Troubleshooting Guide

Long Communication Delays

Problem:

Some Neckbands are not communicating for many hours, or there are long delays before another location update is received.

Answer:

Sometimes neckbands may not be able to receive or send messages to the eShepherd system. This can happen for both the LoRa Communication Neckbands, and the Cellular Communication Neckbands.

For the Cellular Neckbands, these delays may occur for many different reasons. Here are some common reasons:

• Animals have moved into a poor cellular signal area
• The cell tower has receive the message from the neckband but was unable to pass it to the eShepherd database server
• The network provider is experiencing degraded performance (this may be linked to network congestion)
• The eShepherd system uses a global SIM card that can connect to many different telecommunication providers across the globe. Sometimes these roaming data sharing arrangements fail and this can cause an interruption to the messages flowing back and forth.

For the LoRa Communication system, some of these same factors may cause delays, but there are also more localised factors that can interrupt communications. These include:

• animals roaming outside of the communication range of the base station.
• the LoRa communication range can vary significantly depending on the topography and vegetation of the property. Hills can block the rf signal, and trees can also reduce the signal range.
• for properties that have multiple base stations, the system automatically adopts a round-robin communications - meaning that base stations take turns to send messages to the neckbands. If some of these base stations are far away from the animals/neckbands, then the messages will be delayed until they are sent from a nearby base station. This can delay the activation and deactivation time of virtual paddocks.

Solution:

Whilst there is no immediate solution to these issues, if you are experiencing long communication delays then you may need to take this into consideration when planning your virtual paddock activations and deactivations. For example, if you are planning on brining the animals into the yards in the morning, you may need to turn off the virtual fence the night before.

Summary:

Neckbands may experience communication delays with the eShepherd system due to various factors. For Cellular Neckbands, common causes include poor signal areas, issues at cell towers or with the network provider, and failures in global roaming agreements. For LoRa Neckbands, communication can be disrupted by distance from base stations, topography, and vegetation. In systems with multiple base stations, delays can also result from the round-robin messaging process, especially if distant stations are attempting communication.

Cannot Turn OFF Virtual Paddock

Problem:

You have turned OFF the virtual paddock for a Mob of animals, but after some time, this virtual paddock is still shown as being active on the eShepherd Web App.

You have tried to turn off the virtual paddock again, but there is nothing that you can do to turn it off.

Answer:

This is typically the result of a Neckband failure. If a Neckband suddenly stops working, then all communications between that Neckband and the platform also stops. If that neckband was actively enforcing a virtual paddock (lets say "Virtual Paddock A"), then the eShepherd platform will continue to show "Virtual Paddock A" as being active. If you have tried to turn off "Virtual Paddock A" then the platform will send a message out to that Neckband, but because the neckband is not working it can never send back an acknowledgement to day it has now turned off. So in such instances, the virtual paddock will remain active only on that one faulty neckband indefinitely.

Solution:

The best way to deal with this problem is to "unfit" the Neckband on the eShepherd Web App. By definition, an unfitted neckband cannot have an active virtual fence associated with it, so the act of unfitting a faulty neckband will make the platform 'release' that virtual paddock.

There are two ways to unfit a neckband:

1) Go to the Animals Menu, find the faulty neckband, select it, and press Delete in the bottom menu. This will remove the record of that animal, and return the Neckband to the unfitted state.

2) Go to the Animals Menu. find the faulty neckband, select it and press the Edit -> Edit Single Animal button in the bottom menu. Now go to the top of the side menu and select the dropdown menu for the Neckband. In the drop-down menu, the first entry is "Unfit". Select this and then press Save. This will leave the record of the Animal in the Animal menu, but will move the Neckband back into the Unfitted Neckbands menu.

Summary:

If a virtual paddock remains active on the eShepherd Web App despite being turned off, it is usually due to a failed Neckband that can no longer communicate with the system. Since the platform receives no acknowledgment from the faulty Neckband, it continues to show the virtual paddock as active. To resolve this, the Neckband should be marked as "unfitted" on the Web App, which will automatically deactivate any associated virtual paddocks. This can be done either by deleting the animal record or by editing the animal and setting the Neckband status to "Unfit."

Why do some of my icon have a cross through it?

Problem:

Some animal or neckband icons have a black cross through them. (For Animal icons its a round circle with a cross through it, and for Unfitted Neckbands its a green triangle with a cross through it).

Answer:

If you have hibernated your neckbands then they will stop communicating with the eShepherd platform. After 24 hrs, then the eShepherd platform automatically puts a cross through that icon to highlight this issue on the map.

The same condition may occur if a neckband has failed or stops communicating for any reason for more than 24 hours. This can be a indication of a premature neckband failure.

Solution:

If you have one or more icons with a cross through it then first check to see if these were deliberately put into a hibernated state.

If these neckbands should be operational, then the cross through it can be an indication of a premature failure. Reach out to the eShepherd support team to report this via email eshepherd.support@gallagher.com and they will be able to organise warranty replacements.

Summary:

Animal or neckband icons with a black cross indicate that the device has not communicated with the eShepherd platform for over 24 hours. This can occur if the neckband was deliberately hibernated or has failed unexpectedly. If the neckbands were not intentionally hibernated, the cross may signal a premature failure. In such cases, contact eShepherd support to arrange for a warranty replacement.

Neckband does not respond to magnet key

Problem:

You have touched the magnet key to the neckband but it does not make any sound and the LED is not blinking.

Answer:

If the Neckband battery is completely flat, then the the Neckband will no longer respond to the presence of the magnet.

Solution:

Leave the neckband out in direct sunlight for a number of days. One of the solar panels should be facing towards the sun - for instance, if you live in the northern hemisphere, face one of the solar panels to wards the south. In many situations, its best to keep the neckband standing up, but if you do live close to the equator, or the sun is directly overhead for the best part of the day, then it may be better to lie the neckband down flat on one face, with the other facing straight up.

For a completely flat battery, it might take 3 to 4 days of solid sunlight to recharge the battery.

Unable to access or login to the eShepherd Web App

Problem:

I am trying to login to the eShepherd web app but this is not working.

Answer:

Firstly, make sure that you are trying to login to the correct site. The web address that you must use is

https://app.eshepherd.com/login

Then use your email address and password to login.

If you have forgotten your password then you can use the Forgot Password link to reset this.

Note that some users have tried to login via the Gallagher Animal Management site at https://am.gallagher.com/ This is not the same as the eShepherd Web App and will not work.

Updated on: 06/08/2025