Dry matter intake widget:
This new widget shows the DM intake of the last 5 or 7 days per animal type (dairy cows, dry cows, young stock, or beef cattle). To calculate these numbers, Horizon is using the 'Location type’ setting on the Fence settings page.
Through this way, Horizon knows how many cows there are for the different animal types. By combining this with the amount of feed distributed at the different fences, Horizon can calculate the average ’DM intake/day/animal’.
In the graph on the right, you see a red dot at the end of the line. This dot (in this example for dry cows) means that the Vector has distributed 10% less feed (or more) compared to the set ration.
Dry matter intake analysis:
If you click on the widget, you will enter the analysis part, where it is possible to dive deeper into the DM intake per location. The first information is shown at ‘Animal type’ level. When you click on an animal type, analysis can be performed at ration level and eventually at feedstuff level.
In the example above, the analysis is filtered on the location type “Dairy cows”. There is only one ration fed to this animal location type, therefore only one ration is shown at the top part of this page.
In the middle section, all individual feedstuffs are shown as yesterday's DM intake, average DM intake of the last 7 days, and the grey bar represents the set feed amounts of the current Vector ration. The feedstuffs which are fed at the Astronaut and Cosmix are also shown, for these the grey bar represents the average of the feed table calculations for the applicable animals. The graph at the bottom shows the DM intake trend per feedstuff for the last 7 days, this can be used to see the effect of ration changes. If there is a warning icon next to the graph title, the deviation between the set ration and the actual ration is greater than 10%.
How to get the most accurate information
To get the best input for the analysis, it is of the utmost importance that the animal location is accurate. For example, if there is a dry cow location with 20 cows, while according to the registration there are 22 cows, this could possibly result in a deviation of 10% of the DM intake.
There are two ways to get the most accurate animal count. This can be set via Manage > Feed > Fence, click on the desired location and go to reporting settings > animal registration.
Here the following can be selected:
- Automatic animal count - (based on location). When using the automatic option Horizon counts how many animals are present at the location via a Lely product which can identify animals by their tags (e.g., Astronaut, Cosmix, Grazeway). This means that animals have to be assigned, sometimes manually, to the correct location. For example, if an animal has been dried-off, she must be assigned to the dry cow location. And when there are different young stock locations depending on age, these animals should also be assigned to the correct location when they physically change location. For this purpose, customers can change the location while entering for example a dry off or calving, see the example below.
Note: Device visits can also change the registered location of an animal, the last registration (either manual entry or automatic via a device visit) is leading.
- Manual animal registration – When using this setting, the customer must manually track the number of animals at the location and register them accordingly. When using manual animal registration customers must keep track of the animal numbers per location themselves. This can be done within a location on the Fence page (can be found in the Manage section). On the bottom part of this page, customers can enter new registrations or edit historical records (see image below)
We are here to help
For more information or questions, contact your FMS Specialist