Seagull-Bay Supersire

I’ve already covered my fall breeding plan for Jersey, Reds, and Strong breeds.  Next up in the series is the Holstein breed.

I’m beginning to see what I like and what I don’t like in using Holstein in a crossbreeding rotation.  I made the unfortunate choice of using Million on a lot of crossbred heifers.  What would have been more unfortunate was using Million over a bunch of pure Holsteins.  Even with his terrible daughter pregnancy rate of -3.1, the crossbred Million daughters aren’t terrible in terms of fertility.  Million is also a poor bull for daughter stillbirth percent and I have seen more than my fair share of dead crossbred calves coming from Million daughters.

I’m starting to put much more stock in production numbers for Holstein bulls.  Bulls like Clark have given me some crossbred daughters that are not all that impressive for production.  You’ll see on this fall’s list of Holstein bulls that most are pretty good production bulls.

The other question to ask is young sire or proven?  My list will skew more towards young sires than proven.  I’m comfortable enough with genomics that I’m confident even using relatively large numbers of young bulls.  I generally believe that genomics will inflate index figures on young bulls but the patterns will remain relatively unchanged.  I find bulls that fit the pattern I’m looking for on the upper end.

Anyway, here’s the list:

1. Seagull-Bay Supersire - Very popular young sire.  The genomics say extreme production from non-extreme frames.  While noting reliability issues of any young sire, this bull is one of the elite of the breed and fits into a crossbreeding program perfectly.  An added benefit is his SCR of +4.5, and I can say anecdotally that Supersire gets cows pregnant.

2. S-S-I Mogul Defender – I was using Defender’s sire, Mogul, for a few months on heifers before supplies became tight.  We’ll just move on to his son, Defender.

3. Regancrest AltaIota –  This proven bull I’m using is also one I’ve been using for a while.  I’m pretty excited for crossbreds sired by Iota.  He’s been great at getting cows pregnant and his second crop proof makes him a reliable choice.  Plenty of production, lots of strength, and solid udders make this bull one that could stay in my program for a while.

4.  Co-Op Bosside Massey – The other proven bull that I’m looking to use more.  Massey fits the pattern of high production and solid everywhere else.  I’ve always liked Holstein bulls that have lower stature values than strength values.

5. Coyne-Farms Jacey CRI - I’m using Iota and I’m using Massey.  So why not use a young bull that combines those two bulls along with tremendous genomic numbers?

6. Co-Op Robust Cabriolet – This one is getting some use on a group of heifers that Genex breeds for me.  More or less Genex’s version of Supersire (both Robust X Planet).

Of course I use a few other bulls, either old inventory or young bulls that I’ll use 10 units and maybe a few Kiwi Friesians in there from time to time.  But the six listed above look to be the main bulls for 2013-14.

I have gotten some feedback from a few of you that wish to contact other crossbreeders who frequent the blog often.  In response I will set up an email contact list for anyone who wants to contact other crossbreeders or allow others to contact you.  I will assure you that I will try my best to keep the list out of the hands of spammers and salesmen.  Therefore, the contact list will only be open to those who comment on the blog often and are not a part of any company.  If you want to be part of the contact list please email me at bomgardner8@yahoo.com.  If you wish, you may include the following in your email.  Name (and screen name if applicable), location, number of cows, breeds, and any other important information.

Just thought I’d pass along a note about an upcoming informational meeting on December 13th in Downing, WI (near Menominee).  Global Genetics Resources will be hosting this meeting at their office and speaking will be Dr. Les Hansen from the University of Minnesota and DVM Marv Johnson who has a herd of mostly Fleckvieh cows.  Most importantly, free lunch will be served.

Sounds like a good excuse for me to take a day trip.  If you’re interested, the meeting begins at 11:00 AM and any other pertinent information will be on the graphic below.

I recently staged a visit at my farm from the Cumbria crossbreeding group, hosted by Dairyco. The meeting had prompted me to compile some performance data to show how the introduction of crossbreds to the herd had impacted on production. So having shared them with the group, I thought I’d share them on the blog.

The figures are worked out on the 12 month rolling averages to October in each year going back to 2007. That was the last year to have no crossbreds in milk. I decided that would provide a good base for a comparison.

The first point mention is that 2013 has averaged 90% of the herd being crossbred. Average yield per cow is almost exactly the same as in 2007 when the herd was 100% Holstein at about 7550 litres. Yield was something I was prepared and expected to loose slightly in order to gain the health benefits from cross breeding. But this has not been the case.

Milk solids are up, especially butterfats. However Cell counts have not reduced as I thought, perhaps this could be explained by the older surviving Holsteins. I don’t get anything like as much mastitis as I used to.

