Colony Management with Climb™
Complete Colony and Vivarium Control
Climb’s Colony Management solution is a comprehensive, user-friendly part of the Climb platform, dedicated to managing animals and vivarium operations from one centralized system. In seamless coordination with the study management capabilities of Climb, the colony management features support the full animal lifecycle within research environments, simplifying tracking and inventory management while helping teams meet compliance requirements and maintain high data integrity. Its flexible, scalable capabilities support evolving non-GLP studies across organizations of all sizes.
What is Climb’s Colony Management Solution?
Climb’s Colony Management solution is a robust set of purpose-built tools designed to help research teams efficiently manage animals and vivarium operations. It covers colony management, detailed animal tracking, breeding management, and animal welfare and compliance reporting, providing comprehensive tools needed to manage scalable animal studies across the full animal lifecycle within research facilities.
Climb helps research teams stay ahead of resource needs, generate audit-ready reports, and align with IACUC and EU animal welfare compliance standards. Its versatility makes it ideal for large, established organizations as well as teams looking for a cost-effective starting point in colony management software.
It eliminates time-consuming, error-prone manual data handling and simplifies reporting. The system is designed for smooth usability and adapts easily to internal processes while supporting a wide range of workflows, providing flexibility as studies progress and requirements evolve.
How Climb Colony Management Works Seamlessly with Provantis® for GLP Studies
Climb’s Colony Management solution also complements Provantis® GLP study management by providing a unified data environment that strengthens traceability, data quality, and readiness for regulated studies.
While Climb manages non‑GLP husbandry, breeding, welfare monitoring, and vivarium operations, Provantis remains the validated system of record for dosing, protocol execution, and regulatory reporting. Together, the two systems maintain a consistent animal identity and harmonized vocabularies across workflows, reducing manual reconciliation and eliminating gaps between colony operations and GLP protocols. Real‑time visibility into colony status, health events, and animal availability helps study teams plan more accurately, while structured digital records ensure that husbandry and welfare data supporting GLP activities are complete, transparent, and audit-ready.
This connected ecosystem enables organizations to modernize vivarium operations without disrupting GLP study controls, ultimately creating an integrated preclinical environment that improves compliance, efficiency, and long-term data integrity.
Key Benefits of Climb Colony Management
Improved Operational Efficiency
Centralized animal, cage, and vivarium management reduces manual input and duplicate data entry, while integrated scheduling and task tracking help teams maintain efficient daily operations.
High Data Integrity
Standardized, traceable data captured at the point of activity preserves lineage and lifecycle history, ensuring reliable datasets for analysis and reproducible research, while health monitoring helps detect confounding variables early.
Time-Saving
Rapid configuration and intuitive workflows minimize implementation time and disruption, allowing teams to migrate quickly from manual or fragmented systems to unified colony management.
Improved Compliance & Reporting
Status monitoring, adverse event tracking, and real-time veterinary alerts promote animal welfare and enable accurate, audit-ready reporting aligned with IACUC and European Union requirements.
Greater Workflow Flexibility
Configurable workflows support diverse breeding, housing, and operational processes, allowing teams to adapt procedures and schedules as research programs evolve without system constraints.
Core Features/Modules
Climb’s Colony Management provides a broad set of capabilities that enable teams to perform end-to-end colony operations with efficiency and confidence.
Cage & Vivarium Inventory
Maintain cage inventories, locations, and labelling to support accurate housing management, space utilization, and facility organization.
Animal & Housing Management
Track animals from intake through the lifecycle, assign cages, manage housing locations, and maintain real-time census and population visibility across the vivarium.
Breeding & Lineage Management
Create matings, record births, and track pedigree, lineage, and breeding performance to support colony sustainability, genotyping, and phenotype planning.
Orders & Animal Intake
Manage animal orders and arrivals with structured intake workflows, ensuring accurate records, housing assignment, and seamless transition into colony operations.
Health & Clinical Monitoring
Record clinical observations, track adverse events, trigger veterinary alerts, and manage treatments to support animal welfare and regulatory alignment.
Workflow Data Collection
Capture routine operational data (weights, observations, procedures) at the point of activity through guided workflows that ensure completeness and consistency.
Audit Trail & Activity Journal
Maintain a complete history of animal activities, health events, and operational changes, to ensure traceability and audit-ready colony records.
Why Choose Climb for Colony Management?
How It Works
Colony Management in Climb supports complete workflows for managing animals, cages, breeding, and vivarium operations.
Order Animals
Record and track incoming animal orders to create a clear starting point for colony intake.
Receive & House Animals
Receive animals from the order, create animal records, and assign them to cages and locations within the vivarium.
Assign Weights and Observations
Record initial body weights and welfare observations to establish baseline information.
Assign User Tasks
Allocate responsibilities and coordinate work across the team.
Set Up Mating & Record Births
Manage breeding workflows by creating matings, recording outcomes, and capturing litter details.
Review Pedigree & Breeding Efficiency
Visualize lineage and breeding performance to support colony planning, genotyping, and phenotyping decisions.
Collect Body Weight & Observation Data
Standardize day-to-day data capture using structured workflows.
Flag & Escalate Observations
Flag issues, notify veterinary staff in real time, and assign treatments.
Review History in Animal Journal
View a complete, traceable record of activities, observations, and outcomes.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can Climb’s Colony Management be used without study management?
Yes. Teams can use Climb’s Colony Management feature set independently for animal, breeding, and vivarium workflows, or alongside integrated study management capabilities within the same Instem platform.
Does Climb provide audit trails?
Yes. A complete activity journal maintains traceable records of animal events, health observations, and operational changes, supporting transparency and regulatory readiness.
How does Climb support compliance?
It records animal health observations, adverse events, treatments, and housing history in traceable records, enabling audit-ready reporting aligned with IACUC and European Union animal welfare requirements.
Get a Free Demo Today
Streamline colony and vivarium management with a unified, purpose-built platform that improves efficiency, compliance, and data integrity across the animal lifecycle. Climb’s Colony Management solution is easy to set up and simple to use, making it a practical tool for gaining immediate operational visibility and control.
