Running your first chute session

A breeding session is the chute-side workflow that lets you record one or many breedings without re-entering the sire, technician, and method on every cow.

Before you start

• Open Chute on your phone (or any browser). The mobile layout is the right one for the chute.
• Make sure the cow you're about to record exists in your herd. If she doesn't, add her from Cows → New cow first — it takes 20 seconds.

Step 1 — Start the session

1. Tap Start session.
2. Pick the sire (bull from your herd, or free-text for outside semen).
3. Pick the AI tech (yourself, a hand, or a vet/repro consultant invited to your domain).
4. Pick the method: AI · Natural · ET.

You only do this once. Every Bred event you record while the session is open inherits these three values automatically.

Step 2 — Capture an event

1. Type the cow's tag (autocompletes after 2 characters).
2. Tap Bred.
3. Move to the next cow. Repeat.

Other event types are one tap too:

• Heat — opens a tiny form for confidence (seen / suspected / activity tag) and observed-at time.
• Preg — preg-check result (open / pregnant / questionable / recheck), method, optional estimated-due date.
• Calved — calf sex, ease, outcome, optional birth weight.
• Note — a free-text observation tied to the cow's timeline.

Step 3 — What happens automatically

• Every Bred event creates a preg-check task 21 days out.
• A pregnant preg-check creates a calving-watch task at the estimated due date.
• A questionable preg-check creates a recheck task 10 days out.
• All generated tasks land on the TODAY screen automatically.
• SMS reminders deliver at 6 pm in your farm's configured timezone — not server time.

Step 4 — End the session

• Tap End session when the chute is empty.
• The session is logged to the audit trail: who, when, sire, method, count.
• You land back on the home screen, ready for the next group.

What about spotty service?

• Event recording uses retried writes — your Bred entry survives a 30-second LTE drop.
• Full offline-capable chute capture (queue events with no signal, sync on reconnect) is on the v1.2 roadmap.
• SMS reminders work everywhere your phone gets signal — they're not dependent on you having the app open.

Common gotchas

• No active session? The Bred button is disabled until you start one. Look for the "Active session" badge at the top of Chute.
• Tag not autocompleting? Confirm the cow exists in Cows — and that her tag matches what you're typing (case-insensitive but spaces matter).
• Recorded the wrong sire? Open the cow's timeline, find the event, tap to edit. Sessions are convenience, not lock-in.