Cowgorithm: A Smart Collar for Dairy Cows
Added to the Museum of Data by Mariachiara Ficarelli on Wednesday, June 22, 2022. Museum of Data Collection ID: 1149.
Public description: Halter is a New Zealand agri-tech start-up which has developed a solar-powered, GPS-enabled, smart collar for dairy cows. It is in other words, an Internet of Things (IoT) wearable for cows. The collar hardware is controlled remotely by an app using Wi-Fi and LoRa (the wireless platform of IoT, which allows for connectivity also in rural areas where reception might not be available). The image featured here is a still from a GIF of the app featured on the Halter Website. The blue-dots represent the cows moving and reflects how a Halter farmer will remotely experience their cow herd. The collar has two main purposes: 1. To allow farmers to automate and control the movement and pasture of cows on their farm remotely. The collar does this by providing virtual fencing: sound and vibration emitted through the collar's hardware prods the cow to move in a specific and programmed direction. 2. To monitor the cow’s health through a proprietary algorithm developed by Halter, trademarked as their "cowgorithm". Machine learning is used to allow the collar to detect if a cow is sick or in heat through the cow’s movements. Essentially this aspect of the collar is similar to a FitBit for cows. Halter promises dairy farmers an optimised herd, better “work-life balance” and a more environmental and productive approach to farming. Through this, Halter states they are creating the future of farming (or at least their start-up version of the future farm).
Materials used: Amazon Web Services (AWS); the materials for the collar hardware (which is information not publicly available, at least in my research).
Credit: Halter 2022 (https://halterhq.com/)
Copyright: Halter
Language: English
Size: The collar weighs approximately 650 grams. The counter to secure the collar weighs 1kg or so
Creation date: 2016/01/01 00:00:00