep in one ear to encourage it to turn back. When it’s moving the right way, it feels a gentle vibration — something Fraser likens to a smartwatch buzz — as positive reinforcement.

Halter can also shift cattle between paddocks, replacing the need for riders, dogs or temporary electric fence to move a herd. Behind the scenes, the collars continuously track behavior such as grazing, ruminating, resting and walking, plus GPS location.

In dairy herds, Halter already uses this behavior data for heat detection and health alerts. In beef systems, it’s being used for grazing management, stock location and early warning of unusual behavior.

Training Cows with Sound, Not Shock

Fraser is quick to point out that Halter is designed around sound, not pain.

“Even our strongest pulse is 1/50 the strength of an electric fence,” he says. “So, this is not a significant shock, or anything like what cows are used to with hot wire or poly wire.”

Training a herd typically takes two to seven days. Ranchers start with an existing strip of hot wire, then gradually move it and pair the fence with sound cues, teaching cows to use sound instead of a visible wire as their boundary.

According to the podcast discussion, here are five ways a smart collar can change how producers graze cattle:

1. Turn Fixed Fences into Flexible, On‑Demand Paddocks

With virtual fencing, producers can draw the paddock on an app instead of building it with posts and wire.

“On your app, you’ll draw where you want your cows to stay, or your cattle to stay, and they will stay there,” Fraser explains.
Using the Halter system, producers can:

Tighten or loosen breaks day‑to‑day.
Change paddock shape, for example hub‑and‑spoke around water instead of rectangles.
Redraw setbacks along waterways or sensitive areas instantly as rules or conditions change.

According to Fraser, using Halter, producers can graze to the residuals they want, in the spots they want, without being locked into permanent fencelines.

2. Intensify Rotational Grazing and Boost Pasture Utilization

For all the technology involved — solar-powered collars and towers, satellite data, and machine learning — Fraser insists Halter’s value proposition starts with something simple: better grass management.

Because cattle can be kept in tighter areas and moved frequently with sound cues, rotational grazing becomes much more precise and practical. Fraser says producers “should be able to make the cost of Halter back from gains in pasture alone.”

By holding cattle in small areas and moving them often, Fraser says:

You push cattle to eat more uniformly — not just the “ice cream” spots.
You protect regrowth by not overgrazing favorite areas.
You can raise stocking rate or hold numbers steady with fatter cattle.

He gave an example of a Wyoming ranch that went from grazing approximately 800 to 1,500 head in a year, pairing Halter with better water infrastructure to fully use its grass.

3. Replace Chase-and-Pressure Moves with Calm, Low‑Stress Shifts

Instead of horses, bikes, dogs and yelling, with the Halter system cattle learn to move on their own in response to sound and vibration. Fraser explains the cues are beeps in one ear or the other to turn left or right. Apple Watch–style vibrations are positive reinforcement when they’re headed the right way.

This changes how producers graze by turning musters and shifts into scheduled, low‑stress, almost “hands‑off” events, which is better for cattle, people and time use.

4. Use Data on Behavior and Biomass to Refine Grazing Decisions

Smart collars and supporting tools give real data on what’s happening in the paddock, not just gut feel. Behind the scenes, Halter has invested heavily in data science and artificial intelligence (AI). Today, Halter uses on-collar machine learning to interpret behavior, plus satellite imagery and weather data to estimate pasture biomass and residuals.

Halter helps producers track where cows are, how long they graze, ruminate, rest and move. It can help calculate how many tons of dry matter are consumed.

“We’re able to tell you what the residual is when the cow goes in, what the residual is when the cow leaves,” Fraser says.

This helps ranchers understand herd-level dry matter consumption between moves. Looking ahead, Fraser is especially interested in individual cow feed efficiency — answering a question many ranchers have wondered about for years.

Right now, he said, producers know which cows are the heaviest or give the most milk, but not how much forage each one eats to get there. Halter hopes to help identify animals that eat less but still perform well, offering new levers for genetic selection, profitability and sustainability.

Today, consumption data is built from satellite data plus time in paddock plus behavior. He says the research and development aim is to go from herd-level to cow-level intake, so producers know which cows are genuinely efficient, not just big eaters.

5. Integrate Grazing with Water, Labor, Risk and Regulations

Fraser summarizes once producers can move virtual fences easily, grazing decisions connect more tightly to other constraints:

Water access: Producers can design hub‑and‑spoke paddocks around fixed water or move small troughs and redraw breaks to match.
Labor: Less time on poly wire and fence repair frees people up for land and animal work; Fraser notes that avoiding “boring tasks” is a big benefit.
Risk and emergencies: Ranchers have used Halter to move cattle in floods or fires when it’s unsafe or impossible for people to go in, and fences might burn or wash out.
Changing rules: When riparian buffer rules tightened in New Zealand, farms with Halter simply redrew the virtual exclusion zones. “If you had fencing, that would have been a huge cost to move all of that. If you had Halter, you just drew a different break on your phone,” Fraser says.

Those factors change grazing from a mostly fence‑ and labor‑limited system to one that’s more data‑, water‑ and policy‑aware, and much quicker to adjust.

Not a Fit For Everyone

Fraser was upfront that Halter falls short or isn’t a fit yet for:

Very small “hobby” herds — fewer than 50 head — return on investment doesn’t pencil out.
Extremely large, ultra-extensive ranches — tower-based communications still limit practicality.
True cow-level feed intake/efficiency today — still herd-level, with individual metrics as an research and development goal.
Full system integrations and “AI for everything” — they’ve done relatively few integrations so far and intentionally avoid AI where it doesn’t clearly help producers.

For an industry built on barbed wire and sweat, the idea that cattle might one day move mostly to the sound of a beep and the buzz of a collar is a big shift. But for Fraser, that’s exactly the point: use technology to make ranching more controlled, more flexible and more humane — without losing sight of what matters most on the land.

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Earlier Calves, Bigger Paychecks: Utilizing Estrus Synchronization to Increase Ranch Profit

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 14:44:46 GMT

In a cow-calf operation, timing is the primary driver of profitability. By using estrus synchronization, producers can ensure more than 50% of their herd conceives on the first day of the breeding season, leading to earlier calving dates and heavier weaning weights. According to Mario Binelli of the University of Florida, shifting the calving window to the “front” of the season ensures calves are older and more uniform when they hit the scale on sale day.

Binelli was a featured speaker during the Beef Reproduction Task Force’s 2025 Applied Reproductive Strategies in Beef Cattle Symposium . He says the purpose of estrus synchronization is to get cows to come into heat and ovulate together in a short window of time. Estrus synchronization works with a series of hormone treatments to control the cow’s natural cycle; as a result they all come into heat at the same time.

The 3-Step Synchronization Process

By synchronizing cows, more of them are bred at the start of the breeding season rather than spread out over several weeks. Binelli shares these three steps to get a cow herd on the same schedule:

Reset the Cycle: A GnRH injection and a progesterone device (CIDR) are used to reset the follicular wave.
Producers typically start by giving a shot to reset the cows’ cycle and inserting a progesterone device to keep cows from coming into heat.
“We want to remove a dominant follicle — then a new follicular wave will emerge,” Binelli explains.
Induce Estrus: After approximately seven days, remove the CIDR and a Prostaglandin shot is given to bring the cows into heat simultaneously. Producers should watch their herd to identify when the cows are ready to breed.
“The goal is to have cows expressing estrus within a short, predictable window so producers can make breeding decisions more effectively,” Binelli says.
Insemination and Cleanup: Cows are artificially inseminated (AI) upon heat detection, followed by bull turnout approximately 15 days later to cover any remaining cows.

Because of the improved cost to reward ratio, more producers are utilizing synchronization protocols with natural service breeding programs . The Beef Reproduction Task Force’s website has a list of protocol options for producers to consider when planning their estrus synchronization program.

Read More About Synchronization Strategies:

Maximizing Reproductive Success: How to Use Estrus Synchronization to its Full Potential

Technology Takes the Guessing Out

Adapting to new technology makes heat detection easier. Accelerometers, commonly used in dairy cattle, are wearable devices on ear tags or collars; they are used to track rumination, activity and welfare. During the estrus cycle, a cow’s behavior changes, with activity peaking while rumination declines. The cow data is sent to the producers’ devices; from the patterns they can identify when she is ready to be bred.

“New technologies are helping decrease labor while increasing the accuracy of estrus detection,” Binelli says.

Read More About Technologies Available:

24/7 Employee: How One Rancher Is Using An App-Based Monitoring System

Bridging Genetics, Management and Technology in Beef Production

Another heat detection tool is heat detection patches placed on the cow’s back. Patches take the guesswork out to determine if the cow is in heat. As another animal mounts the cow, the paint on the patch is scratched, indicating she is in standing heat.

Why Timing Makes Money

Every day a calf is born earlier in the season adds age and weight. By consolidating the calving window through synchronization, producers reduce labor during calving and increase the total pounds of beef sold at weaning.

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Farmers Don’t Use AI for Answers — They Use It to Think Better

Fri, 17 Apr 2026 15:10:26 GMT

What you should know:

To use artificial intelligence in your business for a competitive advantage — not just a gimmick:

Ask better questions than most people
Combine AI with real-world experience
Execute on the answers

For Rachael Sharp, dry weather hasn’t made planting go any easier in the Lowcountry of South Carolina. And when a planter went down, the first thing she did was pull up Chat GPT.

“I pulled up the part number, and I saw that I’d actually entered in there last year. So it told me the date I changed it, and that was helpful, because I was trying to figure out why is this wearing out so quickly?” she says. “We’re in desperate need of rain, and we’re pulling in some pretty hard non-irrigated land right now. I logged that we changed the bearing again, and so next time, knock on wood, it hopefully doesn’t go out again, but if it does I can look and see I changed it twice in the last year.”

That’s just one of many examples of how Sharp is using ChatGPT to manage equipment, her time, and the farm business. She and her father, Don, are featured in an OpenAI commercial, which premiered during the Super Bowl.

And she’s in good company with other farmers in how to use the artificial intelligence platforms.

Marc Arnusch, the 2025 Top Producer of the Year, says ChatGPT is the most used app on his phone.

Jeremy Jack, leader of Silent Shade Planting Company the 2023 Top Producer of the Year, uses AI as his daily management teammate from agronomy and business decisions.

Here are the four ways these farmers use AI every day on the farm.

(Photo: Yvonne Min)

1. Make better decisions faster

Colorado farmer Arnusch uses ChatGPT and Grok to narrow down his consideration set when making decisions.

“It helps on the strategic side of things, and when making a decision, I’ll let it give the top four or five things to choose from, which helps when there’s a million choices,” he says. “It really is like my funnel. I’ll set up my phone on my dashboard and just dictate to it. Then when I’m back at the farm office, my wife Jill is relieved because I’ve already processed out loud with the AI tool.”

While most farms collect data, Jack uses AI to make decisions, particularly agronomic.

“I uploaded multiple years of soil data across our farms,” he says. “And we’ve found ways to manage fertilizer better, for example with sulfur.”

The data interpretation has shifted his thinking by connecting the yield zones with as-applied fertility and return on investment.

Jack is also using the technology to double check every spray application — from rates, to tank mix, to nozzle selection, to pressure optimization.

Sharp has also found AI helpful in managing chemical applications. She can remember chemical boxes marked up with her father’s calculations by hand.

“I tell the prompt what I’m spraying, where I’m spraying, how many acres, tank size, and then I let it tell me what to order,” she says. “Over time, it’s learned which products are liquid and which are dry flowables. And it’s helped me keep track of the inventory we have so we don’t end up with pallets of odds and ends.”

(Photo: OpenAI)

2. Be more efficient

When it comes to where to start with AI, Sharp has one piece of advice.

“Think of the task that you don’t like to do at the end of the day. For me, I didn’t want to do paperwork at the end of the day,” she says. “So I threw it over to ChatGPT, and I said, hey, this is what I planted today, this is the date, and I left it at that. I started really, really simple.”

Now, she’ll record things directly in the field or in the truck. She says it has helped with FSA 578 forms. And in day-to-day operations, she’s found benefits for time management and accuracy in all record keeping.

“We have seed samples that require a handwritten seed form that I turn in along with the sample, but I spoke into my phone and said, hey, Chat GPT, I need you to log that I sent this variety, this lot number, on this date, to the lab. And so, that’s probably one of 15 entries that I’ve made over the course of a month. And at the end when we finally turn in our last sample to the lab, I’ll ask it for a spreadsheet with all that listed,” she says.

(Photo: Sarah Green Photography)

3. Think more clearly about complex problems

Jeremy Jack often asks ChatGPT “What does this mean for my farm?” with current events.

“With the war in Iran, global fertilizer supply chain concerns, and even things like USDA reports, it’s given helpful perspective in how to think about what’s happening off the farm but impacts the farm.”

And he’s found success in using the platform to specifically think about the business strategy for his farm with vendors, including lenders, landowners and more.

4. Manage more professionally

Jack has been active with an advisory board for their farm, but AI has become like a boardroom in his pocket.

“I bounce ideas—pressure test if you will—before it costs me real money,” he says. “This includes input purchases, land agreements, and equipment purchases.”

He’s also come to use it in his external communications about the farm including his regular social media posts on LinkedIn.

When it comes to team management, Arnusch has input culture index results for vendors and employees, then the AI compares their individual characteristics with the job they are being asked to do.

“This has been a breakthrough,” he says. “It’s shown me that at no fault of their own, why some people fail at what they are being asked to do. It wasn’t because they weren’t working hard or doing the job. It was stretching them beyond what they can do.”

He gives the example of a farm foreman position on the farm, and how he used this process to match the candidate with the role.

(Sarah Green Photography)

Inside The Tax Return of Your Farm's Future

Thu, 09 Apr 2026 13:41:28 GMT

The traditional process of preparing agricultural tax returns has long been defined by manual data entry and the complex reconciliation of income. However, the integration of artificial intelligence into financial systems is ushering in a more sophisticated era of tax management. For the modern farm, the future of filing lies in a seamless pipeline where software handles the heavy lifting of data organization, leaving the high-level strategy to human experts.

Comprehensive Data Integration

The foundation of a modern tax return is the accounting system. Platforms like QuickBooks, Xero or specialized farm management software are becoming increasingly autonomous. In the near future, these AI agents will do more than simply record expenses; they will analyze them in real-time.

With direct links to bank feeds and digital invoices, AI can categorize expenditures with precision. It can distinguish between capital investments, such as machinery or land improvements, and standard operating costs like seed and fuel. This continuous synchronization means by the end of the fiscal year, the financial records are already in a format that mirrors the requirements of a tax return.

Automated Document Reconciliation

A significant portion of tax preparation involves matching — ensuring the farm’s internal records align with the documents issued by third parties. A preparer of a farm tax return may spend more time making sure all of the income is in the right box then planning to optimize the income tax level.