2012 was a bad year for milk production. Non stop rain all summer coupled with a poor maize crop, hit yields. On top of that my herd size shrunk as many of the older cows were not bred again and dropped out.

Overall concentrate usage has stayed pretty stable. 2013′s figures are skewed a little because my feed rep who does my costings, has started to include Vitagold as a concentrate. In previous years this has been classed as a bulk feed ( Vitagold is a wheat based by-product from the distillery industry and is 36% protein). This has caused yield from forage to slip and concentrate use kg/litre to go up as indicated by *.

Margin over purchased feed has improved over the past few years but this is mainly down to an increase in milk price.

                               White Lund Farm 12 Month Rolling Averages

October

November

• Overall production is not where I want it to be.  I’ve brought it up before but the drought of 2012 had some lasting impact on 2013.  All our highest quality haylage has been fed already.  That and our best corn being stuck in a harvestor right now (I can’t wait to tear those things down) means lower production.
• One thing I won’t complain about is the component levels we are shipping.  After the Great Holstein Purge of 2013, our protein levels are doing pretty well especially.  Yesterday we had our first tanker go over the 3.5% protein barrier.
• We are coming up on three complete years of production data.  I’m debating how I will go forward presenting the data.  Perhaps I’ll move to a model where I report production based on the breed of sire.  As I get further into my crossbreeding program the data will get spliced more and more especially with all the different breeds being used.  Perhaps another format would be to report production of two-way crosses, three-way crosses, etc.. without distinguishing breed.
• One more month and I’ll put the three year totals together.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of you out there.

Santa Claus left me a nice gift in my stocking this morning, a Dr. Gonzo heifer calf from one of my best Norwegian Red (Braut) X Holstein cows.  The vet had sexed this calf as a bull so it was a pleasant surprise.

Hopefully everybody enjoys their day and has a prosperous New Year.

We are now several years into the so called “Genomic Age” of dairy cattle selection and breeding.  Yet it seems like the original sides of the debate are as dug in as ever in their convictions as to whether this has been a successful pursuit as an industry.  While the accuracy of the genomic proofs continue to be scrutinized, one area there seems to be agreement is that inbreeding has been accelerated by genomics.  So what do the numbers say?

(Source: CDCB)

Since 2000, the Holstein breed has increased it’s inbreeding percentage by 1.5% and the Jersey breed by 1.08%.  In the past five years (rough timeline of the “genomic era”), Holstein has increased 0.46% and Jersey by 0.19%.  The Jersey numbers are interesting in that they were able to use outcross Danish genetics to slow down the pace or even make progress but 2012 to 2013 saw a pretty big jump in inbreeding.  Same with the Holstein in that the first few genomic years don’t necessarily seem out of place from the pre-genomic years until 2013 had the biggest jump since 1997.

When I was breeding purebred Holsteins, this trend was always at the forefront of my mating decisions and it was a constant search to find unique genetics to use on my Holsteins.  I spent many mornings punching in different matings into the Holstein Association’s inbreeding calculator.  Where it became difficult was attempting to use pure breeding to improve the health and fertility of my Holsteins.  I do believe that I made real progress in creating a healthier Holstein by selecting for health traits and using unique bloodlines relative to my herd.  But I began to feel that the well had run dry and that recycling bloodlines I’ve already used would be necessary.

Of course we all know the story.  If I was so worried about inbreeding, why on earth was I still breeding any purebreds?  Purebreeding is inbreeding after all!  Now as a crossbreeder, instead of worrying about inbreeding, I embrace it.  If genomics is increasing the rate of genetic gain at the expense of inbreeding, as a crossbreeder using completely unrelated bloodlines in a rotation we see only the good side that comes with genetic progress and none of the ill effects of inbreeding.

I do feel some empathy for the people that are raising concerns about inbreeding with the Holstein breed.  Because I’ve been there.  The problem is that when breed improvement is driven by an index (TPI or Net Merit $ for example), breeders will not bring back genetics that lack index.  So you want to really improve the daughter fertility of your Holsteins?  Go find some A Butlerview Mattador semen (+5.2 DPR).  Of course he is also -111 lbs for fat and protein so there will be some production sacrifices.  And good luck marketing something sired by a bull with a TPI in the 1100′s.  Index will drive progress in the breeds and the consideration given to health traits within most indices ensures that bulls like Braxton and Atwood won’t make the Holstein breed useless to even crossbreeders.  So while I once decried the path of inbreeding that the Holstein was traveling down, I now know that was misguided.  It is an unavoidable path for a pure breed and crossbreeding is the only way to avoid it.

Here is a recap of 2013.  The outlook for 2013, posted in early 2013, is here.

