Virtual Fence Could Modernize the Old West

Hugh Pickens writes "For more than a century, ranchers in the West have kept cattle in place with fences of barbed wire, split wood and, more recently, electrified wires. Now, animal science researchers with the Department of Agriculture are working on a system that will allow cowboys to herd their cattle remotely via radio by singing commands and whispering into their ears and tracking movements by satellite and computer. A video of Dean Anderson, a researcher at the USDA's Jornada Experimental Range at Las Cruces, NM., shows how he has built radios that attach to an animal's head that allow a person at the other end to issue a range of commands — gentle singing, sharp commands, or a buzz like a bee or snake — to get the cattle to move where one wants them to. Anderson says it would cost $900 today to put a radio device on one head of cattle, but he says costs will fall and the entire herd wouldn't have to be outfitted, just the 'leaders.' Much of the research has focused on how cattlemen can identify which cattle in their herds are the ones that the others follow."

Comments

Re-adapted Tech

[slifox]

"working on a system that will allow cowboys to herd their cattle remotely via radio by singing commands and whispering into their ears and tracking movements by satellite and computer"

Looks like they're finally re-adapting that technology once reserved only for our most esteemed government leaders ;)

The animal trials usually come before the human trials -- but I don't know if I'd consider any of our current heads of state still "human" ...

Re:This sounds laughably impractical

[morgan_greywolf]

Perhaps. But you sound like a whole lot of people whose jobs have since been replaced by automation.

Seriously.

For example, it was once said that vinyl-cutting CAD/CAM systems would never replace the journeyman sign painter (yes, signs used to be painted by hand!). You could NEVER do all the stuff that a guy with a brush and some paint could do.

Yet, today, you pretty much can. There are very few people left who actually know how to layout and paint a sign by hand like an old pro. Most sign companies don't even have a hand lettering person on staff anymore.

This might be in its infancy, but it is possible -- even likely -- that one day, something along these lines might actually be made to work well enough to replace experienced ranch hands.

If a rancher can even eliminate the need for 1 or 2 ranch hands with this technology, in the long-run, he'll save himself a bundle of money.