AI is uniquely suited to handle this high-volume verification. The system can automatically ingest Form 1099-PATR (cooperative distributions), 1099-G (government subsidies) and other Form 1099s and W-2s and verify them against recorded deposits.

If a document is missing or a figure does not match the ledger, AI identifies the specific discrepancy immediately, allowing for a targeted correction rather than a manual search through months of records.

The Role of Human Oversight

While AI provides the technical framework for the return, the final stage remains firmly in human hands. Once the software has mapped the data to the appropriate tax schedules, it produces a comprehensive draft for professional review.

This allows the farmer or a tax consultant to transition from a data entry role to a strategic advisory role. Instead of spending hours verifying line items, the human reviewer can focus on critical tax planning decisions including accelerated depreciation choices or income averaging that require professional judgment and an understanding of the farm’s long-term goals.

The result is a more accurate, defensible and efficient tax filing process. By automating the clerical aspects of the return, AI allows agricultural producers to maintain focus on their operations while ensuring full compliance with the evolving tax laws.

Halter Raises $220M in Series E to Accelerate Global Expansion of Virtual Fencing

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 12:40:41 GMT

Halter, the global agtech company transforming cattle farming, today announced it has raised $220 million in Series E funding at a $2 billion valuation. The round was led by Founders Fund, with participation from Blackbird, DCVC, Bond, Bessemer, NewView, Ubiquity, Promus and Icehouse Ventures, as it continues to expand alongside the ranchers using Halter in their operations.

The capital will be used to support the ranchers and farmers already using Halter and to extend it to more operations globally, with a continued focus on the people using it every day.

The round is one of the largest-ever in agtech globally and reflects growing demand for virtual fencing technology. Halter serves more than 2,000 ranchers and farmers across New Zealand, Australia and the U.S., with 1 million of its solar-powered collars now sold. Since launching in the U.S. in 2024, American ranchers using Halter have built 60,000 miles of virtual fencing as part of how they manage their land, with Halter working alongside them.

Ranchers using Halter can move herds, rest pastures and cut their reliance on physical fencing — all from their phones. The GPS-enabled, solar-powered collars help reduce the kind of labor-intensive work that has long defined cattle operations, giving ranchers back time and more control over how their land is managed.

“We started Halter because we believed technology could fundamentally change what it means to run a ranch, and enable ranchers to use innovation to build long-term futures on their land,” says Craig Piggott, CEO and founder of New Zealand-born Halter. “Our ranchers need tools that work, and the fact that they’re using Halter tells us our technology has earned their trust. This raise lets us bring it to far more of them — and faster.”

The deep tech company’s GPS-enabled collars use audio cues and gentle vibrations to contain and herd cattle within virtual boundaries, allowing ranchers to move herds from a smartphone — without breaking ground or stringing wire.

“Agriculture is a multitrillion-dollar industry that feeds the world, yet remains one of the least digitized sectors on Earth,” says Founders Fund Partner Amin Mirzadegan. “Halter is changing that by bringing software, sensors, and AI directly into livestock operations in a way that ranchers actually adopt. Craig’s deep understanding of the ranchers he serves has enabled the company to build something that’s not just useful, but mission-critical to how ranches run.”

Halter will deploy the new capital to grow its commercial and field operations across the U.S., New Zealand and Australia, while expanding into other international markets, starting with Ireland and the U.K. later this year. The company already has early ranches in Canada and is also exploring further expansion in North and South America this year.

Investment will continue across product development, including animal health monitoring and pasture management, shaped by how customers are using the system in the field. The focus remains on supporting the ranchers and farmers building their operations with Halter.

Halter plans to hire an additional 200-plus people — its largest-ever hiring effort — with a focus on product, engineering and customer roles at its Auckland headquarters.

Five Generations of Women Ranching in California

Mon, 23 Mar 2026 12:03:34 GMT

There is cracked plaster above Grace Magruder’s desk at Ingel-Haven Ranch, the marks of a house that has carried generations and is still standing. Magruder describes it almost with affection, the way someone might notice the lines around a person’s eyes and recognize a life that has been lived.

The house in Potter Valley, Calif., has been holding women for more than a century, carrying the weight of decisions made long ago and the pattern of people choosing, again and again, to return.

A Century of Returning

Magruder’s great-grandmother, Helen, first walked through that doorway in 1919 after her father bought the land so she and her new husband could settle there while he was still strong enough to help them get started. It was the kind of gesture families make when land is both livelihood and inheritance.

Helen stepped into a life shaped by livestock, weather and land that asks something of you every single day and doesn’t much care if you’re tired. Helen met this demand head-on.

“You did not get between her and a chicken she was going to slaughter. She was a serious, serious lady,” Magruder says.

Seriousness can become its own inheritance. Helen raised two daughters on the ranch, and one eventually bought out her sister and continued the operation with her husband. The ranch moved forward because a woman chose to stay, and it moved forward again because another woman returned.

Another Helen, Magruder’s aunt, belongs in the story as well. She grew up on the ranch and later returned in the 1970s and 1980s to run a children’s summer camp there. Kids from the nearby cities would arrive each summer and sleep in tents and cabins while learning to ride horses and explore the ranch. For many of them, it was their first real experience of the land.

Over time Aunt Helen became the ranch’s most enthusiastic ecological observer, paying close attention to the birds, the creeks and the quieter corners of the landscape that others might pass without noticing.

“This ranch really owes itself to the women who decided to come back,” Magruder says. “They were never obligated to return. No one assigned them the responsibility of keeping it going. They chose it.”

Over the decades the ranch kept reshaping itself in the hands of those women. It began with sheep, as much of Mendocino County did in the early 20th century, when wool was the backbone of the local grazing economy. Later the ranch shifted toward cattle when Magruder’s grandmother took over the operation with her husband and decided sheep no longer suited either the landscape or their way of working. The ranch was never treated as something fixed, and what mattered was keeping the land productive and the family on it.

Magruder’s father continued that pattern of reinvention. After earning a master’s degree in sculpture, he returned to the ranch and began experimenting with ideas that were only just beginning to circulate in American agriculture. He noticed that the ranch grew grass well and began holding cattle longer, finishing them on pasture rather than sending them into conventional grain systems. He also began talking about rotational grazing before it became a common language in the industry.

At the same time, he kept one foot in the art world, teaching at the local college while managing the cattle operation. In this family, art and agriculture were never separate paths; they ran alongside each other.

By the time Magruder was growing up, the ranch had become an early example of grass-finished beef sold directly to customers. That model worked well for many years, until the realities around it began to shift. Slaughterhouses closed, markets tightened and weather became less predictable.

Each of those pressures required another adjustment, and you learned to observe what the land is offering, notice what the moment requires, and reshape the business accordingly.

Every generation did it a little differently; the land never stayed static and neither did the women caring for it.

Magruder herself left for eight years and built another life in Boston, studying American history and arts administration. She remembers knowing for a long time that she would return.

“I had known this was my path for a while,” she says.

When we talk about her earliest memories, you can hear the smile in Magruder’s voice. Rain hammering on a tin roof, the smell of hay dropping into winter stalls, cattle coming in from the weather, calves being raised on the ranch until they were 2 years old. “You got to see every step of their life,” she says.

Watching the full arc of an animal changes how you think about stewardship. You begin to understand the rhythm of growth and recovery, and the cost of rushing either.

(Halter)

The Physical Toll of Stewardship

Magruder also saw what decades of physical ranch work can do to a body. “I watched my dad get kind of gnarled by the ranch,” she says.

There were valves buried underground that required digging and wrenching hard enough to force water through the system, miles of fence to build and repair, posts to pound into uneven ground. Wire to stretch again and again across pasture.

“That work adds up over the years. It really does.”

(Halter)

Digital Boundaries, Natural Freedom

When Magruder and her husband, Kyle, stepped fully into managing the ranch, the conditions around them were shifting again. Slaughterhouses closed, margins tightened, rainfall patterns became less predictable. Elk began returning to the valley in larger numbers, which was very exciting for a family managing the land with wildlife in mind.

“This is such a dynamic climate,” Magruder says. “We couldn’t just have a stocking rate that worked every year.”

The land was asking for flexibility, and cattle needed to move regularly so grass could recover and wildlife could move through the landscape. Traditional fencing systems demanded constant physical work.

When the couple began exploring virtual fencing through Halter, they had their children front of mind.

“Being able to rotate the cattle regularly without physically building and moving fence is a game-changer,” Magruder says. “There is no point at which you’re unfit to rotate animals now.”

The ranch still requires judgment about grass height, water placement and herd health. Those decisions now translate into digital boundaries drawn from a phone. Cattle move calmly across the landscape without posts and wire defining every edge rotations can happen daily, grazing becomes more precise and wildlife movement can be accommodated without tearing down physical infrastructure.

(Halter)

After a few weeks of using Halter, she told Kyle, “I don’t want a ranch any other way. I love the dynamic of moving cattle comfortably and slowly and intentionally, across the landscape.”

For Magruder’s aunt Helen, that shift has opened up. Being able to guide cattle away from sensitive nesting areas and riparian corridors means parts of the ranch can recover while the rest continues to function as working land.

These days she shares her knowledge with Magruder’s children — June and Walter — through nature walks and birdwatching, passing on stories about the birds, the seasons and the life that exists alongside the cattle.

“We’ll be able to graze the way we want into later years in our lives,” Magruder says. “We’re not worried about having to switch careers when it becomes too hard.”

The Magruder Family

(Halter)

Grazing Into the Future

For this family, the question has always been how to stay in it, how to care for the land without grinding down the people doing the work and how to adapt as weather shifts and wildlife returns.

Five generations of women have shaped Ingel-Haven Ranch. Each inherited land already marked by the decisions of the last, and each adjusted the model to fit her moment. Virtual fencing becomes part of that lineage now. Another tool chosen by someone determined to keep the ranch viable, responsive and alive.

The cracked plaster above Magruder’s desk remains, and the house continues to hold the story of women returning. The land keeps asking for care, and the women keep answering.

Your Next Read:
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From Forage to Fertilizer: Iowa Farmers Turn Cover Crops Into A Profit Engine

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 17:37:00 GMT

Where the borders of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois converge above the Mississippi River, Jack and Maria Smith, alongside their sons Nick and Ted, have turned cover crops into the strategic backbone of their diversified farming operation.

Based in eastern Dubuque County, Iowa, the family combines no-till corn and soybeans with a 420-head beef operation. They utilize a spring and fall calving schedule to produce registered seedstock and yearling bulls, while also finishing select calves.

One of the things that makes their farm unique, Nick Smith says, is how completely they’ve integrated cover crops in all aspects of their operation.

“We cover crop every single acre now. We’ve been able to do that for the last five, six, seven years, somewhere in there,” he told Andrew McCrea, during their recent discussion on Farming The Countryside.

Smith Family Farms got its start in 1853. In addition to their conservation efforts, the family is dedicated to preserving the state’s history through the Iowa Barn Foundation, which has saved more than 300 barns.

(Environmental Stewardship Award Video)

Matching Cover Crops To Cattle And Terrain

Because their land is prone to erosion, the Smiths first used cover crops to protect the soil from heavy rains. However, the practice quickly became a “no-brainer” feed source for their beef herd.

On their steepest slopes, the family often uses a two-year rotation centered on covers. They plant a spring cover crop to graze or harvest, then follow it with a diverse “summer cocktail” that is harvested once and grazed in the fall. This rotation prepares the fields for no-till corn the following year.

“With some of our steepest slopes, that’s what we typically do,” Smith says. “On ground that’s not as steep, we grow more continuous corn.”

Cattle graze the rolling hills that make up a significant percentage of the land the Smiths own in Dubuque County, Iowa.

(Environmental Stewardship Award Video)

Most of the family’s cover crop acres are grazed by cattle at some point.

“In the fall, I would say we’re grazing all of them,” Smith says. He notes that distance and accessibility sometimes limit spring grazing. “Probably 50-plus percent of the acres do get grazed in the spring. It just depends on the weather. You can’t really have the cattle out there if it’s wet.”

Custom “Cocktails” For Summer And Fall

Smith chooses different cover crop mixes based on the season and the next crop in the rotation. For summer covers, he prefers diverse blends based on sorghum-sudangrass.

“We love that stuff,” he says. “It’s really hard to screw it up. It’ll grow pretty much anywhere, and it grows quickly. It’s great feed; cows love it.”

He typically adds legumes like clover and buckwheat to those summer mixes. For fall and winter grazing, the farm relies on small grains and brassicas, including triticale, cereal rye, turnips, and oats. These fall covers are usually seeded in August and September.

The Smiths use a corn-soybean rotation along with some continuous corn. Cover crops help fuel the family’s row crops and feed their cattle herd.

(Environmental Stewardship Award Video)

Smith adjusts his seeding rates based on the upcoming row crop. If a field is headed to soybeans, he seeds cereal rye at a heavier rate.

“Beans like cereal rye,” he said. “If we’ve got a thicker stand out there, that’s not going to bother me.”

If he is planting corn the next year, he uses a lighter rate of cereal rye, especially on fields that won’t be grazed in the spring. The family has also experimented with camelina ahead of corn to add more diversity.

From Planes To Drones — And The Combine

Smith’s father, Jack, began aerial seeding cover crops more than 15 years ago, but the rolling terrain made it difficult to get consistent results.

“In our topography, we haven’t had great success with that,” Smith says. “It’s hard to get good coverage over every acre.”

In recent years, the Smiths have used drones for more precise seeding, especially to drop oats, radishes, or turnips into standing corn to create high-quality fall forage.

“We’ve had years where we’ve had knee-high oats while we’re harvesting corn,” Smith says, though he notes success depends on timely rain.

One of the most significant changes the family made was five years ago when they decided to mount a Gandy air seeder on their combine to plant cereal rye during the corn harvest.

“It’s hydraulically powered and blows the seed so it drops right at or through the header, just before the residue goes through the snapping rolls on the corn head,” Smith says. “As that material goes down through the corn head, it basically covers the seed up and helps trap a little bit more moisture there for it to get going.”

Smith can seed about 15 acres per fill. He dismisses concerns that the practice slows down the harvest.

“Everybody’s excuse is, ‘I don’t want to stop harvest,’” he says. “You can refill in 5 minutes with the right kind of tender. We’re saving a whole other trip, saving a lot of fuel, and we’re getting more growth because it’s done earlier.”

Soil Health And Nitrogen Efficiency

Smith credits no-till and consistent cover cropping with improving his soil function. He has observed faster residue breakdown, more earthworm activity, and higher microbial activity.

Earthworms are the only tillage tool on Smith Family Farms operation in northeast Iowa.

