Anyone visiting Don Badour’s cow-calf operation in the last 18 months will have noticed his cattle sporting some spiffy orange bling around their necks.
The bovine baubles aren’t just for looks, however. They’re part of a sophisticated virtual fencing system that helps the Lanark County farmer monitor and track his herd’s movement and wellbeing.
Badour is quite pleased with the investment — and so are the cows.
“I thought that the cows might be not too happy with them on, but we put them on, they gave their heads one or two shakes, and that's it,” Badour said during a panel discussion at the 2026 Northern Ontario Ag Conference, hosted by the Northern Ontario Farm Innovation Alliance in Sudbury Feb. 6-7.
“They've come to realize they're there. So we haven't had any trouble with the cows rejecting them.”?
?Made by the New Zealand company Gallagher, the eShepherd neck bands weigh about eight pounds each and are powered by solar-charged batteries. They run on GPS and the system is operated all through a smartphone app or computer.
In the app, the farmer’s land shows up as a virtual map, with each cow represented by a coloured dot. The farmer draws out a paddock onscreen, directing the movement of their herd. They can see where an animal is at any time, change a paddock's parameters to shift grazing, or pick up on potential problems, as when an animal remains in one spot for too long.
Click here to see more...