Matt:  2013 turned out to be a great year.  It was the first full year of farm ownership for me and my wife after buying the farm from my parents in April 2012.  The weather was almost perfect with rain for most of the growing season and a cooler than normal August.  The pastures grew great as I increased the amount of grass the cows grazed over previous years.  The corn silage crop was also great as I was able to harvest half the acres I did last year, but store the same tonnage.  Overall it was a very profitable year and I can thank the crossbreeds for helping me do that by keeping my cull rate lower, increasing my component percentages, and getting bred back quickly.

After taking an online course from the University of Missouri on Pasture Based Dairy Management, I again tweaked how I breed cows.  Looking for a well conditioned animal that grazes well, I started to select for animals that have low dairy form or show a 5 early in the aAa numbers.  The course also encouraged me to continue my pursuit of short animals.  Furthurmore, I became interested in seasonal calving and have started working on going bi-seasonal with spring and fall calving until I am confident I can hold a spring only calving herd.

I didn’t add many crossbreds to the milking herd in 2013 but I did add 3 Gunnarstorps and 3 Facets.  However, in 2013 I kept 44 newborn calves with only 1 being a pure Holstein which was out of a high genetic cow.   Sires of the crossbred calves include, Tosikko (SR), Ruud (NRF), Motroen-P (NRF), Bosnes (NRF), Foske (SR), Zuma (JE), Checkpoint (Kiwi), Critic-P (Je), Redondo (NO) and a few others including a polled Royal Holl (NO) out of a Signif-P (Ho).

Looking back at last years 2013 Outlook, I noted that I would be breeding lower genetic cows to Holstein so I could sell unwanted heifer calves for more than crossbred calves.  I have found that those calves are not selling well and am looking to use beef semen.  I also used Rorb (Fleckvieh) to get some beefier calves and maybe milk a daughter or two.

Jon:  The drought we endured in 2012 had a ripple effect into 2013 that combined with about 50% winter kill on our alfalfa made a tough situation feed wise in 2013.  We did have a plentiful crop this year but due to the previous year’s shortage we weren’t able to give some feedstuffs the proper time to ferment before feeding it, impacting production.

It wasn’t all bad.  My herd is as healthy as it’s ever been.  We’ve only had one DA surgery in the past six months and only eight on the year (which is about half of what it’s been in the past).  Reproduction is as good as it’s ever been.  While we are doing a better job of managing the herd’s health and reproduction I don’t think it’s any coincidence that the more crossbreds we milk, the healthier the herd is.  Getting Johne’s under control has also been a huge factor in overall health.

We continue to increase the amount of crossbreds milked.  With a selloff of Holsteins and through simple natural selection the Holsteins are now less than 30% of the herd.  2013 saw a big group of Norwegian Red daughters calve in and I’m not regretting the decision to use Norwegian Red at all.  Notable less Jersey influence on the new heifers coming in, as I predicted in last year’s outlook.  A few new Montbeliarde crosses trickled in but 2013 was definitely a year we had an injection of Nordic bred animals into the milking herd.

Mark: Where did that year go to? The past 12 months have been very good for dairying on my farm in the most part. Despite a late turnout, the grazing season was fairly long with both high and low yielders out during the day until 31st October. The weather has ideal for growing both grass and maize.

Looking back at last years 2013 outlook, one thing i failed to achieve was to lay more concrete on my cowtrack. Perhaps in 2014 i may get more time. I did get round to draining some wet patches of my land which has helped no end.

The bad news was the TB restrictions i was put under from July. In total 3 cattle have been removed as reactors. The whole thing has been puzzling as i run a fairly closed herd and have no badgers or infected farms near me. I have another whole herd test early in the new year in which i hope my herd can go clear.

On a herd level, cow numbers have increased slightly to around 280 going through the parlour. Looking at all the youngstock coming through, i expect my herd to keep expanding. I’m down to my last 20 pure Holsteins now, however my first Holsteins out crossbreds were born this year. Another first are my Fleckvieh cross calves which arrived in the Summer.

Ben:  The biggest event for 2013 at Andersen Dairy has been the completion of the freestall barns.  The construction was completed in March so we have had almost 10 months with cows in both barns.  The barns have provided a consistently comfortable environment for the cows, and as a result I have seen more consistent production from the cows.

It has been a very good year for production.  The production number I am most concerned with is the combined pounds of fat and protein produced per cow.  In November the herd averaged 4.32% Fat and 3.56% Protein producing over 6 lbs of combined fat and protein per cow.  This is the first time we have broken the 6lb barrier.  Now the challenge is finding a way to continually produce over 6lbs of fat and protein month after month.

We continue to have a large surplus of heifers.  I was able to sell 84 springer heifers to Lance Johnson, and that has helped control overcrowding for the short term.  My long term solution continues to be the use of Black Angus semen on lower relative value cows.  I am breeding about 15% of my milking herd to Angus.

