How to take good quality cattle observations?
When there are inconsistencies in how yards collect data, it is difficult for us to use it to make improvements. We want to know what your weather stations are saying and what your animals are telling you. That is why we introduced the standard cattle observations dashboard.
Recording good quality cattle observations will help you better manage your cattle heat risk in the future, and help us improve our forecasts so you can get more accurate predictions.
You can use this data to improve your knowledge and reduce your risk.
For more information about how to use the Cattle Observations dashboard, see the Cattle Obs help page.
How to take good quality observations
All factors that impact heat stress are important to show the full picture, including animal characteristics, pen conditions, feed, mitigation measures, etc. So the more information you can provide with each observation, the better.
Remember: A recording of no heat is as important as a recording of heat load!
Recommendations for staff:
Make sure to use a naming convention for the cattle populations that all staff can understand.
Ensure all staff are well trained at identifying heat stress in cattle. You can find information about how to recognise the panting scores in the Panting Score Reference Chart here.
Recommendations for recording observations:
Set up the cattle populations you may want to monitor pre-summer.
Identify high risk cattle.
Monitor your high-risk cattle every day (preferably twice a day, early morning and late afternoon). Aim for a frequency that is achievable for you.
If the high-risk cattle are showing early signs of heat stress then start observing the next risk level up.
During the build up to an event, monitor more pens and more frequently.
FAQs
If only one or two animals are panting should I record it?
If it is observed in the morning you should record it, as the cattle don’t appear to have cooled down enough overnight.
If it is observed in the afternoon, it’s up to you and your staff whether you record it. If staff are busy with other work, it’s not necessary to record. However if staff have time to record it, more data is always better than less.
Note this panting could also be an indicator that the animals aren’t well, or have other issues besides heat stress affecting them.
Do I need to collect data for every pen?
You don’t need to collect data for every pen, as keeping it all consistent and high quality may be too difficult. Consistent data from one pen is better than data from lots of pens for a short period of time.
Choosing which pens to monitor: You should aim to collect consistent data for the most susceptible pens (those containing the cattle populations most susceptible to heat stress).
How do I collect data for a mixed pen?
For each observation, you should consider the specific populations of cattle affected. If populations are in mixed pens, you should choose the population which the observation relates to and just specify the pen number.
If there are cattle in a mixed pen that have passed the Panting Score trigger, they should be recorded because otherwise they could get missed. If you feel there’s enough cattle in a certain population that you want to take note of (as being above the Panting Score trigger) you can still select the >10% red button, even if it’s not technically over 10% of the population. Just make sure to put this detail in the observation comments so we (and future you) know what the observation indicates.
The AHLUs on my weather station say all my cattle should be stressed but they look fine. What should I do?
If the cattle look fine, then they’re fine. Collect an observation and say they are fine, so we can use it to improve data in the future.
This could be occurring due to constantly increasing AHLUs, or unreliable weather station data.
The issue of constantly increasing AHLU can occur sometimes in hot climates, so we implemented the Reset AHLU button to help mitigate it. This button makes it easier for you to start again, if you are absolutely sure there’s no heat load. Additionally, we also capped the AHLU at 200 to further reduce the issue. You can find more information about the Reset AHLU button and how to solve this issue here.
Weather station accuracy could also be the issue, as they only show information for the very small environment they collect data from. There could also be a malfunction such as a stalled wind sensor.