Paper vs tablet in the shed — how much time do you really lose rewriting notes?
Precision at the crush matters, but so does the record you leave behind. We look at what that actually costs in minutes, and what changes when it goes digital.
Paper records and what replaces them
In a hoof trimmer's work, precision at the crush is only half the job. The other half is the accuracy of the record you leave behind. For years the standard was writing diagnoses on a sheet of paper, and that came with a long list of problems.
Where the time actually goes
With a traditional record, data gets written by hand first. Usually in poor conditions — dirty hands, in a hurry, which regularly produces notes nobody can read afterwards. Then, back from the farm, the same data has to be typed into a computer so a report can go out to the farmer.
The realistic estimate for the paper method is three to five minutes per animal once you include the later digitising and correcting of mistakes. That time is spent entirely on administration, rather than on rest or on the next herd.
Recording in seconds
After switching to a digital record, the difference shows up almost immediately, because recording gets cut back to the minimum. Straight after trimming:
- Enter the cow number.
- Tap the affected claws on the screen.
- Pick the diagnoses from the ready list of ICAR codes.
The whole recording procedure — not counting the trim itself — fits inside a minute at most. Nothing has to be copied out neatly afterwards.
Reporting without the effort
When the work is done, the report generates itself. Depending on what the farmer prefers:
- The record shared as a PDF
- Data exported to Excel
- Direct access to portal.cownt.app, where the full trimming history is available to the farmer at any time
In summary
Digitising the process cuts the time spent on paperwork several times over, and it raises how professional the service looks from the farmer's side. Every minute not spent copying notes is a minute you spend with the next cow — or at home.