Count on it

BY RICHARD WOODD

A small Taranaki electronics company is claiming a world first with its innovative infrared livestock counter. The counter has been designed for and successfully tested on sheep and dairy farms and is attracting interest from abattoirs and saleyards.

The manufacturer, Watchman Electronics of New Plymouth, says its breakthrough is a built- in correction for cows that back up in a race and go through twice.

Company owner Ashok Rajasingh says this is the key part of the counter system "and I'm not prepared to reveal more detail about it at this stage, but it takes care of behavioral aspects of livestock that traditionally have been a hindrance to establishing accurate counts.

"We think we are the first engineers in the world to have cracked this problem. We have searched the internet extensively and found no other product available that will perform this function."

Mr Rajasingh says two sheep units were sold before Christmas to an abattoir in Abu Dhabi. He has orders from two South Island dairy farmers and inquiries from the Waikato - a sheep-dipping contractor and others wanting to be distributors. An American milking equipment agent in Connecticut has also made contact through the internet.

The cattle counter unit has two sensor beams 12 centimetres apart reflected across the race. Each time a cow intersects the beams, she trips the counter. But if she baulks and backs up through them again, a flashing light warns the milking shed operator this has happened. The readout is corrected when the animal goes forward again.

Watchman has been making electronic people counters for about 20 years. The company's livestock counters were developed in the company's factory, which is in the basement of Mr Rajasingh's Bell Block home. Both retail for $950.

"From time to time, farmers have inquired about something to count their livestock, but we did not go down that path because there were a lot of issues to deal with, such as the unpredictability of animal behaviour. They walk on four feet, they mob up - we can't count groups - they may jump or ride each other or back up. It's often outdoors and in an environment subject to dust, mud, animal waste and high pressure washdown water."

Inglewood dairy farmer Warren Gill has been trialling the counter for about 12 months and has just had the new model installed. Northern Farm Services technician Bert Fisher put him in contact with Watchman.

Mr Gill's big family partnership Sandstone Farms milks two herds totalling 420 through a 44-bail rotary on broken, gorgy country 5km up Lepper Road. He can lose two or three cows a year.

"At the end of milking, I can see on the counter whether they've all come through. If there's one missing, maybe she's stuck in a creek and we can find her before she dies. That's the only benefit for me, but it's enough. One of these counters is only half the value of one cow. I like the technology. I'm totally confident with it."

Wairarapa sheep farmer Blair Percy of Eketahuna located Watchman through the internet and asked if he could help develop something from its people counter using sensors from his sheep-dipping conveyor.

"That's how we ended up making the first unit," Mr Rajasingh says.

"Blair installed it himself and got it working, with a bit of trial and error, about March last year. So he was the driver. Later we went to the Percy farm and videoed it in operation in his sheepyards and thought there could be an opportunity for a new product in the market. There were no copyright issues because the technology is commonly available - it's just an application."

Mr Percy says the sheep counter is reliable when properly positioned in a well-designed race and he uses it regularly. He tests the count accuracy against shearer tallies. "It could interest sheep farmers, but it depends on how good they are at counting the traditional way. I've seen guys keep a count in their head while three-way drafting," he says.

The first prototype was unveiled at the 2009 New Zealand Agricultural Fieldays Innovation Centre.

"It was a very basic application, more a proof of concept and principle than a finished working model," Mr Rajasingh says.

"It was well received, but we realised it would have to be fine- tuned. When we started, we sold one to an abattoir, then found it wasn't counting black sheep, and at Warren's it wasn't counting his black cows. Then we realised that the sensor wasn't a typical IFR, but a variation which did not differentiate black. Fortunately, at that time, we had available the services of a young, bright design engineer trained in the UK, Ben Evans.

"Working with our technical director Ravi Iyer and operations manager Shirley Brown, they changed the sensor to a more sophisticated industrial reflective type used in robotic manufacturing, a $300 sensor compared to the $5 item from our people counter."

It can pick up individual units at rapid speed and at accurate levels.

"The critical thing to successful operation is the farmers have to install it in a position where the cows can't knock the instrument, where there is a kink in the race, either existing or created by welding on appropriate pipe, so that only one animal can pass and it stops them riding each other.

"The farmer has to solve that problem. We have found that if installed correctly, it is very reliable.

"We could adapt it to a herringbone shed, or even drafting through a paddock gateway, because it can run off motorcycle batteries as well."

Mr Rajasingh says he can produce 50 to 100 orders a week with extra labour, but if production needs to get bigger, he can outsource the manufacturing process into a robotic factory locally or elsewhere.

"The quality assurance takes as much time as manufacturing, so that if we went to computerised out-sourcing, the quality aspects would also be automated.

"We would have to train distributors to be commissioned sellers and installers."

Mr Rajasingh came to New Zealand to do his MBA at Otago University "in a country which focused on agribusiness and respected my qualifications from India. Work for Tegel got me to New Plymouth and that's how I found this business, which I purchased from the founder, Dave Winters, three-and-a-half years ago".

Watchman also makes diesel turbo timers, shop-door entry bells, motorcycle safety lights, public urinal water savers, plumbing controls for prison cells and navigation light controls for luxury yachts.

- © Fairfax NZ News