David Tait

“smaXtec gives you unique information on rumination and drinking cycles at your fingertips.”

David Tait has been using smaXtec on his farm in Omagh since early 2021 and is more than happy with his decision installing the system: “I am very pleased with it surprisingly encouraged by it, by what it can tell you about your cow a lot of things we didn’t even notice before a lot of things going on with cows rumination and even drinking cycles things like that you never had real information on before, all that now at your fingertips”, the farmer says.

They have had very good experience with smaXtec in terms of detecting diseases very early on – mastitis, lung infections but also swollen hocks or sore feet. “It gives you time to take action on that cow before you would have clinically seen her with your eye. Particularly mastitis you would generally get a temperature alert two days before you would see any sign in the milking parlour of reduced yield or cruds in the milk”, he adds.

Also heat detection with smaXtec has had a very positive impact on the farm. “smaXtec has been great at picking out those cows that are on heat and it gives a clear pattern then of the heat cycles and you can keep a good record of that then”, David Tait explains.

What David Tait thinks the future of farming will look like? “I think the big focus now is trying more for preventative rather than firefighting and picking out a sick cow that is down. You want to try and prevent her from getting to that stage so if you can act quicker, have the notifications from smaXtec to tell you, you’ve got a problem before you see it you can take action quicker. It will help to reduce the use of antibiotics. That’s a big positive particularly where the world is heading.”