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LinkedInPosts Tagged: will allen
Virtual fencing ‘game-changer’ for ranchers grazing cattle
Tech can save ranchers time and benefit animals and land, becoming more viable
After the Caldor Fire destroyed seven miles of fencing on their cattle ranch in 2021, Leisel Finley and her family needed to replace the fence.
Finley, a sixth-generation rancher at Mount Echo Ranch in Amador County, said reconstruction costs were bid at $300,000 and would take at least a year to build, leaving the family without summer pasture and a herd of hungry cows to feed. Additionally, the U.S. Forest Service mandates that grazing be withheld for two years in postfire landscapes. This put the family in a difficult position.
While watching a recording of a California Cattlemen's Association meeting, Finley learned about a pilot program for virtual fencing. Desperate to find an alternative solution, she registered to try the livestock containment technology, which uses GPS enabled collars to monitor each animal's location in near real time.
Livestock producers can draw a perimeter on a map of their pasture using a laptop or smartphone application and send those instructions to the collar. The collar then uses audio and tactile cues to contain the animal in the area.
Eager to discover the short- and long-term benefits of virtual fencing, Finley turned to Scott Oneto, farm advisor, and Brian Allen, assistant specialist, from the University of California Cooperative Extension office in the Central Sierra. Since partnering with Oneto and Allen, Finley said she has come to understand and uncover more of the technology's potential.
The team has consistently observed the technology's value in integrating with and enhancing traditional livestock production systems across California. Though still in its early stages of development, the location tracking and containment system appears to provide time- and cost-savings that make it a game-changer for ranchers.
Ability to monitor location of animals in real time
Virtual fencing really stands out in its ability to monitor each animal's location in real time. During roundups, ranchers can use their smartphones to see their own location relative to their herd. The system can also send alerts if an animal crosses the virtual boundary or if a collar remains stationary for an extended period, potentially indicating that the animal is sick or that the collar has fallen off.
Rounding up cattle on large, forested grazing allotments can be challenging, as the process generally requires a group of people and many return trips to find every animal. Prior to virtual fencing, Finley and her father could gather about 85% to 90% of the herd in a week. Since using virtual fencing, Finley said one of their most recent roundups lasted three days, and they located every single cow.
Something that every livestock producer dreads is the notorious call from a neighbor or California Highway Patrol alerting them that one of their cows is out in the middle of the road. It always seems to happen at midnight or while they are out with friends or family. This scenario changes with virtual fencing.
Containment based on animal behavior
The containment system that virtual fencing is built on is based on animal behavior. When the animal crosses an invisible boundary, the collar emits an audio warning, prompting most animals to instinctively turn back into the desired area. If the animal doesn't respond, the collar delivers a mild electric pulse as a secondary deterrent.
Field trials by Oneto and Allen demonstrated the system's success. Recently, the team trained a herd of 37 cattle of mixed ages that had no previous exposure to virtual fencing. During the initial six-day training period, the cattle responded to the audio warning alone about 75% of the time when they approached a virtual fence boundary, with the remaining 25% of cases requiring an electric pulse.
After about three weeks, the herd was responding to audio cues alone about 95% of the time. The field trials also showed that the collars contain the livestock within the desired areas 90% to 99% of the time when the entire herd wears virtual fence collars and their basic needs for safety, connection to the rest of the herd, water, forage, shade, etc. are met.
Opportunities for improvement
While the technology is effective in its current capacity, there are notable areas where it can improve. One limitation to the system is the current reliance on cellular networks to operate. If an animal wanders into an area outside of coverage, the collar will continue to operate based on the last instructions but won't receive updates or report locations. This is especially a concern in many areas of California with poor cell reception, including the steep forested rangelands where many livestock producers have summer grazing allotments.
Another limitation is that some companies require a solar-powered base station with radio and cellular antennas to be placed on the pasture. These facilitate the transfer of animal locations and updates to the virtual fences. A base station going offline would create the same conditions as a drop in cell signal until the base station is repaired. Some companies are currently developing collars that bypass the need for these base stations.
The other major concern for ranchers is the cost for a virtual fencing system. The average rancher can expect to pay an estimated $20,000 to $30,000 in upfront costs. The cost to set up a base station alone is $5,000 to $10,000. However, this cost is highly dependent on several factors, including the manufacturer, the number of livestock to be collared, if the livestock are large or small ruminants, and the number of GPS base stations to cover the range.
According to Allen and Finley, the high cost of virtual fencing can be offset by the unique animal and land management benefits it can provide. “While physical perimeter fencing remains essential, VF is rapidly emerging as an innovative tool to control livestock with ease, precision, and flexibility in ways that were not previously feasible with traditional fencing,” Allen said.
Finley described the technology as a “game-changer” for her family.
Virtual fencing helps control invasive grasses, installing fuel breaks
While virtual fencing is designed to contain livestock without physical fencing, it is not intended to outright replace secure perimeter fencing. Instead, it operates best as a highly dynamic and adaptable cross-fence, allowing for more intentional grazing on the landscape to meet livestock production and natural resource conservation objectives within a secure physical perimeter.
With grant funding from the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, the UCCE team continues to work with Finley and other livestock producers to test these applications on California's diverse rangelands.
Within the Sierra Nevada and Coast Ranges foothills, these trials include using virtual fencing on cattle for targeted grazing of invasive grasses to support the recovery of native forage and installing fuel breaks within the wildland-urban interface to remove vegetation where the edge of a pasture meets urban housing.