(Environmental Stewardship Award)

“The pace of the increases in organic matter have gone up a lot since we started using the combine, because we’re getting seed in every square foot of every acre, and we’re doing it on a consistent basis,” he reports.

Grazing cover crops has also allowed the family to reduce commercial nitrogen rates over the last six or seven years, even as corn yields have increased.

“From an efficiency standpoint, we’re way more efficient as far as pounds of commercial nitrogen applied per bushel of corn,” Smith says. He attributes this to cattle returning nutrients to the soil via manure, though the exact fertilizer value is hard to quantify.

Practical Farmers of Iowa (PFI) has played a central role in helping the Smiths refine these systems. Nick says he uses the organization’s website, events, and on-farm trials to guide experimentation with new cover mixes.

Labor And The “Cheat Code” Of Cows

Smith says labor is the biggest barrier for most farmers considering cover crops. However, he argues that seeding during harvest removes that hurdle.

“That’s where the combine’s a no-brainer, because that’s not labor — you’re saving time,” he notes.

He also acknowledges that having cattle makes the financial risk much lower.

“Compared to other farmers, we’ve got a mulligan, if something doesn’t work,” Smith says. “If you’re a cash-grain farmer only and you’re spending money on some cover crops and it doesn’t really work, it’s hard to stomach that cost. For us, if we have something that’s a failure, we can still recover some of that cost — and in a lot of years, way more than recover the cost. The cows are a little bit of a ‘cheat code’ for us in that aspect.”

The Smith Family Farms received the 2025 Regional Environmental Stewardship Award for their efforts in sustainability, which were highlighted during the CattleCon 2026 conference.

Listen to the complete discussion between Nick Smith and Andrew McCrae on Farming The Countryside here .

SenseHub Tags Are Game Changers in Feedlot Management

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 15:46:56 GMT

The SenseHub Feedlot system has transformed day-to-day management and production outcomes at Harper Feeders by streamlining health detection and care.

“It’s been a game changer,” says Catherine Harper, a fourth-generation feeder. “Just having that peace of mind, and especially with the labor situation. It just kind of takes that guesswork out of it.”

Started in 1977, Harper Feeders is a family-managed feedlot near Greeley, Colo. The lot’s capacity is about 65,000 sheep and 3,000 cattle. The cattle side began in 2006 to diversify the business, but the Harper family had to adapt as the airborne malignant catarrhal fever from the nearby sheep limited their ability to feed high-risk calves.

Through the years the family has invested heavily in efficiency — upgraded feed systems, handling facilities and data integration — while maintaining a strong focus on low-stress livestock handling and a close-knit, family-centered culture.

(Angie Stump Denton)

Harper explains they installed the SenseHub system in 2024 when they started feeding Kuro cattle — Wagyu × Jersey crosses — for the Meyer Natural program . They bring the Kuro calves in at 500 lb., feed them for 450 to 500 days to a finish weight of 1,400 lb. to 1,500 lb.

“That was what sparked our interest in the SenseHub deal,” she explains. “They’re going to be on feed for a longer period of time, and we wanted to protect ourselves.”

She summarizes SenseHub was a transformative tool for their feedlot, improving health monitoring and operational efficiency.

“It’s catching sickness two to three days sooner than the human eye,” Harper says. “It changed our death loss drastically. Our rates have been way down in comparison to what we’ve had previously.”

An illuminated, flashing ear tag makes it easy for pen riders to find and sort animals that need attention, without disrupting the rest of the pen.

(Merck)

From Startup to Large Scale Adoption

Austin Woltemath, Merck Animal Health beef monitoring sales, says SenseHub Feedlot originated as the brainchild of a startup called Quantified Ag. The system was conceptualized to address the practical needs of feedlot management by leveraging animal data for early disease detection and enhanced operational consistency.

He explains it took several years and multiple tag versions before landing on the just-right formula for scalability and usability in commercial feedlots. The final technology, now available commercially for approximately five years, focuses on continuous, data-driven monitoring of cattle through inner ear canal temperature and activity tracking.

While SenseHub Feedlot can help producers significantly reduce mortality and improve outcomes where it fits, it is not universally suited for all production scenarios, he explains. The system relies on trust in its behavior analysis and machine learning backbone — a predictive technology that leverages vast previous data sets to guide pulling recommendations.

“This enables a direct comparison of each animal’s current health metrics against both their own past performance and those of their pen mates over rolling one- to five-day windows,” he explains.

SenseHub Feedlot had matured into a robust operational tool, widely adopted from small 300-head lots to very large, several-thousand-head feedlots across the U.S. Woltemath emphasizes its particular importance during the first 60 to 100 days of the feeding process — the period of highest risk for animal health challenges.

During this critical window, the system’s daily pull list and integrated pen/animal tracking improve the speed and accuracy of identifying and pulling sick cattle for appropriate treatments, directly correlating to better animal welfare and producer profitability.

Implementing the System

The implementation process of SenseHub Feedlot is designed for flexibility and assurance. Interest typically originates from word-of-mouth recommendations or online resources, and Woltemath’s team conducts personalized meetings to clarify process details and suitability.

He says once a mutual fit is determined, a technical team is dispatched to install hardware and test tag coverage, while a customer success team provides hands-on training.

The Merck team provides ongoing support and troubleshooting.

(Angie Stump Denton)

Stop Sickness: Early, Easy Pulls

Harper says SenseHub alleviates staff workload, especially during peak periods on the sheep side.

“We get so focused on the sheep side,” she explains. “The SenseHub system helps alleviate having to send someone through the cattle pens every day. It just sends us a pull list every morning telling us exactly which lot, which animal, everything based on their tag.”

An illuminated, flashing ear tag makes it easy for pen riders to find and sort animals that need attention, without disrupting the rest of the pen.

Harper says the system integrates with their animal management software.

Woltemath points out built-in treatment protocols within the system.

“Veterinarians can tailor the pull and treatment intervals per animal, ensuring compliance with recommended intervention gaps and reducing the risk of over-pulling or unnecessary treatments,” he explains. “These parameters are customizable and shield animals from repeated inclusion on the pull list based on established guidelines.”

Question No. 1: Return on Investment

Woltemath says one of the persistent concerns among feedlot owners is the return on investment (ROI). He acknowledges quantifying ROI is complicated since every group of cattle is different, and some require more intensive health monitoring than others.

There’s a minimum tag order of 300. Pricing hovers around $15 per head, with exact costs determined by group size and hardware needs. Woltemath stresses this is an estimate, with certain equipment outlays harder to distill on a per-head basis.

The SenseHub system helps alleviate having to send someone through the cattle pens every day. It just sends us a pull list every morning telling the team at Harper Feeders exactly which lot, which animal, everything based on their tag.

(Angie Stump Denton)

Limitations and Opportunities for Improvement

Harper says the system does have a limitation related to long-term tracking and data visibility.

“After 180 days, that tag basically cuts in half in terms of the data it’s reporting,” she explains. “So, on these longer-fed animals, we’ll go for a while without a pull list, and it kind of gets alarming, like maybe your system is offline. That’s been the biggest challenge.”

The tags have a default one-year warranty, though heavy use of the identification light may reduce battery life. Most producers, Woltemath notes, can expect up to two years of reliable use if the light is used conservatively.

Woltemath says the daily pull list also includes tag issue reports and integrates warning alerts about failing or missing tags, empowering producers to address problems with minimal disruption.

Research-Proven Results

Clinical research at an Oklahoma feedyard shows through 60 days on feed and at closeout, the group of animals under the SenseHub Feedlot (SHF) system displayed a significant reduction in mortality and chronic disease compared to the pen-rider (PR) group.

These outcomes led to a significant decrease in cattle falling out of production due to a combination of mortality and chronic disease at either time point in the SHF group, thereby increasing total sellable pounds compared to the PR group. Additionally, the SHF system improved cattle monitoring efficiency compared to the PR group.

Harper summarizes the system is easy to use, adding: “SenseHub is a practical, proven solution that improves health outcomes, increases management efficiency and brings invaluable reassurance to busy feedlot operators.”

How is Artificial Intelligence Enhancing Cattle Health Monitoring?

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 13:53:17 GMT

Artificial intelligence (AI) has made its way into agriculture in various ways, providing new technologies to enhance production agriculture. At the University of Arkansas, researchers developed a tool, the CattleFever system , that uses AI and thermal and RGB color cameras to detect cattle body temperature.

Traditionally, cattle temperatures are taken rectally. With the CattleFever system, this can reduce labor required to track herd health. Temperature is a key symptom for many diseases, so this system allows for faster detection and treatment.

Research Background

The University of Arkansas is equipped with an Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision Lab, directed by Ngan Le, associate professor in the department of electrical engineering and computer science. She explains one of her key research directions is precision agriculture with artificial intelligence and computer vision.

Previous projects have focused on poultry, but broader agriculture-related projects, including cattle welfare, are on the horizon.

Le says, “This motivation led me to initiate collaborations with colleagues in the department of animal science, including Dr. Kegley, Dr. Powell and Dr. Zhao to combine their expertise in cattle with our strengths in AI and computer vision.”

This project initiative was closely supported and funded by the University of Arkansas division of agriculture.

Platform Construction

To build CattleFever, researchers needed data. However, the existing data for cattle only provided overhead rather than thermal images. So, the group built their own dataset using thermal images of calves. Collaborating with the Savoy Research Complex at the university, calves were recorded with synchronized RGB cameras, technology that captures images with red, green and blue light, and thermal cameras.

Rectal temperatures were also recorded for a base in the dataset. Technical team members, Trong Thang Pham and Ethan Coffman, along with several undergraduate students developed a semi-automated annotation and data processing system. More than 600 recorded frames were used to train the system in what to look for. This data all served as a benchmark for the CattleFever system.

All images gathered were linked to thermal and RGB images. Landmarks in 13 different places, such as eyes, ears, muzzle and mouth, on the animal were established.

“These landmarks allow the system to localize individual facial regions, and the thermal camera then measures the temperatures in those regions,” Le says.

The eyes and nostrils read closest to the rectal temperatures, so these landmarks were established as focus areas for thermal image readings. A machine-learning approach was used to predict data results.

These technology trainings resulted in CattleFever being able to automatically detect animal temperature within 1 degree of the rectal reading. Le explains that as more data is collected in real-life environments, the more accurate the system will become.

Project Outlook

In these studies, all cattle were directly facing the thermal cameras.

“‘We probably need to take more photos of them in the real-world settings, such as running around, to capture their motion in the field,” Pham explains.

Teaching the cameras how to recognize and interpret a cow’s face in real-world environments is the next step. Le explains further features like environmental and audio sensors will be added to increase animal welfare monitoring accuracy and lead to more developments of indicators like common symptoms or early signs of illness. At this point, additional funding is being sought to continue more research on this project.

Eventually, the goal is for producers to have access to technology like this. This could look like a monitoring system of cameras set up that are synched to a mobile interface or app.

Le says, “While the current work represents an important first step, we are excited about continuing to develop technologies and expanding its capabilities to support the real-world agricultural applications.”

GEM: Precision in the Pasture

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 12:31:58 GMT

The challenge of maintaining herd records is a familiar struggle for many cow-calf producers who grapple with balancing detailed documentation and practical, cost-efficient management. However, there are multiple solutions available to help transition from traditional paper to platforms that make data input and analysis more productive. During Smart Farming week, we will learn more about five record-keeping options available on the market today.

Genetic and Economic Management, better known as GEM, was created in the early 2000s by Benyshek and Hough Consulting Services, Inc. GEM is an online data entry and retrieval system that can be used by commercial and registered cattlemen. GEM has users with both small-scale operations and large operations with more than 10,000 head.

“It’s a multifaceted system,” Larry Benyshek says. “It interacts with breed associations for uploading and downloading data and people really like that, of course. They have everything on one platform, from their breeding records through their sale records.”

One feature registered cattlemen can use is registering calves with breed associations through GEM, making the process more efficient with data syncing between the two.

“You can then download back the new registration numbers they get, and they can download their EPDs every week — if they want — to the system,” Benyshek says.

GEM also has a location system where users can build locations within the program and keep track of inventories across their ranch. Records can be easily moved with cattle as they change locations. Then animals can be filtered and grouped by different criteria using records and data within the system.

“The other thing is our auction platform is really good,” Benyshek adds. “We have a lot of people that use the system to create their auction offering. We put that on GEM, and then on sale day they can do all of the paperwork from GEM. In other words, we check people in by bidder number, then there’s a person on the block who records those bids by bidder number in real time and then they’re immediately ready for checkout with an invoice.”

GEM has additional features like embryo records, semen inventory and a database with records on the people an operation works with or for.

“It’s got a lot of aspects that people like — it’s pretty encompassing,” Benyshek explains. “Some people use everything we’ve got. Some people use just parts of it.”

GEM pricing is a monthly fee based on the number of females aged 14 months and older in the operation with a minimum base price of $60 for 50 head or less. Each additional female is $0.40. Large commercial operations vary in pricing.

One aspect Benyshek takes pride in is GEM’s customer service and building those relationships.

“We keep about 110 to 125 clients routinely on the system, and we provide a lot of customer service. Just the other day I did a three-hour training session with a new client, and we use Zoom meetings to do all of that.”

Groendyke Ranch manager Paul Koffskey uses GEM from a commercial perspective. Groendyke Ranch manages more than 2,000 head in a commercial Angus cow-calf operation using Hereford and Angus bulls. In 2025, they were recognized as the American Hereford Association Commercial Producer of the Year.

“We use as much of [GEM] as we want,” Koffskey explains. “I use it more for performance-based information to go into making decisions on what goes in our commercial bred heifer sale every year and then our feeder calf sales as well.”

Koffskey emphasizes the importance of generating different reports with varying data and details.

“The report function to me is the best aspect,” Koffskey says. “It’s simple once you become familiar with it. From an efficiency standpoint, we’re able to identify animals or bulls or whatever the case may be that are not performing. We’ve increased weaning weights, yearling weights, shortened breeding seasons and increased cow productivity.”

Koffskey adds both Benyshek and John Hough are always available if there is a problem or to answer questions.

“Those two guys and their experience in this industry, they are just a wealth of knowledge,” Koffskey says. “If you’re not using GEM or CattleMax or any of the others out there, you’re leaving money on the table.”

More information on GEM can be found at benyshek-hough.com

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Simplicity In Record-Keeping With an All-in-One Hub
Voice-to-Record App Reinvents Cattle Management
Bridging Genetics, Management and Technology in Beef Production

Chute-Side and Simple: Breedr Delivers Cattle Management Integrated System

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 17:40:24 GMT

According to Wheal, Breedr was designed for ranchers first. Key features include:

Individual animal tracking — tracks cattle from conception to processing.
Supply chain collaboration — connects data between seedstock, cow-calf, backgrounders and feedlots.
Data insights — provides actionable insights about individual animal performance.
Technology solutions — offers chute-side data collection systems with mobile and cloud-based platforms supporting electronic ID integration.
Supply chain development — helps producers build branded beef programs and supports collaboration between producers and packers.

