Virtual fence trial aims to help NQ graziers respond better to drought

Called the Virtually Fence Free project, graziers attach an electronic collar to cattle allowing the tracking and control of their movement. It's hoped the project will help determine the best drought resilient grazing systems and improve the long-term condition of the land.

The five-year project, run by not-for-profit company NQ Dry Tropics in partnership with the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF), aims to test how the technology will work reliably in remote areas.

Based at the state government's Spyglass Beef Research Facility north of Charters Towers, the trial will use base stations installed at the facility equipped with Starlink wifi to transmit the coordinates of the virtual paddock boundary to a herd of cattle.

"Like much of remote northern Australia Spyglass has limited mobile coverage meaning virtual fencing systems requiring network access aren't yet a fully effective or accessible tool," NQ Dry Tropics project lead Marc McConnell said.

"We think we can get around this problem and once we do this trial's progress will become more and more interesting for northern Australian beef producers."

As the cattle approach the virtual fence the collar emits a series of beeps, Mr McConnell said. If the beeps are ignored a harmless pulse is given which trains the animal to respond to the audible cues.

"We've seen so far that the animals appear to be learning quite quickly to respect the virtual paddock boundaries," he said.

"A mobile app allows us to monitor the location of both the herd and individual cattle in near real time, and almost instantaneously modify paddock boundaries depending on the needs of the herd and what conditions are looking like on the ground."

The project also use walk over weighing systems and the condition of the land will be monitored on site and remotely.

Mr McConnell said the information gathered will also shed light on the needs of various cattle classes as well as ideal times to rotate cattle for best production results and to keep the land from degradation.

"We will be able to match cattle requirements to available feed in the paddock, and to spell preferentially overgrazed areas," he said.

Animal production scientist from DAF, Jarud Muller said the technology is a big step forward for the industry.

"The potential benefit I find most exciting is the ability to shift cattle into a defined area of a paddock by simply drawing a shape within the app on your computer," he said.

"The ability to manage grazing in such an adaptive way is a game changer for industry.

"We can match stocking rate to feed supply and optimise grazing utilisation on a finer spatial scale within each 'shape' to improve land condition and best meet cattle nutritional needs."