By Shelby Gruss and Beth Reynolds
The Iowa Beef Center with Iowa State University Extension and Outreach will host a Technology Field Day at the McNay Memorial Research Farm on Sept. 29, showcasing a handful of technologies being used in various research and demonstration studies.
According to Shelby Gruss, assistant professor and forage extension specialist at Iowa State, cattlemen and women are discovering top-of-the-line tech to help their operations run smoother and a bit more efficiently. The technologies beef producers can use are expansive, and it is a rapidly evolving space with more options becoming available.
The McNay Research Farm houses Iowa State’s main cow-calf operation, comprised of a purebred Angus spring and fall herd. On-farm data collected provides ample research opportunities, which assistant professor and cow-calf extension specialist at Iowa State Randie Culbertson will discuss at the field day.
“We have both genotype and traditional phenotype information on all these cattle. With new technologies, we can gather phenotype information that has been hard to collect in the past and start looking for more genetic relationships that matter to producers,” she said.
The field day will feature various demonstration trials utilizing technologies, as well as a tradeshow with multiple company representatives available to answer questions about virtual fencing, activity monitoring ear tags and more.
Source : iastate.edu