Wheal predicts beef producers could experience 20% efficiency gains in the next four or five years by moving to individual animal tracking and data collection. He encourages producers to transition from lot-based systems to individual animal tracking.

Breedr recently announced new features to make managing breeding stock and tracking calves easier. These features include:

Improved features for seedstock operations including import and export from breed associations.
Scan tissue sample barcodes to match to EIDs and view genetic and EPD information at the chute.
Three new chute-side quick actions — quick induction on new animals, faster preg testing and condition scoring, all available offline.

(Breedr)

Producer Perspective: The Answer to Integration

Simmental breeder Logan Butcher from Lewistown, Mont., says he’s been frustrated trying to find a cattle management program that will work for his 900 registered cows and 700 bred heifer commercial operation.

He tried other programs but found them not intuitive and too time-consuming to set up. After seeing Wheal give a presentation on Breedr, he says the user-friendly interface and clear workflow convinced him to try it.

He says Breedr is a fully integrated, usable system — hardware, software and people all tied together — to capture data from calving through chute work to carcass, and that integration is where the real value lies on his ranch.

“We have been using EIDs in our cattle for years in preparation for something like this,” Butcher explains. “Nobody could give me an integrated system; this is the EID reader and scale you need to buy and the program you need to use and they are all going to work together. It was crazy. Somebody needed to put it all together in a usable format, and that is what Breedr did.”

His favorite features are:

1. Shared calving book — During calving, entering data is fast and easy, and everything stays in one place. Multiple family members can enter data from their own phones simultaneously, eliminating the need for multiple paper copies.

“There’s lots of power in that when you’ve got more than one guy doing something,” he summarizes.

2. Chute-side functionality — He says the chute mode is “really good.” He appreciates when working cattle, if his brother sees a lame animal in the back, he can mark it on his phone and that animal will flag “lame treat” when it comes through the chute, reducing missed treatments.

3. Hardware synergy — Breedr’s integration with Butcher’s scale and EID reader was simple, solving a long‑standing problem of poor or clunky software around EIDs and capturing and recording weights.

4. Birth-to-harvest value — As a Superior representative, he sees big potential in Breedr’s ability to link carcass data back to every life-stage data point.

5. Customer service — He says support has been responsive and effective, helping him through minor bugs and how-to issues without any data loss.

With the upcoming breeding season, Butcher says he’s looking forward to using Breedr with RightMate, integrating the precision mating tools to help make decisions.

To learn more about Breedr, visit breedr.co

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CarVe: Transforming Efficiency, Safety and Coaching at Cargill

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 14:08:20 GMT

With the U.S. cattle supply at its lowest level in years, every ounce matters. Cargill’s CarVe program is one way the company is working to get more from every animal, reduce waste and make protein production more efficient and sustainable from start to finish.

What is CarVe?

CarVe is Cargill’s proprietary, patent-pending computer vision and artificial intelligence (AI) system used to maximize red meat yield in real time while reducing waste and helping refine cutting techniques.

The CarVe system uses a network of cameras and data analytics positioned on the fabrication floors, collecting fine-grained metrics on every aspect of the production line.

According to Leon Fletcher, Cargill’s vice president of operations for North America beef, the philosophy behind the system is to harness AI’s capacity for real-time, actionable insights.

Currently, CarVe technology has been implemented in two Cargill facilities: Friona, Texas, and Fort Morgan, Colo.

“As we start to build out our CarVe program, the focus is on yield improvements,” Fletcher says. “We are using cameras on our production floors to provide us real-time insights.”

The Benefits

“Before CarVe, yield data was always yesterday’s news,” explains Jarrod Gillig, senior vice president of Cargill’s North American beef business. “Now, we’re making decisions in the moment and saving product that would’ve been lost.”

Even a 1% improvement in yields could save hundreds of millions of pounds of beef annually. Fletcher explains incremental gains of even one ounce, applied at scale, can equate to roughly 1.2 million quarter-pound servings.

“So, it’s a huge impact to the supply chain,” he says.

To summarize the potential of CarVe’s financial impact:

Consider the chuck roll market value of approximately $6.49 per lb.
If the plant can pick up just 0.1 lb. per head more through CarVe
A plant running about 1.2 million head per year could generate roughly $778,000 in incremental product value, based on prevailing market conditions

Gillig adds Cargill is actually targeting about 0.25 lb. per carcass, especially around the neck bones, which could equate to about a $2 million gain at a single site. When you multiply that across multiple facilities, the potential impact “gets exponentially large extremely quickly.”

“This is about maximizing yield, making sure more beef is available to help meet demand, and strengthening value across the entire supply chain,” Gillig adds.

CarVe is also changing plant culture by providing individualized, actionable feedback. It provides real-time coaching capabilities with details for the stakeholder to see.

“The other piece of it is a training device, so obviously there’s a lot of training that goes on when you have 2,500 team members in each facility,” Fletcher explains. “With our CarVe system, we’re able to use video technology to show our employees where they’re at, how they’re performing and things we can do better again in real time.”

Time is money, and a little piece of product adds up to so much in the packing industry.

“It’s a huge tool for our supervisors,” Fletcher says. “We are able to do some great coaching, whether it’s pacing, whether it’s knife work or whether it’s safety and food safety opportunities.”

He adds: “We can actually see the results for each individual. The employees, as they started to see the scoring, actually got more engaged with the process and realized, ‘How can I get better?” and actually soliciting that feedback from the supervisor.”

Gillig says the CarVe system “gamifies” performance with ranking systems, turning improvement into a friendly competition among employees. This makes feedback immediate and engaging for employees, enhancing motivation and job satisfaction.

“I started out on the processing floor,” adds Steve Rodriguez, fabrication floor manager at the Fort Morgan plant. “CarVe is a game changer. I wish we’d had it 20 years ago.”

Together, Cargill’s investments in people, technology and community partnerships reflect its long-term commitment to Fort Morgan and the broader food system.

Cargill uses auto-packaging systems to streamline the handling of products at both the front and back ends of its operations.

(Cargill)

Additional Technologies

CarVe is just one strategy within Cargill’s Factory of the Future initiative , aimed at improving operational efficiency, yield and worker safety.

“We’re just at the tip of this from a technology standpoint,” Gillig summarizes.

He explains during his 27 years with Cargill, he has watched how technology has increased rapidly in the meatpacking industry. From the use of cameras, AI and auto saws, technology is helping the industry better use the carcass and improve decision-making in the meat industry.

Beyond CarVe, the company has implemented a variety of technology tools in its packing plants to improve efficiency, safety and productivity in its beef facilities, including:

1. Automation (Packaging and Palletizing): Cargill uses auto-packaging systems to streamline the handling of products at both the front and back ends of its operations. Palletizing robotics perform repetitive “pick-and-place” tasks, reducing manual labor and increasing throughput.

Safety saws equipped with advanced sensors and vision technology are in place to minimize direct human interaction with large cutting equipment.

(Angie Stump Denton)

2. Safety Saws & Vision Technology: Safety saws equipped with advanced sensors and vision technology are in place to minimize direct human interaction with large cutting equipment. Fletcher says implementing the saws has greatly improved worker safety.

For example, in the Dodge City, Kan., facility, two chinesaw (spinal process or chine bone saws) lines are changing the game, helping separate meat from bone. Previously, two product line workers per shift pushed a large cut of beef into a bandsaw. They did this up to 3,000 times a day by hand.

Now a 3D vision system handles this product process in real time. It scans the meat to find the best cutting path after loading it into a cradle. The meat travels on a conveyor belt through a bandsaw that adjusts for the best cut.

Cargill employees only need to load the cradle, which minimizes the risk of injury from the blade.

3. Robotics: Robotic arms and automation are used to handle heavy or repetitive tasks, lessening labor strain and injury risk.

4. Process Optimization Technology: Cargill continually upgrades older facilities by integrating the new tech infrastructure, helping make operations more structured and efficient.

Together, these technologies drive efficiency, reduce risk, improve safety and enhance product quality — all while supporting Cargill’s focus on making jobs better for their employees.

Gillig stresses CarVe and related technologies are not about replacing employees but enhancing and supporting their work.

“With CarVe, we are not replacing employees. It is empowering them to work more efficiently and effectively and helping us optimize yield,” Gillig summarizes. “It’s actually making their jobs better and enhancing what they’re able to do.”

Through technology implementation, Cargill is not only improving operational metrics but reshaping how employees experience their work — through real-time feedback and improved safety.

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Investing in the Future: Cargill Announces $90-Million Investment in Automation and Technology

Simplicity In Record-Keeping With an All-in-One Hub

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 13:47:37 GMT

CattleMax is an online record-keeping service used by ranches to store cattle inventory, herd health records, breeding and pregnancy records, calving data, weaning data and sync data from breed associations.

Terrell Miller, founder and CEO of CattleMax, says the program is designed for commercial and registered cow-calf producers of all herd sizes.

“It’s currently used by ranchers worldwide in herds from 10 head to 10,000 plus,” Miller says. “CattleMax has been around for over 25 years and is designed in the U.S. by cattle ranchers. It’s supported by ranchers who use the software in their own herds.”

CattleMax was built to be a complete record-keeping system with features like pasture activity, hay production, equipment maintenance and tasks.

“The most used features across users include breeding, pregnancy and calving records; weights, health treatments and pasture movements,” Miller adds.

Commercial plans start at $12 for the first 50 head of cattle and increase with herd size. Registered plans start at $16 for the first 50 head and increase with herd size. Both commercial and registered operations with more than 1,000 head have additional plans with features better suited for large operations.

computer screen,cell phone blank mockup.hand woman work using laptop texting mobile.white background for advertising,contact business search information on desk in cafe.marketing,design

(Shutterstock and CattleMax)

Customer Feedback

Manager of Stalwart Ranches in Texas, Bill Cawley uses most of the features CattleMax offers to keep data and records on their registered and commercial cow herd.

“We run about 300 registered cows and about 3,700 commercial cows,” Cawley explains. “My favorite thing is that you can get reports to go to the [ranch] owner at just a touch of a button. You can get reports so that they actually know what’s going on like inventories. It’s not, ‘Let me find it, let me count it up.’ It’s just right there. We have EIDs (electronic identification ear tags) in all these cattle now. We can scan those and run off a list of calves in just a matter of minutes. It’s what everybody else in the world has in business, where you can run a report and don’t have to go through all your paper files to try to find something.”

Cawley adds having all their records on CattleMax makes taxes much easier for both the rancher and their accountant.

“We can run that report off and it’s in black and white, It’s easy for those guys to understand,” Cawley says. “There’s just so much that’s at your fingertips.”

(CattleMax)

Cawley has been using CattleMax for more than 20 years, so the program functions are simple for him to understand with many years of experience. However, he recommends CattleMax to ranchers and cattlemen because it is so user-friendly.

“It has what the everyday person needs on it, and you can get a little more technical if you want it to,” Cawley says. “Sometimes people don’t know what they’re looking at, and this is pretty self-explanatory for the most part. It’s been a really good company for us.”

The only limitation to CattleMax, like many record keeping programs, is that the animals need to be individually identified. Find more about CattleMax at cattlemax.com

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Voice-to-Record App Reinvents Cattle Management

Voice-to-Record App Reinvents Cattle Management

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:51:50 GMT

Arkansas cattleman Gabe Wight has tried notebooks, Rite in the Rain pads, commercial software and even his own simple app to keep cattle records. The frustration of taking gloves off, pulling out the phone, logging in and typing data in meant he wouldn’t keep up with records.

Wight explains his No. 1 pain point is keeping up with his cattle records, and traditional systems never fit how he actually works. He wants to be on a horse or in a tractor, just talking, not typing.

With a poultry science degree from the University of Arkansas, Wight’s career started in marketing and brand management, while cattle remained a passionate side business. His professional career spans media, advertising and general management, and he founded a software company in 2019 that he then sold in 2023.

He says the combination of necessity, love for ranching and a drive to fix frustrating processes in agriculture fueled his entry into ag-tech solutions for cattle. His aggravation led to Herd Advisor — a voice‑first, AI-powered record-keeping system built by a working cattleman to solve the problem he hates most: paperwork.

Wight says he built the program for real ranch life:

No stopping to log in and type, just talk to your phone.
Works from a saddle, tractor or pickup.
Focused on what matters: something useful that reduces aggravation.
Can be used by the whole family or hired help

Hands-Free Record-Keeping

Instead of forms and keyboards, Herd Advisor lets producers “just talk” while they work cows, drive through pastures or feed. It allows ranchers to log herd data such as treatments, calving records, weights, movements and more, hands-free via voice commands.

He says this minimizes manual input and the risk of lost data, making adoption practical for producers who’d rather focus on livestock than data entry. Despite being a self-described technology rejecter, Wight leverages AI as a development partner and backend engineer.

“For me, voice-first cattle records have been a game changer,” Wight explains. “Just to be able to drive through the pasture and just talk.”

Wight first beta tested the program with a group of producers before rolling it out for public download during CattleCon 2026. He says the beta users have been instrumental in refining workflow, especially given the unique naming and tagging conventions in herds.

One of the beta testers was Susan Gurley. Gurley and her husband, Rick, operate Diamond G Farms near Huntsville, Ark. Diamond G is a commercial cow-calf operation. The couple also manage a neighbor’s operation and Rick’s father’s cattle. In total, they manage about 450 cows across 2,000 acres.

“You know the struggle is real when you’ve got notebooks this size and cardboard that size, and 47 different vehicles and people on the farm, and you can’t find the records you need,” Gurley says. “This is going to be something that we can truly utilize and benefit from.”

She says Herd Advisor’s simplicity and flexibility are what excite her most. She loves that initial data entry is not burdensome. Bulk editing and voice entry are also key features for her. She says reminders, pasture records and multi-farm management are also big wins.

“The beautiful thing about voice entry, for example, is on a new calf,” Gurley says. “If I don’t have a tag in the calf. It automatically pops up next to that cow that she’s had a calf, and it calls it calf, and it puts her number and then it puts the date.”

The Gurleys have multiple employees, so they can put reminders in Herd Advisor for their crew with jobs that need to be done — from cow and calf management to pasture management tasks.

“I love the bulk edit,” she summarizes. “If you go work calves, with one click, ‘I used this medicine, this medicine, this medicine,’ and you’re done. And that’s exciting to me.”

(Herd Advisor)

How Does it Work?

Herd Advisor is currently available as a website and iOS app, with an Android app in final stages pending Google Play approval.

