Using Virtual Fence Collars On Lead Goats to Manage Herd at Reduced Cost

Commodities

Practices

Virtual fencing is an effective management tool for moving and containing goats. Virtual fencing is particularly useful when fence installation is labor intensive and frequent, as in management-intensive grazing and commercial brush clearing operations. Virtual fence companies recommend a collar for each member of the herd. A collar for each individual can be cost prohibitive due to the cost of collars and subscription-based service contract.

As ranchers, we know our herds and which individuals are leaders and which are followers. Utilizing our understanding of our herds, we could potentially collar only lead goats and still manage the entire herd effectively and economically. The number of individuals requiring collars would depend on factors including herd age, sex ratio, and familiarity with an area. In addition, there will likely be greater boundary crossing by follower goats without collars, but the extent of crossing is unclear. In most situations, where there is no immediate threat to boundary crossing, such as next to freeways or property boundary, some crossing will not be problematic or could be accounted for when setting boundaries. Therefore, I will test the concept that collaring lead goats will allow effective herd management at reduced cost to collaring all goats.

The objective of this project is to determine if collaring a reduced number of lead goats, rather than the entire herd, will allow me to effectively manage the entire herd by conducting trials on my own goat herd. All goats in trials will have collars for monitoring and recording GPS data. However, only select goats, based on leadership rank, will have collars turned on (activated) to send audio alerts and shocks, while others will only have GPS data turned on (inactivated). I will determine leadership rank of each goat based on observations of grazing leadership, movement initiation, feeding dominance, and risk taking. In all situations there will be a property boundary woven wire or 5 wire electric fence to prevent goats from straying onto neighboring property, clean, fresh water will be available at a waterer within each trial paddock, and access to shelter will be provided in each paddock. During the first year of the trial, I will set up trials randomly with between 1 and 5 "lead" goats activated in paddocks that range from 1/4 acre to 1 acre in size.

For each trial I will randomly determine how many lead goats (1-5) have activated collars and how large the paddock (1/4, 1/2 or 1 acre) will be. In general, I will set paddock shape as a square to reduce boundary complexity. During each trial, I will allow goats to acclimate to new paddocks for 5 hours prior to data collection. I will use GPS data to determine the amount of time each goat was inside or outside of the established virtual boundary and how far outside of the boundary after an escape. For goats with activated collars, I will record number of warning alerts and fence breaches. For each fence breach I will determine if an inactivated goat left the boundary prior to the activated goat breach, indicating the inactivated goat enticed the activated goat to breach.

Each time I move the goats to a new paddock I will reestablish which lead goats are activated. Goats will not see the same paddock for at least 45 days. I will also transport goats to novel properties for brush removal scenarios following the same protocol. During the second year I will add 5 naïve non-activated goats to assess whether new goats will learn from established goats. In year 2, potential lead goats will increase from 1-5 to 1-7.

We will use GIS collar data to determine the amount of time individual goats are inside and outside of the virtual boundary and the distance a goat has strayed. We will determine if a particular size of paddock and number of activated goats is optimal for managing the entire herd. By establishing the amount of time and distance a nonactivated goat is outside of the boundary relative to activated goats we can determine the relative risk of each collaring scenario. For example, 1 lead goat activated in a small paddock vs 4 lead goats activated in a large paddock. We can then estimate the efficacy of managing the entire herd while only activating a subset of goats.

If goat herds can be managed with virtual fencing without collaring all goats, then we provide production efficiency and economic sustainability benefits by reducing labor time and cost of goat management and reducing costs of virtual fencing. Determining risk of escape based on number of activated individuals, duration of exposure to virtual fence, and size of paddock allows producers to judge the efficacy and economics of using virtual fencing in their own systems. These benefits could be more broadly applicable to other livestock.