• We’ve been suffering through our coldest winter in decades.  For Wisconsin that is pretty cold.  Picture taking of cows has been scarce the past few months but I did manage to snap this picture of a Normande (Redondo) X Viking Red (B Jurist) X Holstein first calf heifer.  I watch this one with interest because the dam is one of my better old B Jurist daughters and Redondo is a bull I’ve praised in the past but have not actually milked that many daughters.
• New French proofs were released recently.  Crasat remains atop the ISU rankings.  I’d be interested to hear observations on his daughter’s ability to calve as when it was brought up as a concern by some on this blog it was at 86 and has now declined to 83.  There was a base change this run so that should be kept into consideration.  Interesting to me was Ugostar, a bull that actually went up with the base change.  Ugostar is the top net merit Montbeliarde bull on the USA Holstein base.
• Genex Cooperative and Jura-Betail have partnered together to bring some Montbeliarde bulls to the United States.  Headlining the three bulls that Genex will initially market is 2011 Bull of the Year Valfin. Valfin now has 550 daughters milking in France and maintains his spot among the top ISU Montbeliarde bulls.  My Genex representative was able to see Valfin daughters firsthand in my heifer shed.  I’m very excited for these to calve in the second half of this year and now he is back into service in my herd as a sire once again.  The full Genex Montbeliarde offering can be found here. Accelerated Genetics also has an updated flyer with their Normande and Montbeliarde choices.
• New on the Creative Genetics Viking Red price list are some genomic young sires.  There are some very interesting pedigrees on these and they are priced lower than the proven bulls.  Also new and intriguing to their proven price list is Game, a Gunnarstorp X St Hallebo. I’m just now getting into Pell-Pers and added a cane of Cigar to the tank.  Foske remains a mainstay in the rotation
• With Geno Global’s release of new proofs recently, they’ve expressed confidence in Tangvoll being a bull that will have an impact.  Tangvoll is an Oygarden son and I’ve had a few Oygarden’s calve in recently and they are both near the top for production among my two year olds.  Interestingly, I got my Oygarden semen from when Semex unloaded their excess inventory on me after Geno partnered with ABS.
• A few more to watch in Norway are Skjelvan and Eggtroen.  Skjelvan is the new TMI leader by a fairly wide margin.  Eggtroen has 274 daughters in Norway and I imagine that number will be going up soon as my first Eggtroen daughter is weeks from calving.  I really like her frame, it’ll be interesting to see how her udder develops.
• I’ve sent my first 60 registrations into the Composite Dairy Cattle Registry.  I see some nice potential with this Registry for information gathering purposes on crossbred animals.  Already, efforts have succeeded in getting the Milking Fleckvieh its own breed code (FL).  CDCB has changed its databases to reflect this addition and currently efforts are being made for DHI processing centers to modify their databases.  57 Fleckvieh bulls have been added to the NAAB cross referencing program and soon CDCR will have a list for all of us with Fleckvieh sired animals to correct sire information on them.  The Montbeliarde bulls that Genex are carrying are also being listed by CDCR.  I’ve corrected my own Valfin daughters to his new NAAB code, 217MO1000.  However we look at it, the work being done by CDCR is good news for those of us that want to see data collection on crossbreds expanded.  I would encourage anybody that feels the same to at least correct any information on your own animals and look into getting some animals registered in the CDCR.

As the title suggests, it has become increasingly hard to find a pure Holstein cow in my herd. Since the last one was born on my farm back in 2007, numbers have dwindled down to just 12 individuals remaining.
I’ll be honest, when last one exits, i won’t shed any tears. I have never had any regrets crossbreeding. On the positive side, a Holstein herd provides a good base breed from which to crossbreed from.
Below are pictured the surviving cows plus sire details. In theory these should be some of my better Holsteins judging by the fact they have stuck around so long.

One more thing I’d like to mention is that this is my 50th post on the Crossbreeding blog. Thanks to Jon for allowing me to contribute my bit. I was a blogging virgin before this, but I have learnt so much from the discussions. I never thought there would be so much to say on such a small niche subject.

No. 556 Roylane Jordan x Stardale herd bull
7th lactation

Roylane Jordan x Maughlin Storm
7th lactation

No.1 Geno x Maughlin Storm
5th lactation

No. 65 Lem x Cevis
4th lactation

No. 619 Roylane Jordan x Hanoverhill Raider
6th lactation

No. 26 Hilmer Star x Home bred herd bull
5th lactation

No. 615 Roylane Jordan x Hanoverhill Raider
7th lactation

No.14 Comestar Outside x Modest Integrity
5th lactation

No.666 Weeton Jackson x Valbas Arpagoni
6th lactation

No. 66 Lem x Homebred herd bull
4 lactations currently dry

The post Holstein: An Endangered Species appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

I received this press release this morning:

GROUND BREAKING PROCROSS TAKE-OFF

As from April 1st of 2014, VikingGenetics & Coopex Montbeliarde, two farmer owned A.I. cooperatives, have partnered in launching ProCROSS - a subsidiary equally owned by VikingGenetics & Coopex Montbeliarde. The overall goal is to develop the ProCROSS brand and crossbreeding concept on a global scale.