The system is flexible, with three main ways to capture records:

1. Siri voice command
A user can say something like: “Hey Siri, cattle record for Herd Advisor … Cow No. 2 has a limp. I gave her a shot of LA‑300, 12 ccs, and remind me in five days to give her a booster.”

2. In‑app microphone button
A floating mic button in the mobile app lets users dictate records directly.

3. Emailing voice transcripts
Producers can create a phone contact like “Voice Records” and email dictated notes to a special Herd Advisor address. You don’t have to have the app on your phone. You can input records via email.

Offline use is also supported. If a producer does not have service, Siri or the app holds the text until the phone is back online, then pushes everything through to be processed.

(Herd Advisor)

How AI Processes and Organizes Data

When you voice in a record, the record goes through a series of AI agents.

1. Contextual understanding
Siri often mishears “cow” as “count,” or misinterprets drug names, so the first AI agent asks: Is this about cattle and what does it mean in that context?

2. Parsing complex spoken notes into structured records
One long narration might include several cows, a calf and a treatment. The system:

Splits those into individual animal records
Handles tricky realities like duplicate tag numbers or long, multi‑generation number sequences

User Workflow and Safety Nets

Wight says critical to the user experience are built in information redundancy and safety nets, with daily database backups and email confirmations.

Each new entry lands in a “Records for Review” page on the web/app. Producers see exactly what the system heard and how it interpreted it. They can:

Confirm or correct which specific animal a record belongs to (for example, if there are multiple “Cow 600s”).
Edit details before finalizing.

The system can also set reminders for booster shots or rechecks for animals or pastures.

Multiple safeguards are in place against data loss:

Optional email copies of each record so the raw text is never lost.
A daily full database snapshot kept for 30 days.

More than Records: The Cattle Market Guide

Along with the herd management program, Gabe Wight has also developed the Cattle Market Guide and a Cattle Market Guys podcast .
Wight says he always questioned if he sold cattle at the right time.

“I pulled out of the auction market parking lot I was thinking the same thing I every time, which is: ‘Should I have sold this week? And should I have sold them here?’” Wight explains.

That led him to build the market predictor. By harnessing AI, Wight first developed the Cattle Market Guide to report profitability differences in when and where to sell. This catalyzed the broader vision for a practical decision-support tool and records management solution tailored for cattle producers.

To learn more about Herd Advisor, the Cattle Market Guide and to listen to the Cattle Market Guys podcast visit HerdAdvisor.com .

Bridging Genetics, Management and Technology in Beef Production

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 16:37:44 GMT

701x is a North Dakota-based agricultural technology company specializing in smart, connected, solar-powered GPS ear tags and management software for the cattle industry. It enables ranchers to monitor livestock health, location, breeding activity and behavior.

“There’s a lot of pressures on the ranching industry today, and there’s not a lot of technology or tools that can help them,” summarizes Sam Fisher, 701x vice president of sales and marketing.

701x was created by Kevin Biffert, a ranch-raised engineer, who saw the lack of effective technological tools available for ranchers.

“We have to develop a feature set that offers a lot more to the rancher,” Fisher adds.

(Photo: 701X)

Three Pillars: Registry Services, Herd Management, Devices

Fisher explains 701x’s offerings fall into three primary buckets.

1. Registry Services

701x acquired Digital Beef, a software solution for breed associations. This registry allows users to register animals, manage pedigrees and integrate performance data. He explains 701x is currently working on a rebuild of the registry product to make it a sustainable platform.

2. Herd Management Tools

“Think of this as your on-ranch record-keeping system ,” Fisher explains. “Digital calving book, chute‑side mode, breeding record system, even a financial section in there, all available for kind of on‑ranch records.”

701x is working to provide a unified, modern platform that streamlines data from herd management straight into registry services, minimizing manual entry and ensuring consistent, usable records.

Fisher says the 701x system eliminates double/triple entry of data; it makes data searchable and usable and replaces paper records with quick digital access.

Montana Angus producer Sara Stevenson says, “How I best describe 701x is the solution to a long-time problem I was looking for.”

701x helps her manage and communicate herd data. She explains the biggest historical challenge wasn’t collecting data but organizing it over many years and sending accurate information to the American Angus Association and other breed associations.

She says 701x has replaced scattered notebooks and multiple Excel files with one central, long-term system. It allows the Stevenson family to track every animal from birth to sale in one place, including:

Birth, weaning, yearling data and ratios.
Health events such as treatments, navel issues, deaths and injuries.
Fertility records.
Exact reason an animal leaves the herd — feet, fertility, open or death.

Stevenson emphasizes that bad or incomplete data is worse than no data, and 701x makes it realistic to maintain high-quality, multiyear records.

She shares these additional 701x advantages:

Time, stress and marriage-saving benefits. Before 701x, Stevenson says Maternal Plus reporting meant referring to years of calving books and tedious backtracking, causing weeks of work, frustration and “marriage” conflict. “701x eliminated the annual stress and fights,” she summarizes.
Data entry is now done chute-side or same day versus months later, which reduces errors and guesswork. The 701x system ties together EID (electronic identification) tags, wand, scale head and software reducing transposed numbers, missing digits as well as duplicate or outdated spreadsheets.
Digital workflow keeps accurate cow and calf pasture counts, as well as provides the ability to figure correct vaccine dose and mineral needs and get an immediate check of what animals were missed after working cattle. Stevenson admits they keep paper copies as backup, but the digital data saves their ranch money and time, improves accuracy and reduces stress.
Strong customer service and partnership. Stevenson compliments the 701x team for being accessible and willing to help when needed. She says 701x is not just a tool; it is a partner in their operation.

“What they’re really going for is that one-stop shop — the Apple of cattle data — and we are very happy with it,” Stevenson summarizes.

3. Smart Livestock Devices

701x offers two types of smart ear tag devices: the xTpro tag for bulls and cows and the xTlite tag for calves.

Fisher says the tags are a management tool providing tangible, practical benefits like GPS tracking, health and behavior alerts and reproductive data. The tags help producers improve breeding rates, reduce losses and gain actionable data, making the investment cost-effective over time.

The Stevensons use xTpro tags in donor cows and herd bulls to help:

Detect estrus in older donor cows that don’t show strong physical heat signs.
Track bull activity (steps, mounts) and correlate that with actual calves sired via DNA, revealing which bulls are working harder versus just being lazier. She says this leads to data-backed decisions about which bulls and cows are performing.

Dakota Gerloff of Gerloff Farms , Bland, Mo., manages about 400 seedstock cows and 120 commercial cows. The Gerloffs put xTpro tags in all their herd bulls. He says the biggest benefit of the tags is the peace of mind the system provides his family during breeding season.

While he typically checks his fall cows in person every other day during breeding season, 701x allows him to open the app and see how individual bulls are behaving throughout the day: how active they’ve been, whether they’ve been mounting cows and, generally whether they appear to be doing their job.

He says the tags are a valuable tool in an era when good labor is hard to find. Gerloff adds that he plans to tag his cow herd for heat detection and calving alerts, which could reduce manpower needs by providing timely notifications instead of relying solely on constant physical checking.

(Photos: 701X)

User-Friendly Purchasing and Setup

The company aims to make technologically advanced cattle management solutions simple, accessible and valuable to both seedstock and commercial beef producers. Producers can order products directly online through a marketplace. Ongoing support, educational videos and in-person field staff are available to streamline onboarding and maximize value.

Fisher says transparent pricing and simple online purchasing eliminate barriers for adoption.

“We focused on easy, easy, easy, easy,” he says. “You go to 701x.com, there’s a tab for the marketplace ... add to cart ... check out and it’s shipped directly to you.”

Fisher explains the tags come pre-integrated into the software ecosystem, which makes the setup seamless. Producers are supported by educational materials, responsive field staff and personal phone/video help as needed.

When inserting xTpro tags, place the buttons between the two main ribs of the ear. Apply the tag so the solar panel sits forward and up for best sunlight exposure.

(701x)

The tags are designed to be robust, solar-powered and connected by both cellular and satellite networks for maximum utility and minimal hassle. The system’s value is demonstrable through examples of loss prevention, breeding improvement and labor savings.

Fisher says customer feedback shapes product development and issue resolution, and all customers have open access to knowledgeable staff. 701x continually refines its algorithms and is developing new features like feedyard systems and more advanced monitoring to adapt to industry needs and drive future genetic improvements.

(701x)

A Seedstock Supplier Service for Bull Buyers

The Gerloff family hosts an annual bull sale each October selling 80 bulls. As a customer service, the Gerloffs tagged all 2025 sale bulls with 701x’s xTpro. If a bull sold for more than $6,500, the buyer was offered a one-year 701x app subscription.

Gerloff says the tag process went smoothly and praises retention and durability. He says they tagged the sale bulls 10 days before the sale. He was originally concerned about the bulls fighting and losing tags before sale day. He reports they didn’t lose any tags despite the tendencies of 20-month-old bulls.

Gerloff says more than half of the buyers who qualified to use the system have made a 701x account thus far. He also notes he has not received one negative call or frustration about the tag.

701x’s core aim is to help both commercial and seedstock producers be more profitable and sustainable by providing customers cutting-edge, practical tools that deliver real-world results.

“I really believe we’re building tools that actually matter,” Fisher summarizes. “Tools that will actually keep people in the beef business, keep families on the same piece of dirt that they’ve always ranched.”

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24/7 Employee: How One Rancher Uses an App to Monitor

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 16:48:54 GMT

What started as a small trial in 2018 has become a core part of Trinity Farms’ management program providing labor savings and improved conception.

Located in Ellensburg, Wash., Trinity Farms is a multigenerational SimAngus/Angus seedstock operation specializing in selling bulls to commercial cow-calf producers across the Pacific Northwest.

Robb Forman, owner, says his family started with the SenseHub system in 2018. They got aggressive with it a couple of years ago when Merck came out with the new tags and new algorithm.

“We are much more successful in getting cows pregnant,” Forman says. “Conception rates and our preg rates prove that.”

The Formans previously used a synchronization system and timed AI. Today, using SenseHub, they are beating those results by as much as 15 to 20% in given groups.

“That’s not in every situation, but it’s significant,” he says. “We’ve cut out the labor of all that synchronization work, and we were doing so much hormonal manipulation that the cows that weren’t getting bred for another cycle. But the biggest thing I keep coming back to is once you’ve used this thing long enough and you start to trust in it enough, I mean, it’s the best damn heat detector you’ll ever have, and it never, doesn’t show up for work unless the power’s off.”

(Photo: Merck)

A Full-Time Employee

Forman says for the last two years he has bred exclusively off the system alone, treating it like a full-time, highly skilled employee. This means they do not visually heat check cattle.

“The system is like having an employee on the clock 24/7,” he stresses. “A really experienced employee as it relates to heat detecting. I can’t tell you how many man-hours it’s replaced.”

SenseHub Cow Calf has allowed Trinity Farms to:

Replace most synchronization and mass timed AI work.
Improve conception and pregnancy rates compared with timed AI.
Run an aggressive AI and sexed semen program with less labor, even during the darkest part of the year.

What is SenseHub Cow Calf?

SenseHub Cow Calf from Merck Animal Health is an app-based monitoring system using ear tags with accelerometers to track the reproductive, health and nutritional status. It provides real-time alerts for heat detection and health issues to improve herd productivity.

According to Mallory Bormann-Liss, Merck Animal Health beef monitoring customer success specialist, the SenseHub Cow Calf system is the latest technology from the company that helps monitor and gather data in real time to improve decision-making.

“The system tracks activity and rumination in real time with an ear-mounted accelerometer,” she explains. “SenseHubCow Calf ear tags also illuminate and flash, making it easier for caregivers to find animals flagged by the system. SenseHub Cow Calf provides remote, 24/7 monitoring of individual cows and breeding heifers. It helps improve breeding decisions. You get heat detection data and insemination timing guidance.”

Bormann-Liss says the system provides three types of monitoring:

Reproduction monitoring — Receive data on the reproductive status of every cow and reduce the inconsistency of monitoring heat.
Health monitoring — Receive alerts of potential health issues earlier, often before clinical signs become visible.
Group monitoring — Understand key herd behaviors at a macro level, including rumination activity, herd movement and other comfort, nutrition and health information.

(Photo: Merck)

“This monitoring technology can help indicate reproductive issues faster, such as animals not having regular cycles or suspected of aborting,” she says. “All the while, it monitors animal well-being.”

Producers are given data, which is presented in simple-to-read, understandable dashboards. Reports on individual animal estrus, health and group status are available, and you can create custom reports to your needs.

“What the producer puts into the system is what information they will receive out of it,” Bormann-Liss summarizes. “As long as cow or heifer data is put in, it will generate reports, breeding dates and expected calving dates based on the information.”

Bormann-Liss says there are three key factors for the system’s success:

Tag placement is important. It should be placed in the middle third of the ear between the two cartilage ribs. The tag must be dangling and not caught on another ear tag. This will ensure the activity data is being captured.
A consistent routine also is important. To identify differences in behaviors and patterns, there needs to be a consistent routine for at least 10 days, but 14 to 21 days is ideal. This will set a baseline to determine if the animal is doing something unusual.
Read range is a factor to be mindful of. The system is highly accurate a quarter mile in front of it and an eighth of a mile behind it. Animals need to come within that range at least once a day, so the data collected in the tag can be synced up to the cloud and analyzed by the producer. That can be done by strategically placing the controller by the water source or another area the animal will be coming to at least once in a 24-hour period.

How Does Trinity Farms Use the Tags?

All breeding females are tagged and monitored. Tags go in before breeding season and are cut out at pregnancy check to avoid loss. “They say it takes nine days for the algorithm to establish the baseline before you can really start to rely on it,” Forman explains. “So, we try to get those cattle tagged 10 days to two weeks prior to when we start breeding season.”
Breeding decisions are based on SenseHub alerts. SenseHub sends heat alerts and creates a timed breeding window. “When they hit the system, it sends an alert, and that starts what I call the countdown,” Forman explains. He has two graphs set up — one for conventional semen and one for sexed semen — and breeds according to those windows.
The light feature and app are a training tool. Forman says new employees get access to the SenseHub app, and he turns tag lights on for pull times. This helps train employees and improve their awareness of when a cow is in heat.
System infrastructure is spread across multiple pastures. Cows are in big, brushy pastures, so he has multiple antennas and manages grazing and feeding to bring cows into range. “We try to feed up by the road every morning to draw those cattle to where they’re going to hit the antenna in the morning before we need to pull in cattle,” Forman says.
(Photo: Merck)

Trusting the Tag Was the Biggest Challenge

According to Forman, the hardest part wasn’t understanding or putting in the hardware; it was getting over traditional timing and learning to trust the data. The timing of the system is different from what you might have experienced when heat detecting.

