8 Reasons to Install Livestock Scales in Your Farm

 By Kevin Hill

Farm management consists of several critical tasks and weighing animals accurately is one of them. It is imperative that you stay up-to-date with all the details pertaining to individual animals. To achieve this, you must implement livestock scales as it helps in optimizing the performance of your animals and maximizing ranch profits.

Benefits of livestock scales
• Accuracy
Your weighing equipment is going to be used in various stages of production and output and if it isn’t accurate it will definitely affect your profits. When you use livestock scales, you won’t have to worry about inaccuracies as they always deliver highly accurate measurements. Ensure the scales are maintained and calibrated properly for consistent results.  

• Durability
Livestock scales are usually employed in tough cattle conditions and for handling heavy loads. To cater to this requirement, they are designed to be quite durable and they are capable of taking the stress of multiple large loads. In addition to that, they also work well in conditions like rain, dust, animal waste, etc. These scales are built to handle the brunt of animal kicking and shoving too, which would damage other scales that are built for industrial use.

• Performance Evaluation
You can measure the cattle weights at different stages of their lives with the help of livestock scales. You can use and analyze this data to evaluate feedlots, adjusted weaning and yearling weights, gain in addition to average daily gain (ADG) and weight per day of age (WDA). With the help of livestock scales, you can carry out accurate performance evaluation and maximize ranch profits.

• Accurate Calculation of Feed or Medicine
It is important that your herd gets the right amount of feed and medication, which is generally based on the animal’s weight. Livestock scales help in getting the feed/medicine calculation accurately because if the feed or medicine dose is too high or low, it will affect the animals’ performance and you may even lose some of them, thus affecting your bottom line.

• Accommodates Animal Comfortably
Livestock scales are designed to accommodate different kinds of animals comfortably. A low-profile scale would ideal to use as it offers more comfort. Regardless of what animals you have in your herd or what their sizes are, you can implement and use these scales with accurate results.

• Automatic
You require less labor to use livestock scales as they are electronic and quite easy to handle. Moreover, they have an internal memory making it easier to analyze the history of the various animals.

• Ease of use
Livestock scales consist of concrete or flat wood decks which facilitate easy loading and unloading of animals. There are several user-friendly features such as the inclusion of memory components in many scales which reduces the need for separate equipment to collect weight data.

• Customization
Most livestock scales can be customized to suit your specific and unique requirements. Additionally, they may include several accessories such as digital weight indicators, gates, load bars, etc. All these features aid in streamlining the weighing processes further and reducing the time and labor investment.
Regardless of whether you run a small-scale livestock farm or a large-scale dairy, you cannot undermine the importance of measuring animal performance accurately. Installing livestock scales will make a huge difference and you must incorporate them if you haven’t already.

Author Bio:
Kevin Hill heads up the marketing efforts at Quality Scales Unlimited in Byron, CA. Besides his day job, he loves to write about the different types of scales and their importance in various industries. He also writes about how to care for and get optimized performance from different scales in different situations. He enjoys spending time with family and going on camping trips.