Based on our successful cooperation with the ProCROSS concept, developed in the USA and Europe over the last decade, we at VikingGenetics & Coopex Montbeliarde, have decided to further strengthen our ties, by gathering workforce, knowledge and experience with our distributors around the most innovative concept in the AI industry: ProCROSS.

“ProCROSS has been experienced in many countries by progressive dairy farmers focused on profit. In searching for efficiency, those producers are leaving no stone unturned.” says Claus Fertin, Vice Board Chairman in ProCROSS.

The combination of three unrelated and competitive dairy breeds – VikingRed, Montbéliarde and Holstein – has proven to be the most homogeneous and profitable cross in the dairy business. “ProCROSS is the first crossbreeding program of its kind that allows the combination of high production, reproductive efficiency and health, ensuring a major financial return per cow”, notes Tristan Gaiffe, Board Chairman in ProCROSS.

ProCROSS is a trademark brand developed and owned by Coopex Montbeliarde & VikingGenetics.

ProCROSS is already a success in USA, Holland, Germany, UK, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Mexico and France – and we expect success in more countries in the future.

Learn more about ProCROSS at: http://www.procross.info/

For further information please contact:

Tristan Gaiffe +33 676 088 239 – t.gaiffe@procross.info

Claus Fertin +45 20 42 89 96 – c.fertin@procross.info

The post Coopex Montbeliarde and VikingGenetics Launch Subsidiary appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

The post Test Day Results: February appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

I’d like to invite everybody to try out the newest feature of this site, The XBred XChange.  There’s been some interest in a place for people to connect for the purpose of buying and selling crossbred cattle.  With a pretty consistent amount of traffic to the blog, it made sense to expand our reach and create this virtual marketplace for crossbred cattle.

Being that this is in the format of a forum, I’ve also put a general crossbreeding discussion forum on there.  This will offer an opportunity to discuss topics that may not come up on the blog and perhaps share some of your own photos of crossbreds.

Anyway, if you are interested, head over to http://dairyxbred.com/xbredxchange/ and register.

The post XBred XChange appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

I am milking 69 Urocher daughters, 62 1st lactation and 7 2nd lactation, I also have just over 200 replacement heifers.  Urocher is a moderate milk bull but a component improver especially on fat.  He consistently puts on very nice udders and feet and legs.

8961 2nd lactation 118dim 99lbs

9548 1st lactation 127dim 96lbs

9546 1st lactation 144dim 90lbs, 9527 1st lactation 137dim 87 lbs

9587 1st lactation 136dim 90lbs, 1357 1stlactation 84dim 84lbs

The post Urocher appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Orraryd (Viking Red) X Holstein
2nd lactation

127 lbs/day 3.2% fat 2.6% protein 34 days in milk

Raastad (Norwegian Red) X B Jurist (Viking Red) X Manfred (Holstein)
Second Lactation

86 lbs/day 4.9% fat 3.2% protein
12 days in milk

Second Lactation ProCross
Peterslund X Plumitif X Bionic
124 lbs/day 3.9% fat 2.8% protein
19 days in milk

Gunnarstorp X Holstein Young Sire
First Lactation

92 lbs/day 4.1% fat 2.6% protein
42 days in milk

O Brolin X Hatley (Holstein)
92 lbs/day 3.6% protein 3.2% fat

Gunnarstorp X Cassino (Holstein)
First Lactation

. 65 lbs/day 4.9% fat 3.0% protein
21 days in milk

Gunnarstorp X Jakin (Holstein)
86 lbs/day 3.6% fat 3.2% protein
First lactation

ProCross
First Lactation
Facet (VR) X Oran (Montbeliarde) X Mysterious (Holstein)

The post Photo Roll – April 7 appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

It’s time to take a look at the reproductive efficiency numbers from 2013.  The past few years I’ve looked done two different reproductive analysis here and here.

Here is the Holstein vs. Crossbred breakdown from the past four years:

Overall the numbers are pretty similar to 2012, just a touch lower.  At this level of reproduction, the differences seen between Holsteins and crossbreds remains fairly consistent.