He initially questioned the alerts: “I said, ‘Hey, I’m seeing these cows in heat like six to eight hours before they’re showing up on the system. Something’s wrong,’ and they assured me, ‘Oh, no. That’s how the algorithm’s designed to work.’”

And he frames trust as the central hurdle: “The biggest challenge was just the trust — to trust the system, to trust the process.”

Cost Versus Value

Forman says while the system is not cheap, the economics pencil out when you account for more AI-sired calves and reduced labor, especially when producing seedstock bulls.

“How we’re breaking this down is we’re looking at it from the respect of how many more AI pregnancies are we ending up with versus what we were doing in the past,” he explains. “Just think about what happens when we push another 20 bulls through the bull sale. We didn’t add an extra cow… we didn’t do anything different other than how we’re AIing the cattle.”

Forman summarizes, “If you’ve got a serious seedstock operation, I think it’s worth serious consideration, and I can’t imagine anybody who tries it would be disappointed. We’ve become huge believers in the system.”

While the system is a no-brainer for seedstock producers, Bormann-Liss explains commercial cow-calf producers can also benefit from the technology by tracking cow, heifer and bull data, including:

Monitor reproduction heats and when being bred by the bull.
Gather heat information to note which heifers and cows are being bred or may not even show a heat.
Track bull data allowing producers to select bulls to use for more accurate pregnancy windows or knowing how accurate the calving window will be.

Q&A About SenseHub Cow Calf

Bormann-Liss says these are the main questions she is asked by producers:

How is the equipment powered? You will need internet of some sort (Wi-Fi, hotspot, hardwire) to connect to the controller that collects the information and sends it back to the producer. You will also need a regular 110-volt outlet to plug the system in.
Do you have a tech support department and how do I learn more about the dashboard after installing? Yes, we have a great technical support department that will help you get started and installed. After installing, then a customer success representative will reach out and help with the dashboard and how to input cows along with watching heats and reading the graphs and breeding window when cows show heats.
Can tags be used more than once? Yes, you can cut the button out of the back of the tag and unassign it to a cow and reassign it to a new cow or heifer on the same day. Tags have a four-year warranty and five-year battery life.
What kind of computer do I need to install the system on? A Windows-based computer needs to be used to set up the system. After that, any Apple device can be used.
How soon can I get a system if interested in buying? We recommend giving yourself two to three weeks for ordering and installation and a month prior to breeding — so in all, four to six weeks to give yourself accurate results.

The Beef Industry Cannot Afford to Treat AI as a Side Project

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 13:42:45 GMT

The U.S. cattle industry is operating under intense pressure. Supplies are tight, feedlots face rising costs and declining placements, and the national herd remains near multi-decade lows after years of drought, liquidation, and high input prices . Recent reports point to shrinking cattle-on-feed inventories and increasing strain on large feeding operations as they compete for a smaller pool of animals . Yet domestic and export demand for beef remains strong, meaning each animal now carries more economic value than at any point in decades.

Artificial intelligence is beginning to reshape how producers manage that reality. Sensors, cameras and predictive software are moving from pilot projects into everyday use across cow-calf operations, stocker systems, feedlots and packers. Wearables can flag illness through changes in activity or temperature. Computer vision systems estimate weight gain and body condition without handling cattle. Feedlot analytics track intake patterns to identify problems before they appear in closeout data.

Similar pattern-recognition systems are already helping operations detect changes in cattle health, management, and economics earlier across the production cycle. These tools matter because they protect value. When herd size is constrained, losses from disease, poor feed efficiency, or reproductive failure become more expensive. AI allows earlier intervention, reducing both biological and financial risk.

Labor pressures reinforce the shift. Skilled workers are difficult to recruit and retain, particularly in rural areas. Remote monitoring allows managers to oversee cattle across large distances while focusing physical effort where it is most needed. This does not replace stockmanship, but it changes how time is used. However, technology alone does not improve performance. Operations gaining real advantage are not simply installing systems. They are rethinking how decisions are made, how information flows, and how risk is managed across the entire business.

From Data Collection to Decision Power

The beef supply chain is long and biologically complex. Decisions made at breeding or weaning influence outcomes months or years later. Feed costs, weather, forage conditions, genetics, health protocols and market signals interact continuously. AI is valuable in this environment because it can integrate diverse data streams and identify patterns humans might miss.

In cow-calf systems, predictive tools can support heifer selection, breeding management and pasture allocation. Stocker operations can match cattle to forage conditions and growth targets. Feedlots can optimize ration strategies, placement weights, and marketing timing. Packers increasingly use similar tools to forecast demand and coordinate procurement.

When information flows across these segments, the system becomes more responsive. Early signals about feed grain prices, export demand or weather conditions can influence decisions long before cattle reach the packing plant. Health issues detected in one stage can trigger preventive action in another.

Yet many operations accumulate data without changing behavior . Dashboards multiply, reports become more detailed, but daily practices remain largely unchanged. Without a clear plan, AI becomes an expensive reporting system rather than a performance driver.

Our recent white paper on AI in agri-food argues that meaningful impact occurs only when technology is embedded in strategy rather than applied piecemeal. One practical approach is the DRIVE framework, which focuses on five priorities for turning digital tools into operational advantage:

Data first. Reliable, integrated records across genetics, health, feed, performance and marketing are essential. Poor data quality limits predictive accuracy.
Run purposeful pilots. Focus on high-value problems such as reducing death loss, improving feed conversion, or optimizing marketing windows, with clear metrics and a path to scale.
Internal capability matters. Managers and staff must understand how systems work and when human judgment should override model outputs.
VIPs are not exempt. Owner and executive engagement signal that AI is central to strategy, not a technical experiment delegated to vendors.
Execute now. Advantage comes from implementation and learning over time, not waiting for perfect solutions.

Operations that follow this disciplined approach move from experimentation to measurable improvement much faster than those pursuing scattered projects.

Leadership Will Determine Who Wins

Technology tends to amplify existing management quality. Producers with clear goals and disciplined processes extract far more value from AI than those hoping technology will compensate for weak planning. The central challenge is leadership, not software. The transition resembles the arrival of major infrastructure such as high-speed rail. The biggest gains accrue to those who reorganize activities around the new capability. Others see only marginal benefits because they continue operating as before. AI increases the speed of analysis and coordination, but speed without direction can create confusion rather than progress.

I have described AI as agriculture’s “bullet train”: fast, transformative, but requiring careful navigation. AI may be overhyped today, but it is likely to become as essential to food production as electricity and the internet. The question is not whether it will arrive, but how prepared operations will be when it does.

For the beef industry, timing is critical. Herd rebuilding will be slow, capital costs are high and volatility remains constant. At the same time, global demand for high-quality protein continues to grow.

Producers who can improve efficiency, consistency and responsiveness will be better positioned to capture that demand. AI will not replace experience or judgment. Successful cattle production remains rooted in understanding animals, land and markets. What AI changes is how that expertise is applied. Routine monitoring may decline, while interpretation, planning and risk management become more central.

In the coming decade, the divide in the beef sector will not be between those who use AI and those who do not. It will be between those who treat it as a tool and those who treat it as part of a long-term operating plan. The technology is already spreading across the industry. Competitive advantage will depend less on access and more on intent. Producers who start building capability now will shape the future of the beef business rather than reacting to it.

Aidan Connolly, president, AgriTech Capital , is described by Forbes as ‘a food/feed/farm futurologist. He is the author of the book ‘The Future of Agriculture’, now in four languages, and a recent white paper on AI in Agri-Food systems.

Exclusive: In the Eye of the Cycle, John Deere Charts a Path Through Ag’s Slump

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 21:25:38 GMT

After months of workforce reductions and sliding equipment sales, John Deere is reversing course, announcing it will bring 140 employees back to its Waterloo, Iowa, operations as demand ticks higher for its 8R and 9R tractors.

The recall comes even as Deere forecasts the North American ag equipment market will decline another 15% to 20% in 2026, underscoring the push-and-pull shaping today’s farm economy. Large equipment sales remain under pressure from lower commodity prices and tighter margins, yet pockets of global demand are forcing Deere to recalibrate production in real time.

In an exclusive interview with Farm Journal this week, Deere & Company President Deanna Kovar laid out how the company is navigating that tension: tightening its long-standing build-for-retail manufacturing model, adjusting output month to month and working to protect farmers’ equipment equity during a downturn.

At the same time, Deere is attacking costs where it can, reducing prices on 187,000 parts over the past two years and preparing to roll out a new lower-priced tier of replacement parts later this summer. The company is also testing a tractor powered by E-98 ethanol, technology that could eventually eliminate the need for Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) altogether while driving even more demand for the crops farmers already grow.

For Kovar, who grew up on a Wisconsin dairy farm before spending 26 years rising through Deere’s ranks, the stakes are personal. Now, just months into her role leading Deere’s Worldwide Agriculture & Turf Division, she is steering the company through one of the sharpest equipment pullbacks in recent memory, while positioning it for what comes next.

A Cyclical Business in a Prolonged Downturn

The ag equipment cycle has clearly turned. Industry data show steep drops in large equipment sales, and Deere’s internal outlook aligns with the broader trend.

“Deere is 188 years old, so we know we’re part of a cyclical business of ag equipment, but definitely we’re seeing similar numbers. Our expectations that we shared in our last quarterly earnings was that the North American equipment market would be down 15% to 20% again in 2026. We recognize the ag economy is in a tough spot at the moment, and we’re working hard to make sure we can help farmers become more productive and more profitable through using our equipment and technology solutions, but it’s tough out there.”

She says the Association of Equipment Manufacturers figures for 2025, which show sales of 4WD tractors fell nearly 42% and combine sales are down 36%, align with what Deere is seeing.

The significant slump in sales doesn’t come as a surprise to row crop farmers who’ve seen several consecutive years of declining net farm income following a record high in 2022. USDA’s first official forecast for 2026 suggests continued pressure and another year of declining net farm income, with not much relief on input prices and stagnant commodity prices. Kovar says Deere understands the financial strains producers are seeing.

“Overall, the outlook for 2026 is that farmers are going to continue to be under pressure from a commodity price standpoint,” she says. “We’re certainly seeing input costs somewhat flatten for producers, and, of course, many producers are grateful for the government payments that will help them start 2026 maybe in a better place than they would have without it. Certainly great yields last fall were a good positive thing for producers, but it’s still putting a lot of pressure on commodity prices today.”

For Deere, that pressure translates directly into lower equipment demand and tough decisions inside its factories.

Manufacturing Adjustments: Building for Retail in Real Time

Over the past year, Deere announced workforce reductions across multiple Midwestern facilities. Since 2024, it’s reported John Deere laid off over 2,000 employees in the U.S., with those jobs primarily located in Iowa and Illinois. Recently, it reversed course in a couple locations, announcing it would bring some of those employees back.

Back in January, Deere also announced it was returning 99 workers to the job in Iowa, impacting both its Davenport Works and Dubuque facilities. But Deere said this week it’s also bringing back jobs at its Waterloo facility.

“We’re constantly evaluating what we think the market will be. And it’s not an annual thing. It’s a month to month, a quarter-to-quarter opportunity. And yes, we just announced 140 workers to come back to our Waterloo operations. This is the operations where we make the drive trains for 8R tractors, where we pour the castings for the new high horsepower 9R tractors, where engines are made, and where we put tractors final assembly together. So we’re always happy when we can bring workers back into our factory. And it’s because we’re starting to see a little tick up in demand for those tractors,” she says.

Kovar says it’s not necessarily just a North American phenomenon. The uptick in demand is coming globally.

“We are seeing some signs that there could be some opportunities, but much of this is going to be iterative over time. It won’t be from a very low point to a very high point. We expect over time that we can start to see things normal,” she adds.

Kovar emphasizes Deere’s long-standing “build-for-retail” philosophy, avoiding overproduction that would flood dealer lots and depress used values.

“We’ve been in business for 188 years, so we’re always making sure that we’re being as efficient and effective as we can at building the quality products that farmers come to rely on. So we’re all always adjusting how we manufacture, how we make sure we have the quality checks and the automation to make sure we’re making every tractor as good as we can,” says Kovar.

She says the company is also working to forecast demand expectations and where that additional demand could surface. But she says for the past 25 years, the company has been focused on a build-to-order mentality, especially in the larger ag equipment space.

“We are a build for retail mentality,” says Kovar. “We don’t want to build it unless somebody wants it. So this has been something we’ve been working on for 20 years, and we will continue to be focused on really understanding the demand in the market and making sure we’re setting up schedules and plans to build for that amount.”

Equipment Prices: It’s About the Trade Differential

Few issues generate more coffee-shop debate than equipment prices. Farmers have seen machinery values dramatically climb over the past five years. Kovar points out that looking at sticker price alone misses the bigger financial picture.

“We’re always looking at making sure we’re delivering value for farmers when they buy our equipment, when they buy our technology,” Kovar says. “When we think about the price of equipment it’s really important we understand that farmers, when they buy a new piece of equipment, it’s really about the trade differential from the product they’re trading in to the one they’re buying, and if we were to lower the price of equipment, it would lower the trade-in value of their used equipment as well. We’re always very mindful of the equity farmers have in their equipment fleet and the fact it’s a huge part of their balance sheet.”

Not only does Deere need to be careful that changes don’t impact the trade differential, but she says the company is also focused on making sure there’s a balance between products being affordable and creating the value farmers expect.

That balance, of affordability versus protecting used values, according to Kovar, shapes Deere’s pricing philosophy in a down cycle.

Lowering the Cost of Technology and Parts

While base machine pricing remains complex, Deere is targeting affordability in other ways. The first, she says, is on the technology side, and lowering the upfront cost.

“We’re lowering the barrier to entry to amazing technologies like ExactShot fertilizer systems, See & Spray sprayer systems and a combine automation system so that more farmers can afford to get into the technology. These technologies are saving inputs, ensuring we’re getting all of the grain out of the field and increasing yields. That strategy to lower the upfront cost of those technologies, and help the customer pay for it as they get the value from it, is a huge step forward in allowing affordability of the technology.”

On repairs and parts, she points to self-service tools and direct price reductions. She says the company is constantly looking at the cost of parts for their equipment.

“Over the last two years, we’ve reduced the price on over 187,000 part numbers in the John Deere system. Later this summer, we’re going to be announcing a new tier of parts from John Deare that will allow us to give customers choice when they buy parts from us as to whether they want the traditional OEM, that likely has a longer life, or if they want to look at a lower cost option,” Kovar says.

Deciding between the two parts tiers depends on:

How much a farmer uses the machine
Equipment age
How long a farmer intends to keep that piece of equipment

Retrofit Kits: Precision Without the New Iron Price Tag

As new equipment sales slow and more farmers turn to the used market, Deere sees retrofit technology as a critical bridge, allowing producers to upgrade performance without taking on the cost of a brand-new machine.

