Stuart Adams has joined HerdInsights to help develop UK sales of the reproductive and health management system with Mole Valley Farmers.

As a fourth generation Devon farmer’s son and with 15 years’ experience in agricultural sales roles, Stuart has a strong understanding of the challenges facing farmers.

Stuart’s tasks will include the training and development of the Mole Valley Farmers sales team to enable farmers to understand the year-round benefits of using such a system.

HerdInsights is a collar based reproductive and health management system that automatically monitors individual cow behaviours, such as rumination, activity and lying. This information is sent to a data centre where multi-metric analysis compares the animal with the overall herd. Any deviations are then automatically flagged to the farmer, via a text alert.

Stuart said: “This multi-metric system enables us to provide increased accuracy in both heat and health detection. For example, for oestrus alerts we’re not just looking at walking and activity, but also other additional activities such as chin resting, licking, bunting and nudging. This is incorporated into our algorithm to ensure accurate and timely heat detection.”

This type of system also enables early detection of diseases. For example, if a cow starts eating less and lying more, it could be a sign there is a problem.

“By alerting the farmer at an earlier stage it means that the animal can be treated earlier, which provides a wide range of benefits including reduced veterinary costs, reduced usage of antibiotics, along with the ability to monitor treatment effectiveness.”