Matt:  For the coming year I don’t expect many changes other than fine tuning my grazing management and continuing work on seasonal calving.  I do not expect any adjustments to my breeding program except that I’m planning to reduce my use of NZ genetics and Normande semen until I have animals milking from those breeds.  I’ll have my first heifers calving this year from both those breeds and after a few years will have enough to determine if I should continue experimenting with them or not.  This year I’ll add a few more Montbeliarde heifers which are mostly out of Urbaniste.  Unless these Monties really impress, I am not planning to use more.  I also expect my first Norwegian Red heifers to calve which are mostly sired by Motroen-P.

I plan to keep 35-40 calves in 2015 and I hope that they are all born in spring.  That means I’ll have to work extra hard to get enough pregnancies during that breeding window this year.  Having one group of calves will be nice for grouping and grazing purposes and it will help me go spring seasonal quicker.  When I breed for fall 2015 calves I’ll likely be using mostly beef semen unless I did not create enough pregnancies for spring calves.

Jon: 2014 will mark a turning point as we will be freshening the last of our purebred Holstein heifers, in fact we are already near the end.  I may not even keep very many of the Holsteins as we are always pressed for space.  March will see another pretty big influx of heifers so I will continue to sell lots of cows both for dairy and for beef.  Controlling my heifer population will be a consideration going forward.  I’ll be working with a consultant on this issue to form the most profitable strategy going forward.  While things can change fast, raising and selling excess heifers is not a very profitable venture at the moment so my semen tank will likely be seeing some beef semen soon.

We will finally be seeing a nice influx of Montbeliarde, Fleckvieh, and Normande cows enter the milking herd this year.  I will finally be able to see how the Valfin daughters perform and of course the Fleckvieh will be interesting to watch.  Another group that is coming in that will be interesting to watch are my crossbred AltaIota daughters.  I think my return to Holstein has suffered from poor bull choices (Million!) and Iota looks to be a great bull.  As for what’s going to be born in 2014, the first half of the year will be dominated by Papayou and Dr. Gonzo, and Foske.  Later in the year my first Robin’s will be born as he’s my go-to bull at the moment.  We’ll also see a nice bunch of Fleckvieh calves born once again.

Mark: This year will see a few changes on my farm. First off I have signed a new milk contract which will enable me to be one of the co owners of Arla Amba, Europe’s largest dairy cooperative. From January 1st, I will be receiving a European milk price which although may fluctuate more than the UK price, historically has been higher. As part of the new contract I have signed up to a constituent rather than a liquid price structure. My milk solids have shot up recently as the number of crossbreds in the herd has increased. Also the top bactoscan hygiene band is more lenient on this price structure which i have struggled with.

The new milk contract will have a knock on effect on how i choose bulls. My focus has now shifted to pay closer attention to use bulls which transmit higher fat and protein in their daughters.

There will be some infrastructure changes in the pipeline. New slurry storage needs to be built as my current storage is only 2 months in the height of Winter. Also as herd numbers are growing, new cow housing is planned to house my dry cows and incalf heifers. This will release all of my current 380 cubicles to be used just for the milking herd.

Ben:  I am very excited about 2014.  I am pleased with the success we are having in the critical areas for the dairy.  It is now just a matter of making slight course corrections to build upon the success we are having.  2013 was a record year for production and I expect we will produce more pounds of fat and protein in 2014.  Pregnancy rate was down  slightly in 2013 due to a very hot summer, but we are recovering nicely and I am seeing pregnancy rates over 30 the last couple of cycles.  Health continues to be a real success story of the crossbreds.  We had zero LDA’s in 2013 and death loss in the mature herd was 4% versus the 9 to 10% we ran as a Holstein herd.  I believe if we have a normal summer we can hit 3% death loss in 2014.

In 2014 we will freshen in our first Fleckvieh and Normande heifers.  There will not be a large number from either of these breeds but it will be interesting see how they preform.

It’s been a while since I’ve contributed sorry.  I’ve turned into a bit of a lurker!  2013 has been quite an eventful year for us.  On a personal note, I became a mother in October!   Sophie was born 4 days into mating and since I’m usually fully responsible for organising mating I had 3 days to show Bill (hubby) my system, which was also complicated by our embryo transfer work – he had to keep a weeks worth of recipient cows unmated so they could have frozen embryos put in the following week.  So there I was, at the birth center with my laptop out, going through the list of 30-50 cows on heat each day from Bill’s texts so I could text back which ones to leave open and which bulls to mate the rest to!  Fortunately we have awesome staff and Bill’s parents had come from USA for 6 weeks to help out.  Since I had everything under control with Sophie, they helped Bill with mating, feeding calves, topping paddocks etc.

