Cattle Sensor — ROI Calculator
What Does Earlier Detection Save You?
Adjust the numbers to your operation. Every figure below is editable — start from the conservative defaults and model your own expectation.
Your Operation
Total head in the program or period.
Context only — does not affect the ROI.
Your normal death loss before Seismi. A hard winter can push this far higher — a 4% loss rate is a real-world reference point.
0.5% — the minimum improvement at which Seismi pays for itself. This is the floor. In practice, earlier detection can cut mortality far more — taking a 4% loss rate toward 2% would be a 2% reduction. Slide up to model your own expectation.
Cost of a Death
What he weighed coming in.
Tracks USDA July 2026 feeder steers as you move the weight above — heavier cattle cost less per cwt. Edit to your own purchase price.
Not the length of the turn — how far in he was when you lost him. Death loss is front-loaded: most of it lands in the first 30–45 days, which is why 30 is the default.
Roughly $0.86/lb cost of gain at 3.5 lb average daily gain.
Processing and treatment sunk into him before you lost him.
Tag Economics
Every animal needs its own sensor, so the upfront outlay is one sensor per head. The cost is then amortized across the sensor's reuses.
See pricing tiers →Each feeding turn is roughly 6 months; 4 uses ≈ a 2-year device life. The per-head cost falls as the sensor amortizes across turns.
The reusable sensor, clipped behind an existing ear tag — no new puncture.
Net Return
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Where It Comes From
The Math
Investment
Sources & Assumptions
- What a death costs: the default view values a death at cost basis — purchase price, feed to the day it died, and treatment — which is how a closeout accounts for death loss. The alternate view values it at finished sale weight; that runs high, because it counts revenue the remaining feed was never bought to earn.
- Feeder purchase price: USDA AMS National Daily Feeder & Stocker Cattle AM Summary — Medium & Large #1 feeder steers, July 2026. $441/cwt at the 600 lb default. The price tracks purchase weight because feeder cattle sell on a slide: heavier cattle bring less per cwt. A static figure, not a live feed — user-editable to your own purchase price.
- Cattle price (finished-value view): Source: USDA AMS 5 Area Weekly Weighted Average Direct Slaughter Cattle (LM_CT150) — negotiated purchases, live FOB steers, $/cwt live weight; report dated July 13, 2026. Refreshed 2026-07-17 9:21 PM PDT. User-editable to your own contract or sale price.
- Carcass weight context: ~946 lb (USDA Comprehensive Fed Cattle report, June 2026).
- Mortality default: user-adjustable; a 4% loss rate over the 2025–26 winter is used here as a real-world reference point.
- Cost per pull / retrieval: operator-supplied figure, off by default — the sensor is removed with the existing ear tag, so no separate chute pass is required.
- Tag economics: reusable device model; amortization across feeding turns is illustrative.
- Detection: motion-led behavioral monitoring with operator-editable temperature thresholds — it flags genuine candidates, not every post-vaccination temperature spike.
See it in your pens
Bring your own numbers and we'll walk through the math together.