Hoagg and his team received a three-year, nearly $900,000 (£670,000) grant from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture in February 2018 to pursue its drone project. The multidisciplinary effort is hoping to solve multiple pain points for producers – patrolling pastures to locate cattle, and monitoring health indicators such as weight and visible ailments like pink eye. To make this possible, they need to find a way to identify and track specific cows. Hoagg is turning to cow facial recognition.