Dairy farmers running Fullwood’s Merlin 2 milking robot can now monitor the performance of their herd through a new app.

The interface shows real-time performance data and historical milking records, both for individual cows and the herd as a whole.

It can be used to display parameters such as milk yield, number and duration of milkings per day and the time of last visit to make sure that cows are performing as expected.

These can be compared against a 10-day or 24-hour yield average and the information can be accessed from anywhere in the world, provided the user has wi-fi or a mobile data connection.

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The app is also able to alert herd managers to potential problems with the robot and gives users easy access to the robot’s cleaning records and maintenance schedules.

This includes any deviations in terms of cluster attachment timings and milk captured during the first two minutes of milking to provide an immediate warning of potential problems.

According to Fullwood, this helps make sure each Merlin is working as efficiently and hygienically as possible and should also help herd managers improve their work-life balance.

The M2erlinInfo app is free to download from Google Play and the Apple App Store.

It is compatible with the Merlin 2 robot but requires a communicator module to be installed.