How quickly does a new boundary reach the cattle?

A redrawn paddock is sent to the neckbands over the mobile network or a base station within minutes.

Do the neckbands make a sound when new grass opens up?

No. Cattle find the new space by grazing forward as they normally would. The neckband only cues them at an active boundary.

Can I use it from my computer as well as my phone?

Yes. There is a web app and a mobile app, and both can draw paddocks, move mobs and check cattle.

How eShepherd works: draw, send, cue

Three steps behind every fence

eShepherd comes down to three steps: draw, send and cue. Everything else in the system, from scheduled moves to grazing heatmaps, is built on top of them.

1. Draw

You draw a virtual paddock on a map in the eShepherd app and assign it to a mob. The map can already show the things that matter on your property, such as your physical paddocks, water points and landmarks, so you draw the new boundary in context.

A mob holds one active virtual paddock at a time. When you want the mob somewhere else, you draw or pick the next paddock and either send it straight away or schedule it for later. Many farmers keep a set of paddocks they reuse across a rotation rather than drawing from scratch each time.

2. Send

The neckbands pick up the new boundary over the mobile network or, where there is no coverage, through an on-farm base station. The update reaches the neckbands within minutes.

Once a neckband has the boundary, it does not need to stay in constant contact to enforce it. The neckband knows its own position from GPS and compares it with the line it has been given. That is why cattle stay in their paddock even if the network has a short interruption.

Neckbands in a mob can also pass a paddock update to each other over Bluetooth, so animals on the edge of coverage get the same instruction as the rest of the mob.

3. Cue

At the line, the neckband plays a tone. If the cow turns back, that is it: the tone stops and nothing else happens. If she keeps going, a mild pulse follows.

The tone plays for up to 5 seconds before any pulse, which gives the animal time to choose. Cattle learn the tone quickly and soon turn on sound alone. There is no vibration, and nothing happens before the cow reaches the line.

A few safeguards sit around this step. If a cow panics and runs, the cues stop. If she pushes through the line and keeps going, the neckband stops cueing after a set number of attempts and leaves her alone until she walks back in on her own. Coming back into the paddock never triggers a cue.

What comes back to you

Because every neckband reports its position, the same system that holds the fence also tells you what is happening in the paddock:

Live positions and tracks for each animal and each mob.
Grazing heatmaps that show where cattle have spent their time, which helps you plan the next move.
Alerts to your phone, including when an animal has crossed a boundary or has barely moved for hours.

Moves without the drive out

Once a mob is trained, moving it is a matter of sending the next paddock. You can plan a rotation once and have the mob shift to the next paddock at the set time, even when you are away. For grazing that needs a steady release of feed, Moving Fence™ takes this further with a boundary that advances on its own.

Training comes first

None of this works on cattle that have not learned the tone. Training is built into the system: most mobs learn in 7 to 10 days in a simple training paddock, and the app shows when each animal and each mob has graduated.