Video technology comes to the cattle barn
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Using his iPhone and computers to keep tabs on his herd from afar gives this busy Glencoe farmer peace of mind. But video surveillance isn't the answer to everything
by JAMES CARELESS & DON STONEMAN
Whenever he wants, Matthew Zwambag can view his purebred Limousin herd on his iPhone via strategically placed still and video cameras in his barns and feedlots.
Zwambag's iPhone gets images and videos from eight cameras, six of them digital still cameras that shoot colour in daylight and black-and-white infrared at night. Two more are pan, tilt and zoom video cameras with the same capabilities, allowing him to look around the barn.
"I access all of these feeds remotely on my iPhone; either over Wi-Fi or Bell's 3G cellular network," says Zwambag, who still walks to the barns to check on the stock before he retires for the evening. "I can check the cows wherever I am. As well, since the photos and footage are automatically saved to a digital recorder back in my home office, I can review what has happened during the day if I need to."
Furthermore, Matthew's father Bill Zwambag, and brothers Nick and Andrew, can also monitor and access the cameras from any computer in the world.
But video cameras aren't the answer to everything. This technology "isn't going to replace going to the barn at night," Zwambag stresses. "If people think that's what spending a couple of thousand dollars will do for them, they aren't ready for the technology. If you use it as a crutch, you will never get better." An animal can easily get caught in a bad situation in a blind spot, "and blind spots always happen with cameras."
A commercial installer wanted $15,000 to install the camera system in the barns. Matt Zwambag did the job mostly himself for about $2,400. "I did a lot of online shopping," he says. He bought cameras and wires separately and tested them in the house before installation.
About $1,000 of that cost is for wire connections alone, he says. He thinks the wireless industry is still a decade away from matching hard wired connection quality.
The cameras are hard-wire-connected to a receiver in the house, with two 500 foot wires, two 400 foot wires and two 300 foot wires. The wires are buried under the frost line in a PVC pipe. There is cord in the pipe so that another wire can be pulled through if necessary. Matt aimed for a minimum of connections to reduce the possibility of corrosion or corrosion causing damage. The receiver box is located in the house to keep it clean and dry.
He can sit in his office in the evening doing paperwork and see all six cameras in the barn at once, or focus on an image from one camera in particular.
Zwambag's time is at a premium. He and his wife raise about 70 registered Limousin cows on his family farm east of Glencoe. His family cash crops 400 acres, there are 200 acres devoted to hay and pasture, and he has a full-time job as a teacher in London.
The camera helps with decisions at calving time. How long has that cow been calving? Is it time to assist? "Sometimes as farmers we question whether we did the right thing," Matthew says.
From the iPhone, he sees only live feeds from the barn. On a computer, he can view the website and access recorded videos and see when a cow started calving. All of the cameras have a time code on them.
Zwambag can play back the recorder quickly on a computer to determine if a cow just started to calve five minutes before being observed and should be left alone, or has been labouring for an hour and needs help. The video breaks into segments between one minute and 15 minutes, depending upon the amount of activity in the barn. Matthew says he can scan through an hour of video in about a minute.
Not everyone is as happy with cameras in the barn. Rose Stewart and her husband Dave raise Piedmontese and Simmental cattle near Winchester. Three years ago, they put cameras in their barn so that they could monitor activity from the house. The cameras are not connected through the Internet. Rather, an antenna on the barn roof broadcasts a signal to a television in the house.
But it hasn't worked exactly as sold, Rose Stewart says. The infrared camera is confused by dust when there is a light on in the barn. It shows up as fog in the image.
And the zoom on the camera doesn't work from the house. It only operates from the remote if there is someone in the barn, which rather defeats the purpose of the camera.
As a result, the Stewarts are still working with the company that supplied the cameras, Rose Stewart says. She is unwilling to invest in new equipment.
Zwambag says he hasn't had a problem with the infrared camera and dust or a light on in the barn. He deliberately leaves a single bulb on in parts of the barn so that he can enter and leave quietly without disturbing the stock. He says one camera "doesn't seem to be doing what it should be." He describes it as a "lower quality camera and I am working on that with the company" that provided the technology.
Occasionally, something that seems like a spider web appears on the camera viewer. Spiders seem to like to use the cameras as a point to attach a web, Zwambag says. He sweeps the cameras weekly to clear them.
While cameras won't replace barn checks, access via his smart phone to live images in his barn lets Zwambag know if he should go straight home from a meeting "or visit for a bit." And that confidence that things are all right in the barn is worth something, too. BF