Air pressure and animal appetite - technology backs up a farmer's gut feeling

Farmers have long trusted their gut feelings and Dr Jillian Kelly, a vet and animal health and nutrition consultant speaking at today’s Red Meat Updates in Launceston, said they’re more accurate than most realise.

In a presentation about technology, particularly how in-paddock weighting units can be used in an agricultural business, the remark stood out.

However the advocate of proactive livestock management said that being able to back up generational knowledge and experience with data to make timely changes on the farm has her “obsessed”.

“The use of in-paddock weighing can help identify the effect of weather on sheep and cattle behaviour and their appetites,” she said.

“We’ve observed over many years that barometric pressure changes are pretty influential in animal intake and therefore annual daily gain.

“I think farmers have long suspected this, and while it might come across as an old wives’ tale, I think there’s something in there that we could measure that might predict what’s going to happen.”

Dr Kelly said that when a low-pressure storm front moves in and animals sense it, they could seek shelter and temporarily stop eating.

The down side is once the storm has passed, the animals are at risk of gorging on grain or other feed.

“Where I live in Coonamble, New South Wales, when the pressure is roughly 10-20 the animals eat steadily and appetite is normal, but when it drops to around 10 the animals are off their food,” she said.

“While there’s not a lot of grain fed here in Tasmania, even in a pasture setting I’ve noticed the animals aren’t grazing when the barometric pressure is down.”

She said by using technology to monitor these behavioral shifts it could be easier to manage supplementary feeding.

Her business Animal Health & Nutrition Consulting (AHN) owns five Optiweigh units and hires them out to clients along with observing another 14 units owned by clients.

For cattle, these are commonly used for home-bred or trade cattle on crop, pasture or in feedlot pens to ensure the cattle are reaching their daily gain targets.

For sheep, these are commonly used in lamb containment feeding systems to monitor average daily gain and make drafting and trucking decisions.

“We also see the units used on pasture to assess if animals are truly on a rising plane of nutrition during joining, or if cows or ewes are gaining or losing weight during lactation.”

“In both cases, the technology allows monitoring of weight gain performance, the influence of things like change of diet, weather, water cleanliness or temperature worms and supplementation, and has reduced the need for animal handling.

“It also allows us to make supplementary feeding decisions in a very timely way.”

“Like all pieces of technology, in-paddock weighing needs to be used as part of the whole farm or whole mob picture - the volume of data we get to see has certainly helped us learn to ‘read the tea leaves’ over the past five years.”

FULL COVERAGE OF THE RED MEAT UPDATES IN TAS COUNTRY ONLINE AND FRIDAY’S PAPER