Kovar says retrofit kits are designed to separate technology adoption from iron replacement.

“I think the beauty of retrofit kits is you don’t have to buy a brand new piece of equipment to get brand new technologies. Just last year we launched what we call our precision ag essentials kit, which is the foundation of our technology stack. It’s where farmers start to go from no precision to a more precision mentality, and this ability allows them to put a John Deere GPS receiver, a display and a modem on any piece of equipment, Deere or non Deere,” Kovar says.

The strategy fits squarely into Deere’s broader push to lower the barrier to entry for precision ag. By allowing a GPS receiver, display and modem to be installed on any brand of older equipment, the company is effectively expanding the addressable market for advanced automation and data tools.

“We’re seeing people put these kits on 20-year-old tractors and then being able to do things like AutoTrac, AutoPath and turn automation, section control, the things that can save 10% of inputs and make sure your stand is better in the spring and your weeds are deader during the season,” Kovar says. “This is a huge opportunity for every farmer to get more into precision. Once you get into that base of the technology stack, the sky’s the limit to be able to go to other products like ExactEmerge or See and Spray — these technologies that really drive savings to the bottom line for farmers.”

In a downturn defined by lower commodity prices and cautious equipment purchases, Deere is betting the future of precision ag won’t be limited to the newest machines on the lot, but will increasingly ride on tractors that have already been in the field for decades.

Right to Repair, EPA and DEF: Seeking Clarity

Right-to-repair and diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) rules have been flash points between manufacturers and producers with two major announcements from EPA.

In early February 2026, EPA made a right-to-repair guidance announcement guidance and actions supporting the right to repair for farmers and equipment owners, specifically addressing issues with Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) systems and emission controls. The guidance clarifies the Clean Air Act allows for temporary overrides of emission systems during repairs, prohibits manufacturers from restricting access to tools or software, and enables repairs in the field.

The following day, EPA announced the agency is demanding detailed failure data from major diesel engine manufacturers as it considers additional rules aimed at reducing DEF-related shutdowns and derates that have plagued farmers, truckers and equipment operators for years.

“I think if you step back and think about what EPA’s done over about the last nine months, there’s been two important messages. One was last summer when they gave voluntary guidance that said we should extend the time from when a customer might have an issue with their DEF systems and not cause them to go into an inducement or a derate within two hours, which was the original rule. We’re very glad EPA has come out and said we can extend that time to give farmers more time to maybe finish the field, finish the day before they have to execute a derate or go through a regen on their DEF,” Kovar says.

She calls it a huge opportunity for Deere and one to which the company is already responding.

“We’re in the process of making sure we can extent that time on all the equipment we’re producing. We’ll do that over the coming months and years to help make sure we’re extending that time and not putting people in jeopardy of having a shutdown opportunity,” Kovar says.

On off-road right-to-repair clarity, Kovar says EPA’s right-to-repair guidance announced in February directly responds to a formal request the company made to the agency in June 2025 .

“[EPS] had already shared that on-road equipment didn’t have to go to the original equipment manufacturer or an authorized repair shop to turn your tractor or your truck back on after you had a deratement issue. We said, ‘Hey, we have tools that a farmer can do this on their own, but the way we read your rules, we believe we need you to tell us it’s OK.’ We’re grateful that last week EPA came out and said, yes, it is OK for off-road equipment for farmers to fix their own issues. We’re in the process of making sure John Deere Operations Center ProService, which is our self-repair tool any farmer can access, by early March, mid-March, we want to have the ability for a farmer to, if they run into a deratement issue on their tractor or combine or whatever, use Operation Center Pro Service to get their tractors back up.”

If DEF Goes Away, It’s Not a Quick Switch

With political discussions swirling around eliminating certain environmental regulations, and President Trump specifically stating he wants to see those regulations removed on equipment , some farmers wonder whether equipment could quickly be built without DEF systems.

When Trump was in a roundtable with farmers in December, he claimed removing those requirements on equipment would prevent breakdowns and make equipment cheaper. During the one-on-one interview with Kovar, Farm Journal asked if removing DEF on equipment would bring down prices.

“We have to really understand what they mean and how they want to go about it before we can really answer, does it make equipment cheaper? I think we’ve spent 15 years perfecting the system we have today, so we’ll have to continue to understand how far back do we think we’re going to go, how long would it take us, because we don’t have all of the technologies that don’t have DEF today,” Kovar explains. “If it were called tomorrow, we couldn’t start building tractors without it the next day.”

Removing DEF is not as simple as flipping a switch on the assembly line. Instead, she says Deere is focused on making sure farmers have the ability to repair their own equipment if it would go into derate. She thinks that’s a huge step forward in solving some of the issues that farmers have had with DEF.

Deere Tests an E-98 Ethanol Tractor

Even as debate continues in Washington over DEF requirements, Deere is exploring a future that could bypass the issue entirely.

While the company says it remains engaged with EPA on next steps surrounding DEF and emissions policy, Deere is also investing in an alternative fuel platform, an ethanol-powered tractor designed to run on E-98. The tractor will debut at Commodity Classic in two weeks.

“We’re not just thinking also about diesel, right, we also considering how might we fix this problem another way. And that’s an ethanol tractor we’ve been using across Iowa and other places. It’s early for us, but the idea that we could use E-98 to run a tractor, it’s so clean you don’t need diesel exhaust fluid to run it. We’re early in trying to pioneer what is an alternative to diesel that would allow a farmer to grow the fuel they put in their tractor to grow next year’s crop. It’s something we think we need to continue to talk about. There is a ton of infrastructure that would need to follow to allow an E-98-type fuel to flow and be on farm, but we think it’s an opportunity in the long run to help agriculture grow the fuel they use to grow the food we all eat.”

Deere confirms the early results are promising.

According to Deere, the limiting factor isn’t the engine technology itself, it’s the infrastructure needed to support it.

“Do we have the fuels available? Do we have the on-farm ability? Are the fuel companies ready to deliver it to the farm? At this point, there is a much bigger system challenge that will have to work,” Kovar says.

Advocating for Demand: Ethanol, Exports and E-15

Turning the ag economy around, in Kovar’s view, is about demand, both domestic and global. Not only is Deere working on equipment that could run with higher blends of ethanol, but Deere is also advocating for more demand.

“Certainly, we’re focused on helping farmers grow more with less. At the same time, we’re focused on helping to make sure there are markets for the crops our producers sell. We certainly spend a lot of time advocating for agriculture and for producers to have access to markets. We’re grateful for all of the trade deals that have happened here recently. We’re hopeful they start to materialize, and we see more and more grains flowing outside of the U.S. in exports. We also know we’ve got a huge opportunity here in the U.S. to drive ethanol and renewable fuels,” Kovar says. “We’re focused on making sure we’re using our voice at Deere to advocate for agriculture to not only feed the world, but fuel it. It starts with E-15, which we are hopeful we can get across the finish line at some point very soon. But it can’t end there. We have to continue to advocate for renewable diesels and an ethanol future, so we have to make sure farmers can sell their grains at a price that’s profitable, and it’s all about creating demand.”

The Next Five Years: From Data Collection to Real-Time Decisions

For Deere, which sees itself as a technology company, Kovar says she also sees Deere as a smart industrial company. With a focus on technology, she thinks the future isn’t about a single breakthrough machine, but rather about what happens behind the scenes in the data.

When asked what the biggest shift will be over the next five years, Kovar points to the evolution of information rooted in data.

“I think if you look back over those 25 years of technology, data has been such an important part of it. It started with yield maps, yield monitoring and binders on a shelf and has evolved over time to a cloud-based system. Everything’s connected. With Deere, it’s about John Deere Operation Center and how farmers can leverage that data, share it with partners, with their seed dealer, with their ag retailer, with the banker and with their landlords and have this really cohesive opportunity to bring all of the data they have in agriculture into one place,” Kovar says.

Personally, she sees the next step involving Deere helping farmers move beyond timely insights to timely decision-making.

“How do we help [farmers] get insights, timely information, that helps them make the best decision they can make in that moment on their unique piece of land in the middle of wherever they are farming and really give them confidence the data can help them drive to even better decisions,” she adds. “If we’re going to help them be more productive and be more profitable, it really starts with all the decisions they make. I think this next three to five years is a huge opportunity for us to make sure we are connecting all of their data in one place and helping them make really important decisions in real time that help them become more.”

Instead of one sweeping, industry-altering change, Kovar sees steady gains driven by machine learning, automation and in-the-moment decision-making, sometimes by the operator and sometimes by the equipment itself.

“I think that’s a huge part of the next three to five years, and those decisions happen because they’ve consciously made them or the machines are making them. If you think about See and Spray, it is deciding whether that’s a weed or a plant and only spraying the weed to save 50% to 60% of the herbicides,” Kovar says. “Those kind of in-the-moment decisions are a huge opportunity over the next 3 to 5 years as computer vision and machine learning compute and all of these things continue to accelerate at a pace that is very hard to keep up with.”

For Deere, the future isn’t just bigger iron or even more automation, it’s about connecting every data point on the farm and turning it into actionable insight, fast enough to matter in the field.

Watch the full interview here:

Why Embryo Products Make Sense for Commercial Cattle Operations

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 12:22:21 GMT

The U.S. beef industry finds itself in a period of intense pressure and opportunity. Cow numbers sit at modern lows, yet beef demand remains strong. Producers are feeding cattle to heavier end weights , but at the same time, larger cows aren’t necessarily weaning heavier calves. Efficiency, not size, is becoming the currency of competitiveness.

In this landscape, many commercial operations are reconsidering how they build cow herds. One approach gaining traction is the use of F1 replacement heifer embryos.

“Embryo products are no longer a luxury,” says Cary Crow, Trans Ova Genetics business acquisition specialist. “They’re becoming one of the most practical, cost-effective ways for commercial producers to: 1) build better cow herds faster; 2) improve consistency; 3) maximize heterosis; and 4) capture value in both maternal and terminal directions without compromise.”

Industry Realities: Efficiency Matters More Than Ever

Crow shares these industry facts:

The U.S. is producing record volumes of beef with significantly fewer cows.
Mature cow size has increased due to selection pressure for growth and carcass weight.
Larger cows eat more, require more resources and don’t always produce correspondingly heavier calves.
Meanwhile, packers and feedyards increasingly demand heavy-muscled, feed-efficient and high-marbling terminal cattle that finish around 1,500 lb. — without compromising yield grade.

He says this creates an inherent tension: “The genetics that make for the best cows are rarely the same that produce top-tier terminal progeny in the feedyard.”

Trying to chase both maternal strength and terminal merit with the same genetics for the entire calf crop, both replacements and feeder cattle alike, nearly always forces compromise. And compromise is expensive, he stresses.

F1 Females Are the Backbone of Commercial Efficiency

Crow says one finding is remarkably consistent across decades of university research: First-generation crossbred (F1) females outperform straightbred cows in fertility, longevity, calf survivability, adaptability and overall pounds of calf per cow exposed.

“This advantage stems from heterosis,” he says. “When genetically different breeds are mated, heterosis produces offspring that outperform the average of their parents for key traits — especially low heritability traits like fertility, maternal function and cow efficiency. As an industry, we can’t ignore the facts.”

He adds commercial producers benefit from F1 females because they:

Breed back more consistently, even under marginal conditions.
Stay in the herd longer, reducing replacement pressure.
Wean more pounds of calf per cow exposed.
Adapt to a wider range of environments.
Raise calves with more vigor and survivability.

“No other breeding strategy delivers more maternal ‘bang for the buck’ than a true F1,” Crow says. “But there’s a catch: F1 cows can’t replace themselves through natural service or artificial insemination. Managing two purebred herds to generate replacements is costly and unrealistic for most ranches.”

This is where replacement heifers in the form of embryos change the game.

(Trans Ova Genetics)

F1 Replacement Heifer Embryos: Solving the F1 Supply Problem

Crow says, traditionally, producing F1 females required maintaining at least two purebred cow herds or buying replacements from the marketplace, often at a premium and without full visibility into genetic selection or maternal quality.

“Embryo programs eliminate these hurdles by allowing commercial operations to generate true F1 females inside their existing cow base,” he explains. “Recipient cows carry embryos created from high-quality donor dams and sires selected specifically for maternal traits.”

The result, according to Crow, is a repeatable source of elite F1 replacements without managing purebred herds or relying on volatile replacement markets.

He says this approach provides three clear benefits.

1. Uniformity and Predictability

Embryo-derived F1s come from a tightly selected donor and sire pool focused on maternal traits. This produces heifers that are:

Consistent in type and development.
Similar in mature size.
Predictable in udder quality, fertility and structural correctness.

“Uniformity reduces management headaches and improves long-term herd stability,” he says.

2. Increased Efficiency in the Breeding System

“Commercial herds often struggle with the ‘all-purpose genetics trap’: trying to make good replacement heifers while also producing competitive feeder cattle from the same mating decisions,” Crow says.

He adds that embryo F1 programs separate the maternal and terminal goals:

Embryo recipients produce maternal replacements.
The recipients not getting pregnant to the embryos, along with the rest of the herd, can be cleaned up and bred to sires selected strictly for terminal merit.

“This structure maximizes heterosis on the maternal side while also enabling aggressive terminal selection without compromise,” Crow says.

3. Long-Term Value

“When a replacement female has higher fertility, longer stayability, lower maintenance requirements and better calf survivability, the economic compounding effect across her lifetime is enormous,” Crow summarizes. “Many producers report that embryo-produced females have exceptionally low cull rates and nearly every heifer makes the replacement pen.”

Replacing fewer females every year improves cash flow and reduces the long-term cost of production.

(Trans Ova Genetics)

How Embryos Strengthen Your Herd Strategy

“Embryo-derived F1 replacements fit naturally into a modern, efficiency-driven reproductive program,” Crow says.

He explains most commercial operations use them in a way that looks like the following:

Step 1: Designate a Recipient Group

This typically includes animals with good fertility and maternal instincts but not needed as genetic contributors. However, some producers have started with using their open cows after the breeding season as an easier step into the process.

Step 2: Produce a Consistent Set of F1 Replacements

These heifers enter your system with maximum maternal heterosis and predictable performance.

Step 3: Follow Up the Embryo Transfer and Breed the Rest of the Herd Strictly Terminal

With replacement needs met, every other female can be mated to:

High-growth sires
Carcass-focused sires
Superior feed-efficiency lines

“This separation of maternal and terminal goals is one of the largest sources of system-level efficiency available to commercial ranches today,” Crow explains.

Step 4: Repeat Annually

Over time, you will see:

More uniform calf crops.
Higher weaning weights per cow exposed.
Longer-lasting cows.
Better terminal calf performance.
A more predictable, stable business model.

