Waikato sharemilker launches ‘Tinder for cows’ using AI and breeding data

Using artificial intelligence and publicly available data, Zonderop has set up Perfect Cow Breeding Solutions – which he describes as “a Tinder for cows”.

PCBS is a herd management system that combines genomic insights, herd test data, and advanced AI to deliver tailored breeding recommendations and optimise herd efficiency for farmers. It can matchmake a bull to each cow in Zonderop’s 400-strong herd in 37 seconds. Zonderop is a finalist in the National Fieldays Innovation Awards – in the ‘Early Stage Award’ category.

He told Dairy News that some friends persuaded him into entering the awards after watching how he’s using AI to find the right bull for his cows.

“They told me that this product is worth entering for the awards and that I’m a disrupter now.

“This is really a disrupter because I’ve put a lot more effort than just putting everything on a spreadsheet: I’ve honed it down and fine-tuned it into a really good product.”

For Zonderop it all began around 10.30pm – on a weekend off – two years ago, when he was planning mating for his herd using spreadsheets.

“I had one spreadsheet with like five workbooks, and I was linking all the workbooks together – this is three weeks out the start of mating. I made an error at 10.30 in the night on my weekend off; with your eyes glazed over at that time of the night, it was just a simple spelling mistake, and obviously, that broke the link.

“I had heard about ChatGPT and decided to play around with it. I copied the code into ChatGPT, and it’s very humanised, and it told me that I had made a simple spelling mistake, and that it was easy to make such a mistake at that time of the night.”

Zonderop says he then decided to upload the spreadsheets on Chat- GPT for fun and typed in a few commands he used on spreadsheets. AI instantly found him the best bulls for each cow, and he was hooked. The programme is costing him US$20/month.

“Then I thought, hang on a minute if I can do this for my herd, I can do this for anyone. I spoke to a mate of mine and he was amazed with what I had done.

“I got it well-honed down for our herd, so I use it on our herd this year and the expected results are very good in terms breeding worth (BW) and production worth (PW).

“And all the industry professionals that I have spoken to about have gone, ‘yeah, this blows us out of the water’.”

Zonderop points out that he’s using publicly available data and there are no legal or copyright issues to worry about.

He claims that he’s doing the same thing as herd improvement companies “but this is on steroids because I can input a lot more data into that”.

“I can do across the entire spectrum of a cow breeding value, and the bull breeding value. So literally, it’s Tinder for cows.

“For example, I can ask that I would like a bull, who’s going to give my cows big udder conformation, but I want those big udders to have nice teat placements, I can do that.

“I also want to have a low somatic cell count, I can grab that, I can give them a wider rump angle, I can do all of that and hone it down into a specific group of bulls, but without compromising the BW gain. So, essentially, what we’re doing is improving on traits, or enhancing on traits.

“So, if you’ve got a cow - one of your better cows - we can improve on her traits dramatically, but if you’ve got your average cows, we can continue enhancing that.

“Things like her shed temperament, for example, could be really high, and she’s placid, nice, easy cow, no fuss, never gets mastitis, so they’re the ones you want to keep, right, so we can enhance that bottom quartile; building those up, so you’ve got an efficient herd along the way, without forgetting the ones at the top.”

Debating with Peers

At the Fieldays this week, Matthew Zonderop expects some interesting discussions with his peers.

He admits that not every farmer thinks the same when it comes to mating their herds. Zonderop’s company focuses on breeding worth (BW).

“Everybody’s got different breeding goals,” he says.

“I know a lot of people aren’t in favour of the BW system. But that’s okay.

“It doesn’t reflect anything on the farmer or his herd or his method of farming. He just has different objectives.

“But we can still help those farmers achieve those breeding goals, because the data that we’re accessing, thanks to the fantastic industry that we’re in, is publicly available.

“And we’ve got such fantastic breeders at the top end of the scale who are delivering incredible animals that are not all BW focused, they focus on other components.”