Improvising weigh time with the farm feed scales! 5 weeks old

We usually mate the pure Friesian cows to a xbred or Jersey bull and the rest of the herd to Friesian bulls but in an attempt to simplify mating this year we used mostly Friesian bulls.  We would pick one bull to use on all the cows on heat that day, apart from any elite cows that had custom matings planned.  Friesian bulls were: Marcel Fire Macca x 400 straws, Muritai Firenze Wynsor x 400 straws, Bungay Oman Danny x 300 straws.  Jersey bulls were: Pukeroa TGM Manzello x 20 straws, Lynbrook Terrific x 20 straws.  Not much variety for 720 cows because I’m getting pretty strict on my breeding criteria: udders, capacity, overall dairy confo, fat & protein kg.   While fertility, SCC, calving difficulty, and Breeding Worth just have to meet my minimum acceptable criteria.   Wynsor and Macca lead the way with conformation in the high BW market .  And I’ve always been keen on Oman, there’s been very little use of him here, particularly in the high BW scheme of things which pretty much dominates the NZ dairy industry.  So I was stoaked when I discovered that Vision Genetics (a relatively small company) had a proven Oman son (Danny) that captured Oman’s health traits, along with good confo, AND a high BW!!   We also used Danny as a short gestation bull toward the end of our 11 week mating period – he should bring those later cows forward half a week.

Our embryo transfer work has really taken off now.  We had 4 ET heifer calves born in 2012 and 35 in 2013.  We are currently flushing 5 donors and have 3 others that are back in calf themselves.  We’ve implanted 137 embryos this mating and I expect a hold rate of about 55-60%.  And we still have 19 frozen embryos (and counting) to put in next spring (we don’t really want out of season calves).  The donors are cows that we’ve purchased.  I’m always on the look out and my criteria is getting tougher!  I get them all confo inspected so their scores show up on their 3GP, and I register them with the Jersey or Friesian associations if possible.  One cow classified Excellent!  She’s 15/16ths Friesian and 1/16th Jersey, by Elsto out of a Dano cow.

Burgess US Skye S0F – Classified Excellent
6 years old, late lactation

Two donors are pure Jerseys and the rest are crossbreds but my general plan with the elite cows is to breed them up to pure Friesians.  It’ll give me more options being able to access both the purebred and crossbred markets, and the larger cows are more suited to our system.  One donor we were fortunate to buy is Checkpoints paternal grand dam who is now 12 years old.  And 3 of the 2012 born heifers are Aunts of Capri.  Bulls we’ve used for flushing include the above Friesian bulls that were used on the herd plus Mint Edition, Blitz, Kage, Maximiser, Maelstrom, and Shadow.  The latter 4 all have higher calving difficulty which is why I won’t use them over the herd, but with ET work I can make sure those embryos go in large recipients.  Last year we sold our first bull to LIC for sire proving as a result of ET work: Burgess Trickshot, a first cross sired by Mint Edition out of one of our Jersey donors.  Hopefully in time we will have more bulls enter sire proving!

Burgess Trickshot

I just had a quick squiz at what I last wrote about.  We ended up using 30 MRI straws in 2012 which gave us a whole 2 heifer calves!  They were nearly ALL bull calves, and beautiful red and whites at that!  So my effort to get a bit of a representation of MRI crosses was a complete fail!

MRI calf

MRI red and white calf amongst FxJ calves

Also we are now into our second season of farming with a simple uncovered feed pad.  Now milking 720 cows which is up from 600 before the feed pad was built.  We love it, makes management so much easier and was relatively cheap to build (which was important since we don’t own the farm).

Dry cows at dawn in the middle of calving

2012 Bull of the Year Papayou

2011 Bull of the Year Valfin

2012 Bull of the Year Papayou

It’s once again that time to crown a Bull of the Year for 2013.  The first two years of the award so a Montbeliarde bull crowned.  Will that streak continue?  This post is meant as a discussion, it is not the official vote.  Use the comments section to make the case for the bull you feel deserves to be named Bull of the Year.

The procedure will be the same as last year.  I will keep discussion open for one week, unless it dies down earlier at which point we’ll just go ahead and start voting.  Keep in mind, this award is to emphasize impact on crossbreeding.

Discuss away.

The discussion has died down so let’s get on to business.  To vote for the 2013 Bull of the Year, please comment on this post in the following format:

1. First Choice

2. Second Choice

3. Third Choice

Please refrain from commentary and keep this post to voting only.  Commentary may continue in the previous discussion post and when the winner is announced.  Each first place vote will count for three points, second place two, third place one.  Voters do not need to choose three bulls but the maximum is three.

Voting will be closed on Sunday, January 19th at 6:00 PM Central Standard Time.

Thank you for your participation.