Using virtual fencing, 25 cattle were successfully concentrated on a field of Medusahead (Elymus caput-medusae), an invasive annual grass. The herd respected the virtual fencing boundary 99% of the time despite nearby preferable forage. Grazing reduced medusahead seed heads from 2,072 per square meter in the ungrazed control area to just 68 per square meter in the grazed section.
In a different trial, 37 cattle with virtual fencing collars were contained within 120-feet-wide fuel breaks along the boundary of an annual rangeland and residential area. Cattle stayed within the boundaries 99% of the time, leading to an 81% reduction in fine fuel biomass and lowering wildfire risk in the wildland-urban interface.
Within rangelands on conifer forests, these UCCE trials concentrate cattle on brush to reduce the flammable plants and vegetation that competes with desirable timber species. It also can prevent livestock from entering sites that are sensitive to livestock presence.
Upcoming grazing trials will focus on how virtual fencing works with goats and sheep. In addition to Oneto and Allen, UCCE's contribution to virtual fencing research is in large part due to Leslie Roche, UCCE specialist and associate professor at UC Davis, Dan Macon and Jeff Stackhouse, UCCE livestock and natural resources advisors, Kristina Horback, associate professor at UC Davis and Lone Star Ranch in Humboldt County.
To learn more about the trials led by the UCCE team,visit https://cecentralsierra.ucanr.edu/Virtual_Fencing/
The Art of Loving Insects: Bohart Museum-Style
Do you like to draw insects? Do you want to meet artists who draw insects? Do you have a tattoo of a honey bee, butterfly, moth, dragonfly, or another insect? Then you'll want to attend the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house on "Insects, Art and Culture" from 1 to 4 p.m.,...
Megan Ma of the Jason Bond lab, UC Davis, is both a scientist and a scientific illustrator. In 2021, she received a National Science Foundation Award, Research Experience for Post-Baccalaureate Students. In June 2021, she received a bachelor's degree in evolution, ecology and biodiversity, with a minor in entomology. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
This illustration of a Jerusalem cricket, aka potato bug, by UC Davis student Allen Chew, adorns a Bohart Museum t-shirt. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Potato Bug Lovers, Unite! A 'Vienna Sausage' T-Shirt!
It had to happen. With so many folks asking "What are those weird bugs?" and UC Davis distinguished professor Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology, describing them as "basically Vienna sausages with bitey jaws," it definitely had to happen--a Bohart t-shirt...
This is the Jerusalem cricket t-shirt by artist Allen Chew, a UC Davis student and Bohart volunteer, and designer Fran Keller, professor at Folsom Lake College. Keller, a Bohart Museum scientist, is a UC Davis doctoral alumnus.
This Jerusalem cricket, aka potato bug, surfaced in April at the Doran Beach campground, Bodega Bay. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A dorsal view of the Jerusalem cricket, aka potato bug, spotted in April at the Doran Beach campground, Bodega Bay. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Berkeley honors Allen-Diaz
“I am incredibly honored to receive this special award,” said Allen-Diaz, who was visibly surprised and moved by Gilless's announcement.
The Berkeley Citation recognizes academic achievement and University service of the highest order. In addition to her contributions as a researcher, graduate student mentor and professor of range science, Allen-Diaz has served in many leadership roles for UC Berkeley and UC Agriculture and Natural Resources (ANR).
“Her leadership as chair of the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, as Executive Associate Dean of the College of Natural Resources, and finally as the Vice President for Agriculture and Natural Resources has produced a legacy of accomplishments that few academics can match,” Gilless said. “The college would not have its remarkable Geospatial Innovation Facility without her foresight and willingness to make the necessary investment. ANR would not have the strategic plan that has guided a resurgent sense of how to implement the University's land grant mission.”
Allen-Diaz has served as a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the National Academy of Sciences and the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities. She has authored more than 170 research articles and presentations. In February, she became the first woman to receive the Society for Range Management's highest award, the Frederick G. Renner Award.
After earning her bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees at UC Berkeley, Allen-Diaz took a job with the U.S. Forest Service. In 1986, she joined the faculty at UC Berkeley faculty, where she studied the effects of livestock grazing on natural resources, oak woodlands and ecosystems of the Sierra Nevada and the effects of climate change on rangeland species and landscapes. At the end of June, she will retire as UC vice president and as Russell Rustici Chair in Rangeland in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management at UC Berkeley.
The Berkeley Citation was created in 1968, when the University of California celebrated its 100th birthday, to honor individuals or organizations that had rendered distinguished or extraordinary service to the university.
To read more about Allen-Diaz's career, see the latest issue of California Agriculture journal.
Cousins, McNicol named UC Sustainability Fellows
UC ANR has chosen Gavin McNicol and Stella Cousins, both UC Berkeley Ph.D. candidates, to receive UC President's Sustainability Student Fellowships.
“Our search for new ways to reduce UC's and California's carbon footprint is sure to benefit from the creativity and innovative ideas brought by these two exceptional student fellows,” said Barbara Allen-Diaz, UC vice president for Agriculture and Natural Resources.
McNicol, a native of Scotland, is studying how much methane is released from restored wetlands in the Sacramento Delta region. The results of his research will inform the development of future wetland restoration plans, encouraging more effective efforts to minimize emissions of methane, a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.
The UC Office of the President is providing $7,500 to each of UC's 10 campuses and to the Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, earmarked to fund student awards in support of the UC Carbon Neutrality Initiative and other UC-based sustainability efforts.
An initiative to enhance competitive and sustainable food systems is part of UC Agriculture and Natural Resources Strategic Vision 2025.
