$5-8 per cow, per year? I can't see ranchers with 100-300 head of cattle, or more, doing this more than one of two times before deciding it's too expensive. Even with a subscription, they still need to pay for the damned collars, because everyone knows Thiel isn't gonna just give them away to any rancher that wants them. I noticed how the article doesn't mention that little fact. Nor does it mention anything about repair costs, or whether or not they're weather proof. The article doesn't mention what the fail rate is on those things, either, especially when there's significant cloud cover that obscures the satellite signals for the gps transcievers.
The ranchers with less than 50 head herds might, but then, you don't need a lot of land for that many cattle, so using fencing is easier because you can just use binoculars to survey your fencing. Maybe this is one of the reasons why beef prices have gone up so much the last couple of years?
However, cattle ranching isn't rocket science, so I guess they've been able to market it well enough to sucker a bunch of ranchers into this.
Dairy cows already move themselves from pasture into the milking area.
I guess for cattle it might make more sense as it seems a couple bull calves every year get ambitious and escape.
But, TBH, fencing is cheap, it works, and it doesn't require a monthly subscription. And in most rural areas, an escaped cow is an annoyance but hardly a crisis.
Seems like there could be a market for an inexpensive gps tracker, maybe built into the ear tags, but this product seems way overpriced
$5-8 per cow, per year? I can't see ranchers with 100-300 head of cattle, or more, doing this more than one of two times before deciding it's too expensive. Even with a subscription, they still need to pay for the damned collars, because everyone knows Thiel isn't gonna just give them away to any rancher that wants them. I noticed how the article doesn't mention that little fact. Nor does it mention anything about repair costs, or whether or not they're weather proof. The article doesn't mention what the fail rate is on those things, either, especially when there's significant cloud cover that obscures the satellite signals for the gps transcievers.
The ranchers with less than 50 head herds might, but then, you don't need a lot of land for that many cattle, so using fencing is easier because you can just use binoculars to survey your fencing. Maybe this is one of the reasons why beef prices have gone up so much the last couple of years?
However, cattle ranching isn't rocket science, so I guess they've been able to market it well enough to sucker a bunch of ranchers into this.
especially at $5-8 per cow per month.
Our neighbors have cattle and one has dairy cows.
Dairy cows already move themselves from pasture into the milking area.
I guess for cattle it might make more sense as it seems a couple bull calves every year get ambitious and escape.
But, TBH, fencing is cheap, it works, and it doesn't require a monthly subscription. And in most rural areas, an escaped cow is an annoyance but hardly a crisis.
Seems like there could be a market for an inexpensive gps tracker, maybe built into the ear tags, but this product seems way overpriced