2013 Bull of the Year – Braut

The votes have been tallied and the Norwegian Red bull Braut has garnered the most support and has cemented his spot as Bull of the Year for 2013.

Link to Braut’s proof

The final tally for the top ten was as follows:

Braut and the Norwegian Red breed managed to hold off 2013′s Montbeliarde favorite, Triomphe.  This is the first time a Red bull has won the award with Montbeliarde bulls Valfin and Papayou taking the previous polls for Bull of the Year.

Braut Daughter

Braut Daughter Group

Kristin Børresen of Geno Global was kind enough to provide with the following information on Braut and the farm he comes from:

Braut was born on August 23rd 2002 on the farm Braut (the general rule in Geno/Norway is that we name bulls after the farm name) in the southern part of Norway. The breeders last name is also named Braut : first names: Torbjørg (wife) and Ommun (husband).

 Photo of the breeders: http://www.geno.no/no/Forsiden/Nyheter/Bursdagsselskap-for-Braut/
Their son Elling Braut  has now taken over the family farm which consist of 25 milking Norwegian Red cows (average farm size in Norway). They also raise some pigs.

Braut is still alive and producing like clockwork. He is the most exported NRF bull of all times (number of doses) and exported to 22 different countries and is still one of the top bulls on the Total Merit Index list. 
Braut transmits very easy calving and low stillbirths, high production – both for yield and percentages , high daughter fertility, improved feet and legs, and good udders. Braut also has the added advantage of extremely high fertility as a service sire. Most Norwegian Red sires have a non-return rate at the least 5% higher than Holstein service sires, and Braut is the most fertile of the team!

Braut daughter on my farm (Braut X Jersey X Holstein)

Once again, congratulations to the breeders of a wonderful bull and Geno Global for bringing this bull to breeders across the world.

I’d also like to thank all that voted. Participation was greatly increased this year with 87 total accepted votes cast compared to 50 last year.  This award will always be predicated on participation and I think we’ve done well in that regard.

A Linne daughter

I finally got round to tallying up what calves i accrued last year. Here are the links to the tallys for 2011 and 2012. The table below illustrates how many daughters of bulls i got and how the breed combinations are distributed. Total numbers of heifers born have been increasing year on year, with 132 for 2013. The biggest group by far is still the Monty x Swedish Red x Holstein accounting for over half.

A few new comers to mention are the Fleckvieh crosses all sired by Wille and total 10. Also my first Holsteins bred from crossbreds arrived in the form of Red and White Holstein. These are either sired by Delta Lilac or my herd bull Bidlea Henry. I calved a lot of Montbeliarde cross heifers last year which were mostly in calf to Henry.
Pictured above is the last Swedish Red from a first cross breeding. The next time i’ll use any of the Reds will be on the next rotation which will be soon.
There are more sires than usual in the table. This is because i bought a lot of semen in batches of 50 doses rather than my usual 100. Worth mentioning is the comparison of heifer calves i got from those batches of 50. A general rule of thumb is i can expect about 10-15 heifers from 50 straws. Urocher was a real bull calf getter for me with just 6 heifers. The best was Triomphe with 16 plus I got 3 more this side of the new year. The 2 Red Holstein x Monty x Jersey x Holsteins’s are out of bought in dams. I have not used any Jersey blood myself.
From the total number of calves, i had 4 sets of twins and 1 twin to a bull.

SR: Swedish Red, MO: Montbeliarde, FL: Fleckvieh, J: Jersey, RH: Red Holstein, H: Holstein, HB: Herd Bull

I’m going to steal another good idea from Cowtalk.  The Cowpocalypse has struck and you only are allowed 20 bulls and cows to save that will form the basis of the future dairy cow.  Who will you save and why?  Any combination and number of males and females can be chosen but no more than 20 total can be saved.

Fire away in the comments and determine who will rise from the ashes and form the backbone of the post-cowpocalyptic breed.

(Note: past or present animals doesn’t matter for this exercise)

