Feed Intake and Methane Facility
The identification of genetically proven, high-performing sires, of lower environmental footprint, that grow fast and require less feed.
Advancing sustainable livestock production by gathering and analysing methane emissions and feed efficiency performance data from cattle
Opened early 2025, the St Kilda Methane and Feed Intake facility is owned by Pāmu Farms. This state-of-the-art custom-built facility generates robust, large scale data, which provides insights into genetic solutions for feed efficiency, and methane traits in cattle
It is hard to accurately measure feed intake out in the paddock so specialised equipment known as SmartFeed Bins and SmartScales produced by C-Lock Inc in the United States is used. This equipment allows the measurement of each individual animal’s daily feed intake and liveweight gain over a seven-week period, enabling calculation of:
Feed Conversion Ratio (FCR) – the amount of dry matter required per kilogram of liveweight gain (lower is better)
Residual Feed Intake (RFI) – indicating whether an animal consumes more or less feed than expected for its metabolic weight and growth rate (lower is better)
C-Lock also provides the GreenFeed system to measure methane, which is setup to record each animal’s individual emissions through the amount the animal burps while visiting the units for feed throughout the day. This data allows the calculation of:
Methane Intensity (grams of methane per kg of weight gain)
(lower is better)Methane Yield (grams of methane per kg of dry matter intake)
(lower is better)Residual Methane Production – indicating whether an animal emits more or less methane than expected for its dry matter intake, metabolic weight, and growth rate (lower is better)
This information allows the identification and future breeding from high-performing sires whose progeny will be highly productive but also have a better feed conversion in the finishing phase, directly affecting the reduction of feed, production costs, and emissions.
This facility can measure up to 65 animals over seven-week periods and has plans to double capacity in the coming months.
If you are interested to gain some insights for your cattle program we are taking bookings from private entities and research institutes. If your business would like to find out more, please do not hesitate to contact us at info@focusgenetics.com .
In the diagram above the savings from Animal A, over its lifetime, will add up quickly and contribute directly to the bottom line on farm with no additional effort required.