The open-door nature and sometimes the remoteness of dairies means they can be regarded as easy pickings. While tools like cordless grinders have made burglary easier, security systems will often prevent crime, or allow the perpetrators to be caught and goods recovered.
Identifying the risk areas is the first step to a security system. There are six common high-risk areas:
- The farm dairy: Burglars take computers, tools, and other easily removed and saleable items. Even more cumbersome and less easily removed items like hot water cylinders are stolen.
- Milk sabotage: This can occur at a number of places in the milk system from the cluster to the vat, even including yet-to-be-used milk filter papers.
- Equipment from sheds near to the dairy: Workshops are often left open and tools like chain saws and power tools are easy pickings.
- Vehicles: Quads have been targeted for many years but two-wheelers, side-by-sides, and four-wheel-drives are not exempt from being stolen.
- Fuel: Diesel and petrol are common targets for thieves.
- Livestock: Calves have been taken from calf sheds.
The Security Tool Kit:
Point-to-point beams, motion sensors, and cameras are the major items in the security kit, and many firms will provide and install these. Police advice is to ask to see their Security Technician or Security Consultant Licence or Certificate of Approval, which they must have.
Point-to-point infra-red beams detect objects passing through them and are usually set across gateways and tanker tracks. Beam spans of up to 200 metres are available.
They can be solar or battery-powered. With a booster the radio signal to the base station in the house can be up to three kilometres. Four beams can be monitored by one base station, with coded beeps indicating which beam has been broken. Breaking the beam can also switch on exterior lighting or start a camera. A message can also be sent to a smartphone.
Mounting the beam about one metre off the ground means dogs and possums don’t trigger it, but vehicles and people entering, and cows breaking out, do.
Parabeam supply a two-beam system that ignores trucks and milk tankers while still being triggered by cattle, cars, and vans. They do this by a high beam crossing the tanker track diagonally, which is broken by a tanker before the lower beam, telling the base unit to ignore this intrusion.
A basic system from Parabeam, made in New Zealand, for a short range solar-battery system including the base station retails at $549, and can be installed by farmers.
Motion sensors can be set up inside or outside where detection of people is desirable. Their source is passive infra-red (PIR) that relies on changes in heat, so can be triggered by animals like possums, birds and dogs.
They are commonly battery-powered and the batteries can last three to five years. The more expensive units have a microwave detector as well, reducing false alerts.
They can trigger an alarm, which can have a delay to give staff time to deactivate it at a key pad. They can also be monitored through the mobile internet data network.
Because they can have a high false alert rate, they are more suited to triggering flood lights or cameras than alerting farm staff.
A camera system might not prevent theft, but can detect it so action can be taken at the time, and record it so the crooks can be caught and goods recovered.
There is a wide quality range of cameras, with the better and more expensive being full high-definition, with the clarity to read number plates and identify faces in challenging light conditions. As daylight fades, the cameras switch from colour to black-and-white, with an infrared source in the camera providing light. If lighting is activated by a sensor or beam, colours of objects like vehicles can be seen. Good lighting at night means good quality footage.
“Poorer quality systems are not high-definition as they may use a charge couple device (CCD) of a snap camera. A snap camera is not designed to run 24-7, so they don’t last as long and the image quality is not as good. They may be OK in daylight but not at night,” Geoff Tattle, ex-dairy farmer and now managing director of Couchman Alarms, said.
Cameras can be hidden or obvious. Obvious cameras are more likely to be vandalised. Very small, unobtrusive cameras generally have poorer picture quality than obvious cameras.
Pan, Tilt, Zoom (PTZ) cameras can be mounted at a vantage point to scan 360 degrees. They can either view different areas on a programmed basis, or be manually controlled to look at a particular scene that needs further investigation. They are comparatively expensive.
“They have been considered for calving pads to monitor calving from the house, but for the same money four wide-angle cameras could be mounted, one at each corner of the pad”, Tattle said.
Remote cameras are usually battery-powered, so these and the SD card must be maintained. Ironically, they can be stolen. While most operate on a store-and-collect basis, some send footage to smartphones.
They can have wireless links to the house, but this must be line-of-sight and less then about 2km. With out-of-sight transmission, a broadband connection or wireless broadband connection to the shed is needed.
Camera recording can be 24-7 or initiated by a point-to-point beam, independent motion sensor or the camera’s own motion sensor. Notification of the camera being triggered can be by internet or smartphone. Time and date stamping will make the recordings more valuable when used in evidence.
Commonly up to two months of footage is stored, and snapshots can be taken from reviewed footage.
While farmers can set up their camera system, some expertise is needed to get the best locations, angles, and lighting. The system must be tailor-made to the situation at the best price.
A four-channel recorder with two cameras can cost about $3000 + GST installed. An extra two or six cameras can be added.
Cameras should be positioned where there is little movement, because this can initiate recording, although some cameras can be programmed to mask out movement of objects like trees.
While beams, sensors and cameras provide a comprehensive security system, there are a number of items or actions that will help prevent theft or help in recovering stolen items. Some of these cost nothing, and some are just common sense.
A security warning sign at the gate lets the bad guys know you won’t be easy pickings.
Dummy cameras from Uniden, at a cost of about $30, can be a significant deterrent.
Locks on cupboards and doors are a pain but where public access is easy they might save being burgled. Combination locks eliminate the hassle of keys for staff.
A dog, resident at the dairy, that barks at visitors can act as an alarm if the barking is within earshot of the house.
Firearms, by law, must be locked away. These usually disappear in a burglary.
Mark items to confirm ownership, and record serial numbers. The website www.snap.org.nz, authorised by NZ Police, records valuable items and their identification.
Locks on quads, two-wheelers, and UTVs are the only way to deter their theft. Disc locks are available for brake discs on two-wheelers. Alarm locks that activate when moved will deter quad theft. Both these are made by Oxford Products. There are also specialised quad security devices like MacPhee Engineering’s Quad Loc.
Remember to let neighbours and friends know if you are going to be away. They are your extra eyes and ears.
Note any suspicious activity like unusual vehicles or people in the area and let your local police know.
For other useful security advice and information, visit www.police.govt.nz/rural and also www.fmg.co.nz/advice/advice/rural-theft.