A Practical Tool for Commercial Herd Progress

“Embryo technology is no longer an elite luxury,” Crow says. “It’s a practical tool helping commercial ranches solve one of the industry’s most persistent problems: how to produce high-quality replacement females without compromising terminal calf performance.”

He summarizes that using embryos to generate true F1 replacements enables producers to:

Capture maximum maternal heterosis.
Improve uniformity and predictability.
Reduce long-term replacement costs.
Breed the rest of the herd for maximum terminal value.
Build a more efficient, profitable system over time.

“For operations committed to long-term sustainability and efficiency, replacement heifer embryos offer a path toward a more balanced and productive future,” Crow says.

What About the Other AI?

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:17:58 GMT

Artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t new to agriculture, but it has reached a point where it is no longer limited to research projects or niche tools. What’s driving its growing visibility in cattle health and production is pressure.

Cattle values are high, input costs are higher and small inefficiencies now carry outsized consequences. At the same time, cattle operations are managing more data than ever, often spread across disconnected systems that are difficult to interpret quickly.

AI is emerging as a way to manage that complexity. Not by automating care or decision-making outright, but by processing information continuously and surfacing patterns that would be impractical to track manually. Harold Birch of UnCommon Farms and Robert Terry of Folio3 spoke at CattleCon on how AI could be used to improve how we work on the farm and with animal health.

From Raw Data to Continuous Awareness

A central theme of the discussion was early awareness. AI systems are designed to absorb large volumes of information, learn what “normal” looks like over time and flag changes as they emerge.

“It gives us more insight quicker than we can see with our own eye,” Birch explains. “The AI agent learns from you and gathers information out of your systems and gives it back to you in real time.”

That capability applies broadly — across health signals, operational workflows and financial data.

Rather than relying on episodic review or fixed schedules, AI enables a more continuous view of what is changing within an operation or across herds. This represents a shift from reacting to visible problems toward noticing drift sooner with AI analysis.

Pattern Recognition at a Different Scale

Pattern recognition is one of AI’s core strengths. These systems improve through use, refining their outputs as more data flow through them. They are not static tools; they learn from repeated exposure to real-world conditions.

“AI is not one-and-done,” Terry says. “You put it in place, and it just keeps getting better. It learns from itself — when we put things in place that were 85% accurate and four to six weeks later it’s 99%-plus.”

This adaptation makes it easier to identify subtle trends that might otherwise blend into day-to-day variability. Instead of relying on predefined thresholds alone, AI can recognize deviations because it has learned what typical performance looks like across time, conditions and systems.

Why AI Keeps Coming Back to Economics

Most current AI applications on farms are tied to cost and operational efficiency rather than direct revenue gains. AI speeds up routine work, reduces friction in accessing information and helps identify inefficiencies that quietly accumulate over a season.

“The impacts that we can have in agriculture usually revolve around cost and daily operations,” Birch says. “Most of it has been around the cost components. Things like detecting weeds, detecting sick animals and finding where animals are located.”

For animal health, this economic context shapes how AI fits into advisory roles. Insights that support earlier intervention, better timing or avoided losses tend to resonate more strongly than tools positioned purely around novelty.

Ideas for Where to Start With AI

Birch and Terry emphasize that AI does not need to be adopted perfectly — or all at once — to be useful. Its value often becomes clear through trial, not theory. Practical starting points include:

Use AI to scan for change — Apply AI to monitor for deviations in health, performance or operations so attention is drawn to what looks different, not just what is scheduled to be checked.
Summarize before you analyze — Use AI tools to pull together and summarize information from multiple sources before reviews or discussions, reducing time spent searching for context.
Focus on early signals, not final answers — Treat AI outputs as indicators of where to look first rather than conclusions. Earlier awareness alone can be valuable.
Reduce repetitive manual work — Experiment with AI for organizing, importing or synthesizing routine information, such as records, reports or metrics, freeing time for higher-level evaluation.
Apply it where consistency is hardest — AI is especially useful where scale, distance or workload makes consistent monitoring difficult. It can help standardize awareness across people, sites or time.
Test one workflow at a time — Start small, evaluate whether it improves clarity or efficiency and move on if it doesn’t. Learning what doesn’t work is part of the process.

AI as a Capability, Not a Commitment

Above all, Terry recommends dipping your toe in and seeing what AI can do for you.

“It’s not a spectator sport. When I first got involved with AI, I thought I had to do it perfectly and know a lot. Actually, the best thing you can do is get in and start doing it,” Terry says.

Waiting to understand everything before engaging often means never engaging at all. At the same time, not every tool will be worth keeping, and applying the wrong one can add complexity without benefit.

Rather than a single investment decision, AI is better viewed as a capability to explore. Used thoughtfully, it changes how quickly patterns are noticed, how efficiently information is handled and how confidently decisions can be made. For cattle practice, that shift is what makes AI worth paying attention to.

How Does the Ceres Tag Help Producers Find the Most Profitable Cows?

Thu, 29 Jan 2026 14:35:52 GMT

The upcoming technology hitting the beef industry is about more than tracking cattle and measuring performance metrics, it’s about continuing the American ranching legacy.

“Technology does allow the bridge for past generations and future generations to all exist on the ranch … our job as Ceres Tag is to help future generations continue to increase profit so they can return to the ranch,” says Shane White, national sales manager for Ceres Tag.

Bridging that gap looks a lot like combining cowboy logic and data to eliminate guess work and allow for confident decision-making at the ranch level.

“We are a direct-to-satellite animal behavior automation platform,” White says. “We automate phenotypes including pasture feed intake, grazing behavior, eating behavior and drinking behavior.”

Measuring these phenotypes and providing the data to ranchers by integrating with a number of platforms they already use greatly impacts profitability.

“Understanding the efficiency of turning grass into that calf is really important,” White says. “The number of ways they can use that information to maximize their profit is really as endless as their imagination. We get to show them the efficiency of their cows in their environment … and that’s where the profit really starts to show up.”

While initial measurements of pasture feed intake and animal behavior are initially what set Ceres Tag apart, the company and tag offer much more than that.

“We are launching the Ceres Generation 6 device that will have a suite of advanced reproductive capabilities — estrous alerts, calving alerts and mounting scores,” White says.

What does this mean for ranchers? Less guessing on which cows are more fertile and which bulls are most active. Daily estrous alerts provide ranchers with information that can be applied in both natural service and artificial insemination scenarios.

“We’re now automating the return-to-cyclicity metrics … selecting females that return to heat in 20 to 25 days rather than 40 to 45 days allows us to shrink calving windows even further,” White says. “I’m not predicting an exact standing heat moment … but definitively this percentage of your herd has had estrous activity on this day with a very high confidence interval.”

In artificial insemination (AI) scenarios, ranchers can better know which cows are best suited to synchronize versus not.

“When we’re doing our preparation for synchronization, we always know there’s a percentage of animals that are in that seven-to-10-day window on either side of their estrus cycle that may or may not react,” White explains. “So when we know which animals are either three days past their cycle or three days from their cycle, we know that if we put a CIDR in and start a synchronization cycle in those females, we’re actually just going to throw them off because they were about to ovulate on their own as is.”

The result? Fewer wasted dollars and a better investment of genetics.

“We can stop wasting semen we would have otherwise wasted,” White says. “Those genetics are too important and too powerful to go to waste.”

The mounting scores for bulls also can’t be overlooked as a profit tool.

“Mounting scores tell us which bulls are getting out and working … and also which females are very dominant and riding each other,” White says. “It allows us to see which bulls are working and which ones aren’t … when we spend as much money as we spend on bulls in this country every year, that’s important information.”

Calving alerts are the third feature being rolled out with the new generation of the Ceres Tag.

“Calving alerts are going to be behavior-based metrics that definitively predict a calving activity going on,” White explains. “Those will be triggered based upon the last data packet that the tag sends. It won’t be an immediate notification but it still allows us to know which animal was calving within the last three to four hours at this point, and it gives us the GPS location of that.”

For those calving out on the range, this can eliminate some guess work and save time.

Why invest in this type of technology as opposed to doing what’s worked for years?

“Understanding reproductive behaviors paired with the energetic cost of making them occur gives us the ability to be far more profitable than we ever have been,” White says.

From feed intake in pasture and dry lot settings to which females consistently cycle, ranchers can sort out the females that truly work in their environment and business model.

Learn more about Ceres Tag and how these algorithms work on the “ Casual Cattle Conversations ” podcast.

Is a Calving Camera System Your Next Essential Ranch Investment?

Fri, 09 Jan 2026 15:08:43 GMT

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

Old Ranching Heritage Meets New Tech

Thu, 04 Dec 2025 16:30:46 GMT

In Kingsville, Texas, near the Mexico border, the only thing thicker than the accents is the ranching culture.

Natives call it the birthplace of American ranching.

“This is where European immigrants from Scotland, England and Ireland combined with a lot of the native peoples and the Spanish-descended settlers,” says James Clement.

Kingsville is his home, and he knows that heritage well.

“This is where the Catholic mission system and the Western European farming systems collided to create what is known as ranching,” he says.

Much of today’s ranching terminology and practices originated in this South Texas region, and Clement is quick to note that the tradition endures.

“You still see a lot of commitment by the people that own land in this part of the world to maintain large-scale ranches,” he says. “We call this region the last great habitat.”

With his well-worn and scuffed cowboy hat, Clement not only has ranching culture in his heart, it flows through his veins.

At the King Ranch Museum in downtown Kingsville, Clement traces his family’s lineage on a massive, framed portrait that hangs above a stone fireplace. Capt. Richard King and his wife, Henrietta, were Clement’s triple-great-grandparents. His family has all matriculated from the famed King Ranch, a major corporation of modern ranching that has expanded to include farming, luxury retail, recreational hunting and more.

Land of His Own

Though Clement maintains ties to King Ranch, he also now manages his own operation, Bloody Buckets Cattle Co., a ranch deeply steeped in family tradition.

“Our Clement family has been in American military service since the War of 1812, beginning with Sgt. Maj. Kay Clement and his son, Gen. John Clement,” he says. “Four of those generations (from 1812 to 1945), served in the 28^th Division of Pennsylvania.”

During World War II, Clement’s grandfather, Capt. James “Jim” Clement, fought with the division dubbed the Bloody Buckets Division by German forces due to its red keystone insignia

“My grandfather wore the bloody buckets patch on his left shoulder, and we still brand our cattle on the left hip with a brand that is modeled after that patch,” he says.

Bloody Buckets Cattle Co. uses King Ranch American Red genetics. All wear the Bloody Buckets brand on their left hip to pay homage to the ranch’s founder and the family’s military service record.

(Angie Stump Denton)

His grandfather, wounded in France, returned to South Texas as the recipient of a Purple Heart Medal and began a long career with King Ranch, ultimately serving as CEO from 1974 to 1988.

While living in South Texas, he founded Los Hermanos Ranch in 1967, which Clement now operates under the Bloody Buckets Cattle Co. brand. In the 1970s, his father, James “Jamey” Clement Jr., and his uncle, Martin “Martín” Clement II, assumed ownership and day-to-day responsibilities for Los Hermanos. Together, all three men shaped the ranch’s history while each spent his full-time career working for King Ranch.

Clement and his family have been exposed to 400 years of ranching in three operations. Clement’s mother came from the historic Beggs Cattle Company, established in 1876. They, along with their partners, have put that knowledge together and found a way to manage their land and cattle.

“We used the lessons learned from Beggs, King, the experience of our partners and the King Ranch Institute of paying attention to the land, natural resources and wildlife,” he says.

“As we were continuing to grow our operation, we were seeing that we were surviving droughts better, our wildlife quality and quantity was increasing, our water retention was improving and our business lines were growing,” he adds.

A New Approach

Now supporting those heritage practices on-ranch is a host of ag tech advancements. Certainly, they were not seen on his grandfather’s ranch, but Clement knows they are the way of the future, making practices more efficient and easier to accomplish with less labor and fewer man-hours.

He uses Ranchbot Monitoring Systems to keep an eye on his watering systems. Frontiers Market Artificial Intelligence gathers animal health data. On-vehicle cameras are helping to map his land and resources through Enriched Ag.

But his greatest passion lies below the surface in soil carbon capture, so much so that he works as senior vice president and general manager of grass and rangeland for EarthOptics , a company that uses the study of soil biology to predict agronomic outcomes and measure soil carbon. In the role, he helps landowners measure and monetize soil carbon through data-driven insights.

For Clement, it’s a business model that he likens to one he knows well.

“Using an oil and gas analogy, EarthOptics is the drilling company; other people sell the crude (soil carbon in this sense), but we find it.” he says. “What we’re trying to do is help people make more efficient decisions on their land, reduce cost and then potentially also look at additional cash flow streams through the sale of carbon credits.”

Clement calls himself “bullish on carbon” for one particular reason.

“This is really the first opportunity in ranching — first of the growing ecosystem markets — where large companies are paying people to make good stewardship decisions,” he says. “Historically, how did you judge other ranches against each other? Who was selling the most cattle for the most money, selling the most expensive hunts or had the most pump jacks? Now we can pay for taking care of the land and making long-term decisions.”

EarthOptics not only finds a way to quantify and qualify good land and soil stewardship, they validate the data in such a way that farmers and ranchers can capitalize on them.

“We’re at the crossroads of the industry,” Clement says. “EarthOptics is not selling the credits. We’re just advising the ranchers on how to partake in these markets and then also making the introductions and building the industry.”

In November, Bloody Buckets Cattle Company hosted the final 2025 stop in the Trust In Beef Sustainable Ranchers Tour. Owner James Clement III used the event to share the importance his operation places on heritage land stewardship and ag tech advancements for profitability.

(Trust In Beef)

New Land Equals an Accelerated Approach

Clement is broadening the scope of Bloody Buckets Cattle Co., buying additional land and leasing land with his partners, “Poncho” Ortega Sr. and “Poncho” Ortega Jr. They are currently ranching on six ranches in four different South Texas counties. Acquiring new ranches and leases means the work on some of the new land is just beginning.

“On the west side, we acquired some ranches in the last 20 years that had previously been farmed,” he says. “We spend most of our time and resources in the pastures with the worst conditions to build back soil health.”

By applying the same technology he’s helped develop and test elsewhere, Clement is accelerating the restoration process. Their ranching operation has become a testing ground for many of the new ag tech companies in the industry, seeing if these concepts can work in rough country and be beneficial to the operation.

“We’re on a mission to get each of these newer owned or leased properties back in better shape,” he says. “As we expand, we want to make sure that acre is productive.”

Trust In Beef™ works to secure the future of American ranching by providing the information ranchers need to make the decisions that impact the resiliency, profitability and resource management of their working lands. Learn more about Trust In Beef and their Sustainable Ranchers Tour by visiting www.trustinbeef.com

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