• Welcome to the new format of reporting my test results.  Hopefully this format will be cleaner, easier to read and more informative.  With the number of different combinations I milk, it’s become a drag to compile every month and the sample sizes for most of the combinations are meaningless.
• I didn’t forget about December.  I’ve compiled some of those results and will use it when figuring the three year totals soon.  But I was just too excited to switch over to this format that I didn’t feel like posting December.  I’m not hiding anything either as December was one of our better tests.
• Another new figure is ECM 305ME which stands for Energy Corrected Milk 305 day Mature Equivalent.  This will factor components into the mature equivalent figures putting everybody on equal footing.  I’m not selling water, after all.
• In the combinations section of the table I’ll be putting production numbers from cows that have maintained a set rotation of breeds.  ProCross are any animals that are a rotation of Viking Red, Montbeliarde and Holstein.  What I haven’t decided is whether I should include other flavors of ProCross in this group that aren’t “true” ProCross.
• Another small sample warning as the ProCross production numbers look low but I have a Holstein sired ProCross dragging those numbers down (ECM 305ME is around 15000 on her).
• The Holstein-Jersey-Red combination is a compilation of anything that maintains a rotation of Holstein Jersey and whatever flavor of Red.  Norwegian Reds, Swedish Red, Illawarra, Red Dane, Ayshire and eventually Aussie Red all will fall under this category when used in conjunction with Holstein and Jersey.  Also some animals in this group will have two straight generations of Jersey before Red (Swedish Red X Jersey X Jersey X Holstein is an example).
• The Normande data is pretty meaningless at this point but I did want to include it as it will continue to grow this year.
• Overall we tested at 84 lbs ECM/day.  Still a little on the low side but it’s going to take a new (and hopefully bountiful) harvest of alfalfa before I have the potential to get over 90 lbs ECM/day where I want to be.

One of the oft cited reasons for crossbreeding is increased an increase in herd life.  When a person first starts crossbreeding it takes quite a while to see whether this is true or not.  I decided to take a look back at a group of 100 cows from when we first started having a significant amount of crossbreds on the farm.  This group of 100 cows was born between August 15, 2006 and February 21, 2007.

As you can see, only one Holstein has made it to seven years.  Nine of the crossbreds made it to seven years.  It is also interesting to note that this was my first group of Swedish Red crosses to enter the herd.

So who is left?

There were only seven HoJos in the original group of 49 crossbreds.  Two were Brown Swiss X Holstein, three were Montbeliarde X Holstein, two three-way crosses and a 75% Holstein 25% Milking Shorthorn.

The two HoJos are great cows.  Among the Swedish Reds remaining, I think the B Jurist daughters have given me the most in terms of profitability though that Lars daughter is a fantastic cow too.

Regardless, the crossbreds in this group definitely showed a much better survival ability than the Holsteins.  Even the Holstein that is left isn’t much better in terms of production to even the Peterslund with an Angus for a grandsire.  There were certainly better production Holsteins in the group than the one that was left standing but they also didn’t stay in the herd all that long.

The other day I was messing around and I entered my name into a Google Search.  After a few pages I was surprised to see that in August 2013, I had a registered crossbred with the Red and White Dairy Cattle Association listed on the elite cow list.  That list includes genomic heifers so I decided to go to the CDCB site and see their Elite Cow list for registered Red and Whites.  According to that list, 2459 is the fifth highest NM$ registered Red and White in the United States.

She comes from a line of cows that goes back to my childhood.  In fact the beginning of her pedigree is an old Blackstar that was my brother’s cow.  Her sire stack goes like this:

Plumitif X Peterslund X Forbidden X Temptor X Abe X Blackstar

This is an example of resurrecting a good old cow family that had lost it’s way.  The Blackstar and the Abe were great cows.  The Temptor was a good cow until she fell dead of a heart attack.  The Forbidden was a nightmare to get pregnant.  The Peterslund was probably the worst of the bunch as she didn’t milk or breed back easily.  So finally we did the right thing and got some Montbeliarde into the family.

Here is a link to her ‘proof’.

One thing to note is that because she is not genomic tested, the reliability of this cow’s proof is much lower than the others.  So how has she actually performed?

I’d say her performance pretty well confirms that she is a very profitable cow.  Today she was confirmed pregnant to Supersire.

In terms of offspring, 2459 has three daughters, one milking.  The one milking is sired by Holstein but I’m not sure exactly who it is as the breeding book got eaten at the heifer grower’s farm that she was at.  My best guess would be Graybil because the other likely option would have been Million.  Given that she is a little taller than the average heifer and got pregnant on the first service I’d say she’s not a Million.  The other two daughters are from AltaIota.  I’m reasonably excited to see how those cows do but they will not be appearing on any Elite Red Cows list as they are not red.

I attended the Procross tour in Oakdale, California on February 14, 2014.  I went to Oakdale for the 1st time in 2006 and I have been almost every year since.  The satisfaction of the original Procross dairymen is as high as it has ever been.  The tour is a great opportunity to meet other dairymen who crossbreed.  Lance Johnson attended the tour for the 2nd year in a row, I also met Kevin Zart from Wisconsin who comments on the blog.

This is a Triomphe daughter from Hokestra dairy.  I am just starting to have my first Triomphe calves hit the ground.

A Facet daughter from Prins dairy.  I am milking about 15 Facet daughters, they have very good udders but are light on production.

Ulemo daughter from Hokestra dairy fresh about 3 weeks.  I believe Ulemo is a maternal brother of Triomphe.

