Many dairy farmers have a love-hate relationship with the program that controls the robots. After all, they did not choose it and they can’t change it – the manufacturer told them they needed it. They may also have herd management software to track herd health, breeding programs, calvings, dry-offs and more. People ask me which is more accurate, which do you really need, and how do they work together.
There are things you must monitor in the robot software because they do not transfer to herd management software. You need to be familiar with robot software reports to monitor robot performance. The feed in the robots must be set and monitored in the robot software. Milking permission and milking frequency do not transfer to herd management software. At the most basic level, you can select a few reports to track these items and rely on your support team to take care of the settings.
There are things you can choose to manage through either robot software or herd management software. Robot software can monitor repro performance and generate lists of cows to calve, cows to breed and cows to dry off. Some robot software can even track synchronization protocols, vaccinations, and herd checks. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. The management team may be more comfortable with herd management software and herd management software may be more flexible than robot software. It is a little bit like choosing between an iPhone and an Android phone. Both do the same thing but one may be more user-friendly than the other.
There are things that you can track in herd management software that you cannot track in robot software. If a farm has parlor cows and robot cows, herd management software may be the best way to combine records from the two systems. Herd management software has more potential to create new data points and summarize them in different ways. For example, robot software can generate basic conception information, but herd management software can drill down to specific groups of cows or seasons of the year or even combinations. Herd management software allows you to create new items to record genomic test results and more.
If you are using herd management software in combination with your robot software, you must verify that both systems have the same information. Software logic may block certain information from moving between programs. For example, an abortion does not always transfer from herd management software to robot software. If robot software misses the abortion, the calving date may be incorrect. If the calving date is incorrect, a cow can end up with the wrong feed table or the wrong milking permission. If an insemination is erased from the herd management software after it has been sent to the robot software it will stay in the robot software unless it is manually removed. If the insemination is not removed from the robot software, it may prevent the robot software from receiving other information.
Cow Corner can help, whether you are managing your herd with milking system software or exchanging information with a herd management system. I have experience with both robot software and herd management software, so I can help you find and organize the information you need from your system software, or I can help you verify that the systems are communicating correctly.