|
I
recently attended the National Animal ID Expo in Kansas City. The
meeting was sponsored by the National Institute for Animal Agriculture.
The organization is made up of producer groups, agricultural educators,
animal agriculture product manufacturers, government animal health
officials and individual producers. The meeting featured presentations
by each of these represented segments regarding how animal ID was
impacting and being used in various applications. Many of the
applications were aimed toward the use of animal identification in
marketing animals and animal products.
One
of the most interesting speakers was a dairyman from England who
discussed his country’s animal identification or passport system. With
all of the technology we have available today, they use a paper passport
system. Each animal has an individual passport that follows the movement
of the animal. It would seem that system would not be very effective,
and it does have its weaknesses when rapid tracing is needed. However,
their passport system has played a large role in the near eradication of
BSE, also known as Mad Cow Disease. During the peak years of the
disease, there were thousands of cases of BSE each year in England. Last
year, there were only three cases. Their passport system allowed them to
find birth and feed cohorts of positive BSE cows and remove them from
commerce. That is a pretty impressive use of animal ID. The dairyman’s
take home message was very simple, "It is a lot of trouble to keep
up with. We did not like it when it began, but don’t try to take it
away from us now."
Another
application was New York’s Department of Agriculture using active tags
to inventory captive deer and elk herds. An active tag is one that
transmits a signal that allows a reader to capture information from a
distance. One of the requirements of the New York Chronic Wasting
Disease Monitoring Plan is to inventory the individual deer or elk in
each herd yearly. The other way to do a herd inventory is by catching
each animal and reading each ID tag. By using active tags, the animals
do not have to be run through a chute or tranquilized. If you have ever
tried to restrain a deer, you can understand the huge advantage of using
active tags.
There
were industry representatives who discussed the use of RFID (radio
frequency identification) to market animals. There are various source
and age verification programs that are very marketable. Because we have
had BSE in this country, several countries are interested in our ability
to trace animals back to their farm of origin for the purpose of finding
birth and feed cohorts. Some of these types of programs are beginning to
gain popularity in Alabama with some of the larger producers who are
able to market large groups of animals. Somewhere along the way these
programs need to move toward the inclusion of the small producer.
As
State Veterinarian, my interest in animal identification is for animal
health purposes. When we discontinued testing cattle for brucellosis in
stockyards, we, for the most part, lost our official identification
system. Over the past few years, government and industry have been
working toward a system that would allow tracing of animals that have
been exposed to disease, and that is to be accomplished in 48 hours. I,
along with many others, am concerned that progress is coming along too
slowly. I am also concerned about the strictly voluntary direction the
National Animal Identification System has taken. Hopefully it will
someday all come together before we really need it. In the meantime, we
continue to work on premises registration in Alabama, which, if we do a
good job with it, will be extremely helpful to us in this state.
When
I was in practice, I had a client who had two cows—Rosie and Bess.
That was the only identification my client needed. And I believe Rosie
and Bess knew their names. It served its purpose as an identification
system. And wasn’t it an English fellow named William Shakespeare who
once said, "….a Rosie by any other name…"
Today
animal identification and its uses are pretty much limited only by the
imagination. If you have questions about premises registration or other
related issues, give us a call. If we don’t know the answer, we can at
least point you in the right direction. |
