When Herdly announced its shutdown, this 7,400-head Midwest operation faced the same panic as thousands of cattle producers, seven years of breeding records and calving histories at risk. This is the story of how they migrated to Cattlytics in ten days, preserved every record, and discovered a platform that delivered 94% conception rates and 65% less paperwork with AI-driven capabilities.
For nearly four decades, one Midwest family has raised commercial Angus cattle across 18,000 acres of rolling pasture. What started with 170 cows in the 1980s has grown to an 7,400-head operation spanning three generations: grandfather to father to son, each adding their own chapter to the herd's history.
The operation runs a spring calving program with a tight 65-day window, and every breeding decision traces back through years of performance data: which cows consistently throw vigorous calves, which bloodlines hold up in their climate, which heifers earn their place in the herd.
"My dad kept everything in spiral notebooks for thirty years," says the current herd manager, who took over daily operations in 2012. "When we went digital with Herdly in 2018, I promised him we'd never lose what he built. Every calving record, every breeding decision, it all matters."
"We had seven years of breeding decisions in that system, which bulls worked on which cow families, which females consistently weaned heavy calves," the herd manager recalls. "The thought of starting over with blank records in the middle of breeding season kept me up at night."
The search for a replacement began immediately, but the family wasn't willing to compromise on what had made their previous system work. Their requirements were non-negotiable: actual offline functionality for pasture work where cell service doesn't reach, mobile apps that the whole family could use on their own devices, and, critically, a clear path to migrate their historical data.
"I looked at five or six platforms that first week," the herd manager explains. "Some were desktop-only. Others couldn't handle our breeding complexity. A few wanted us to start fresh with no migration support."
Cattlytics emerged as the precise fit. The platform offered everything the operation needed: iOS and Android apps with offline capability, AI-powered breeding and health features, and dedicated migration support for operations transitioning from other systems.
"When I saw they offered free data migration and the app worked offline just like we were used to, I called them that afternoon," he says. "Their team actually understood cow-calf operations. They weren't reading from a script; they knew what calving ease scores meant and why dam-calf linking mattered."
The migration process moved faster than the family expected. The Cattlytics implementation team walked them through exporting their Herdly data, then handled the heavy lifting of mapping fields and validating records before import.
Within ten days, the operation had a fully functional Cattlytics account populated with their complete herd inventory, breeding histories dating back to 2018, calving records with birth weights and vigor scores intact, and health treatment logs with medication details preserved.
"I was skeptical we'd keep our calving records intact. Those cow-calf pairs are everything for our replacement heifer decisions," admits the operations manager. "When I pulled up our senior herd sires and saw their complete progeny lists with performance data attached, I knew we'd made the right call."
"Their support team didn't disappear after migration either," the herd manager notes. "We had questions during our first week of calving, and they responded the same day. That's rare."
Six months into using Cattlytics, the operation has moved beyond simply preserving its old workflows. Features they hadn't anticipated have become integral to daily management.
The breeding management suite now drives their reproductive program. AI-powered heat detection alerts notify the team when cows are approaching optimal breeding windows, reducing missed heats that had previously extended their calving distribution. The system tracks both AI breeding and natural service exposures, automatically calculating expected calving dates and flagging animals due for pregnancy checks.
Calving tracking has streamlined their busiest season. When a calf hits the ground, the team logs birth weight, sex, calving ease, and vigor score directly from the calving barn. The system automatically links the calf to its dam, inherits the sire assignment from breeding records, and begins building that animal's lifetime performance file.
The health records module addresses a compliance concern that had long nagged at the operation. Every treatment now logs medication, dosage, route, and administrator with the system automatically calculating withdrawal periods and flagging animals before they're cleared for sale. BQA audits that once required an afternoon of binder-diving now take minutes.
"The AI chatbot is like having a vet tech in my pocket. I can ask it about any animal's treatment history, vaccination status, or breeding timeline and get answers in seconds, right there in the pasture." — Herd Manager, 7,400-Head Commercial Cow-Calf Operation.
What began as an emergency migration has delivered operational improvements the family hadn't anticipated. The numbers tell the story.
Record-keeping that previously consumed eight to ten hours monthly now takes roughly three hours, a 65% reduction in administrative time. The operations manager attributes this to mobile data entry eliminating double-handling: information goes directly into the system at the chute or in the calving barn rather than onto paper first.
Withdrawal compliance has reached 100% since the switch. "I haven't had a single close call on withdrawal dates," the operations manager confirms. "The system alerts us automatically. Before, I was checking spreadsheets manually and hoping I didn't miss something."
Breeding efficiency metrics have tightened as well. With AI heat alerts and systematic pregnancy tracking, the operation achieved a 94% conception rate in their most recent breeding season, up from the 88% average they'd maintained over the previous three years. Their 21-day calving percentage improved correspondingly, with more cows calving in the first cycle.
"We came to Cattlytics because we had to," the herd manager reflects. "We stayed because it's genuinely better than what we had. The AI features, the dashboards, the way everything connects, it's not just record-keeping anymore. It's decision support."
The family now approaches their herd data with the confidence they hadn't felt since the shutdown announcement. The platform's continuous development as regular feature updates, responsive support, and a clear product roadmap has eliminated the anxiety that their system might disappear again.
"This operation started with my grandfather's handwritten calf book in 1986," the herd manager says. "My dad digitized what he could. Now we're building a record that my daughter and her kids will inherit. Decades of breeding decisions, health histories, and performance data that tell the story of this herd."
When neighboring ranchers ask about the transition, the family doesn't hesitate.
"I've told every cattleman I know if you're still on paper, or if you're worried about your current software disappearing, talk to Cattlytics. We went from crisis mode to running tighter than we ever have. That's not marketing. That's just what happened."
We will be at CattleCon 2026. Meet our team at Booth # 944