Urocher daughter at Hokestra dairy.  I am milking 50 daughters from Urocher with the oldest daughters early in 2nd lactation.  The udders are consistently very good with solid production.

Ugostar daughter at Hokestra dairy.  I have not used any Ugostar but I am tempted after seeing his daughters the past 2 years.  I just struggle with his -.17  Fat%.

I figured I’d show a list of what the new additions to the herd will look like this year:

Already Fresh

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Kourt (MS) X Temptor (HOL) – a different branch from 2459‘s family

Nordbo (NR) X Jacinto (JER) X Britt (HOL)

Plus (JER) X Bachelor (HOL)

Velsvik (NR) X Jerrick (JER) X Earl (HOL)

Crown (HOL) X O Brolin (VR) X Pollyden (HOL) X Brazo (JER) X Forbidden (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Grandeur (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X TBone (JER) X Rudy (HOL)

Raastad (NR) X B Jurist (VR) X Jerrick (JER) X Winchester (HOL) – Red absorption from 1449′s family but she is still black!

Facet (VR) X Bret (HOL)

Vigor (BS) X Adam (HOL)

Braut (NR) X Nelson (HOL)

Urbaniste (MONT) X Jacinto (JER) X Holstein

Crown (HOL) X Celebrity (JER) X Peterslund (VR) X Kenneth (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Juryman (HOL)

Harvest (JER) X Poker (AYR) X Myron (HOL)

March

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Ray (JER) X Molson (HOL)

Crown (HOL) X Safir (VR) X Paramount (JER) X Aaron (HOL)

Braut (NR) X Fairdeal (HOL)

Graybil (HOL) X B Jurist (VR) X Jacinto (JER) X Jersey X Holstein

Bosnes (NR) X Adam (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Tempting (HOL)

Royal Treble (ILA) X Acclaim (BS) X Wade (HOL)

Million (HOL) X B Jurist (VR) X Action (JER) X Holstein

Nordbo (NR) X Peterslund (VR) X Talisman (HOL)

Raastad (NR) X Norski (HOL)

Freddie (HOL) X Action (JER) X Peterslund (VR) X Geno (HOL)

Nordbo (NR) X Ransom (BS) X Emerson (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Cassino (HOL)

Bosnes (NR) X Jacinto (JER) X Jace (JER) X Holstein

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Diecast (HOL)

Eggtroen (NR) X Lynch (HOL) – excited for this one!

Ronningen (NR) X Kenneth (HOL)

Kolton (HOL) X O Brolin (VR) X Paramount (JER) X Forbidden (HOL)

Graybil (HOL) X Trump (HOL) X Oxalin (MONT) X Holstein

Crown (HOL) X Braut (NR) X Action (JER) X Aaron (HOL)

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Million (HOL)

Facet (VR) X Oran (MONT) X Mysterious (HOL) – 2076‘s daughter

Gunnarstorp (VR) X Vence (HOL)

Velsvik (NR) X Jonah (HOL)

April

Raastad (NR) X Talisman (HOL)

Crown (HOL) X Peterslund (VR) X Mecca (JER)

Caruso (HOL) X Peterslund (VR) X Jacinto (JER)

O Brolin (VR) X Ashlar (HOL)

Peterslund (VR) X Louie (JER) X Birdman (HOL)

Durable (HOL) X Peterslund (VR) X Paramount (JER)

O Brolin (VR) X Harvest (JER) X Potter (HOL)

B Jurist (VR) X TBone (JER) X Rocket (JER) X Holstein

Tomteby (VR) X Million (HOL) X O Brolin (VR) X Butler (JER) X Holstein

O Brolin (VR) X Zowie (HOL)

Jordan (HOL) X Ray (JER) X Peterslund (VR)

Crown (HOL) X Rocket (JER) X O Brolin (VR) X Holstein

Impressions

• Starting to get a few more Gunnarstorp daughters in and I like them quite a bit.  Very consistently good in the udder.  Moderate to small in stature, and a good combination of strength.  The ones that freshened several months ago are starting to pick up the pace production wise.  There does seem to be more potential for getting the odd one that doesn’t milk that well.  Good potential for lifetime profit in these.
• A Norwegian bull who’s daughters are impressing me at the moment is Velsvik.  It’s a shame that you can’t get semen on him anymore because he’s a good one.  In terms of type they are very similar to Gunnarstorp’s daughters.  Short, strong with very nice udders.  They are moderate for components but have excellent components.
• The first few Crown daughters are now fresh.  Hindsight is 20/20 and Goldwyn blood is not for me but the first few Crown’s don’t have the tall, frail Goldwyn look.  Having Jersey in there helps.  Then again, the short and strong Million daughters of mine were more dud than stud.  I feel Crown will be a step above Million but look forward to calving in some Iota daughters and in the more distant in the future, Supersire daughters.