In the West Australian outback, pastoralists run cattle on land that sprawls to no end in sight, with red dirt, droughts, cyclones, and iron ore trains more commonplace than human interaction.
Key points:
Rio Tinto is trialing cattle collars on their pastoral leasesStage one is complete with 100 head of cattle wearing the collarsVirtual fencing is aimed to help resource utilisation and rangeland health
The vast distances can make monitoring cattle difficult, but a new virtual fencing technology trial has the potential to shake up the industry.
The cattle collar has been trialled on a herd at Rio Tinto’s Hamersley Station, located just outside of Tom Price in the Pilbara.
The mining giant has partnered with the University of Western Australia, and Meat and Livestock Australia to see the rollout of technology.
The end goal: no fences, smarter farming, and a whole lot of profit.
The cattle yards at Hamersley Station.(ABC: Robert Koenig-Luck)
The dream
As one of Australia’s biggest mining companies, Rio Tinto invests in innovations that could lead to profit – and that’s where the cattle collar idea was floated.
The company manages six pastoral leases across the Pilbara and can carry more than 18,000 head of cattle in a good year.
It is also houses some of its biggest iron ore mines on the same land.
Rio Tinto Manager of Pastoral Sim Mathwin said the collar was a potential solution to the conundrum of running farming and mining operations simultaneously.
“It’s going to be integrated into a new strategy on how we run our stations, which is around holistic management,” Mr Mathwin said.
“It will also prevent cattle accessing Rio Tinto infrastructure, railway lines etc.”
Virtual Fencing Technology allows livestock to be contained or moved without using physical fences.
In the Pilbara, fencing roughly costs $4,000 per kilometre: $2,000 for labour and $2,000 for material.
The average pastoral lease in the Pilbara spans across 200,000 hectares, and fences are routinely damaged by natural disasters.
Mr Mathwin said virtual fencing could be a game changer.
“Honestly, I wouldn’t be involved with doing it if I didn’t see the potential,” Mr Mathwin said.
“I do believe that if the collars can deliver, as we expect it could, it will change the pastoral industry.”
Vence is a virtual fencing technology company that has developed their own collar.(ABC: Robert Koenig-Luck)
The collar
So far the trial has proved successful with 100 head of cattle wearing the collars, each costing about $40. The next step is to increase the trial to 500, and eventually monitor the whole breeder herd.
The collar is a lightweight GPS device, which is attached to the cattle’s neck.
It’s programmed to receive signals from a remote tower that guides the animals away from a virtual fence line which is drawn on a computer or smart phone.
Station manager Evan Casey said he was originally skeptical, but that changed quickly.
“Within about 48 hours the cattle had adapted,” Mr Casey said. “We are testing absolutely everything with the animals, stress levels, markings, welfare.
“At this point, we haven’t had any problem whatsoever, which has really surprised me.”
If the animals approach a virtual boundary, the collar alerts the cattle with a warning sound.
If they cross it, they get a mild electric shock, less than from an electric fence.
Station Manager Evan Casey monitoring cattle weight at the stockyards. (ABC: Robert Koenig-Luck)
Mr Casey said one of the major benefits was managing a herd remotely, rather than driving more than 1000 kilometres a week around paddocks.
“This is a way to check the cattle every single day and see where they are, see what they’re doing, see how they’re moving, see how your bulls are interacting with your breeder cows, if they’re working, if they’re not,” Mr Casey said.
“The potential is quite endless.”
Scientists have a field day
The technology has allowed the scientists to also measure the nutritional value of the landscape and how cattle are eating it, which in turn should put dollars back into farmers’ pockets.
University of Western Australia animal scientist and project lead Phil Vercoe said it was a ground-breaking trial.
“In this part of the world, there has never been a trial and experiment like the one that we’re doing on the scale that we’re doing,” Mr Vercoe said.
“It enables the pastoralists to understand the most profitable parts of the landscape, and possibly tweak their management to improve the efficiency with which they utilise that.
“You can also look after the health of the landscape.
“Spelling land works very much from the soil upwards and if you can rest areas of land, particularly in a really timely manner, it will be key to an efficient production system.”
University of Western Australia animal scientist Phil Vercoe has been monitoring the rollout of the cattle collars.(ABC Pilbara: James Liveris)
However, one of the biggest concerns is animal welfare.
Any electric devices used on livestock are covered by state government animal cruelty legislation.
Queensland and Tasmania are the only states that freely allow the sale and use of Virtual Fencing Technology.
The research trial on Hamersley Station has passed a licensed animal ethics and welfare committee.
Hamersley Station is located near Tom Price in Western Australia’s Pilbara region.( ABC: Robert Koenig-Luck)
Professor Vercoe said the end goal of the research was to provide reason to change state laws and allow for the collars to become commercially available for the pastoral industry in WA.
“We are definitely accepting that there’s an ethical interest in the community and that’s what people and the consumers are really driving for,” Professor Vercoe said.
“The collars will meet the modern expectations of animal welfare standards upheld by the community.”