Patent ID: 9681637
Date: 2017-06-20
CPC Classifications: A01K

Claim:
1. A crowd gate control system, comprising: a holding pen for dairy livestock, wherein the holding pen is adjacent to an entrance to a rotary milking parlor, the rotary milking parlor rotating such that a plurality of milking stalls rotate past the adjacent entrance; a crowd gate comprising an actuator, wherein the crowd gate is positioned at a side of the holding pen and is operable to move forward and backward in relation to the entrance to the milking parlor such that moving the crowd gate from its position at a side of the holding pen toward the entrance of the rotary milking parlor reduces the effective area of the holding pen; a counter that measures an elapsed amount of time associated with the rotation of the rotary milking parlor; and a controller in communication with the actuator and programmed to control the movement of the crowd gate, wherein the controller: stores a triggering threshold; determines that the counter has reached the a triggering threshold; and in response to the counter reaching the triggering threshold, the crowd gate performs a pre-forward reverse movement in which the crowd gate initially moves in reverse away from the entrance prior to moving forward towards the entrance such that the effective size of the pen first increases in area prior to further decreasing in area.