As some of you may know, there aren’t many first lactation purebred Holsteins in my herd anymore so my numbers aren’t necessarily a representative sample for a fair comparison.  So let’s break things down by lactation:

As my crossbred cows get older it’s much easier to appreciate their reproductive efficiency.  You can see that there is little to no difference in Holsteins and crossbreds in the first lactation.  The difference begins in second lactation.  Both groups see some degradation into second lactation which is expected.  But the crossbreds keep their reproductive performance much closer to the gold standard set in the first lactation.

The final area I like to look at is the amount of synchronization needed on crossbreds compared to Holsteins.  We do not initiate any synchronization protocols before 100 days in milk, giving each cow ample opportunity to express a natural heat through our Select Detect activity monitor system.  As you can see, we do a fair bit more synchronization on the Holsteins than the crossbreds which leads to reduced costs.

None of this data is going to be all that groundbreaking.  Most of us already know that crossbreds are superior in terms of reproductive efficiency though the degree may vary from farm to farm.  For my own farm, I think it’s fair to say that we’ve established the crossbreds to outperform Holsteins by about a 7% pregnancy rate.  Pregnancy rate itself is made up of heat detection rate and conception rate, both of which crossbreds have shown themselves to be better at.  While none of this is surprising it is always interesting to see the numbers over time.

The post 2013 Reproductive Analysis appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

I decided to take a Saturday drive and see some of my heifers that I hadn’t seen in a while.  We hire a few local farmers to raise our heifers for us so they are not at my own farm.  Here are a few that were kind enough to pose for a picture:

Foske (VR) X Freddie (HO)
One year old in a few days

Triomphe (Monty) X Legend (Holstein)

Samuel (Fleckvieh) X Black Ink (Holstein)

Samuel (Fleckvieh) X TBone (Jersey) X Mac (Holstein)

Iota (Holst) X O Brolin (VR) X Ransom (BS) X Holstein

Marvin (Ayrshire) X Holstein

Vokendo (Monty) X Holstein

Onze (Monty) X Pollyden (BS) X Jersey X Holstein

Enrico (Fleckvieh) X TD (BS) X Holstein

Royal Holl (Normande) X Holstein

The post A Saturday Tour of My Heifers appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Last years winner

Crossbred cow of the year is back and we’re open to entries for this years contest. If you have a favorite cow, maybe one that’s performed really well for you or maybe she’s just a bit of a looker then she could end up in the Hall of Fame like Jon Lundgren’s cow 1449 above.

Anyone can enter one cow which must be crossbred. It was requested last time that photos of the cows should be recent or at least from the current lactation. Send your pictures by email along with any information on sire details, breed combinations, production data etc to markbirkett1979@gmail.com

Please note that my email address has changed from last year. I am planning on running the contest in a months time so if i could have the entries by mid May that would be great. Here is the link to last years vote

The post Crossbred Cow Of The Year 2014 Entries appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

• We’ve had a bit of an upward trend in production since January.  We’ve gone from 84 lbs ECM/day to 87 in March.  That’s not quite to my targeted level of production but getting closer.  We are in haylage preservation mode right now so we are feeding a heavy corn silage diet.  We’ve learned that we can make this diet work well enough, especially with BMR corn silage, but we don’t reach full potential unless we have a diet that has a good amount of high quality alfalfa haylage.
• This is the biggest gap we’ve seen between pure Holsteins and crossbreds.  It’s not at all concerning to me as I knew this would happen after I undertook the “Great Holstein Purge 0f 2013″.  Only 6 of 59 heifers that have calved in 2014 are pure Holstein.  The rest of the year will see only three more calve in.  After that, it will be at least one year before we have another pure Holstein calve in.
• I’ve added Red Absorption to the list.  These are all young animals.  I don’t think I’ll get too crazy doing this, but one is good enough that I’ve got a bull calf that could be put into AI service at some point in the future.

The post Test Day Results: March appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Just some random musings and thoughts on what I’m seeing lately:

O Brolin (Viking Red)- My oldest O Brolin daughters are mostly middle aged and we still have a few new ones coming in here and there.  A one word description for his daughters would be ‘profitable’.  They are not flashy by any means.  The poor udder cleft figure in his proof is a red flag for some but I’ve found the udders on my aging O Brolin daughters to be more than adequate.  Fertility has been great on his daughters.  A good portion are making it to 4th and greater lactation without skipping a beat.

B Jurist and Peterslund (Viking Red)- I’ve calved in a few more of these lately.  My opinion hasn’t changed much.  B Jurist will more consistently make the kind that I like.  Peterslund can make some very nice cows when they have some strength but sometimes those tall and frail Peterslunds with hoof problems leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Gunnarstorp (Viking Red) -  We’ve calved in most of my Gunnarstorp daughters now.  They are very consistent.  Very rarely are they large and they have excellent udders.  Most have more than adequate strength.  As a group, they are on the lower end for production.  So far they’ve been very easy breeding.  I’ve been looking to bring more production back in the next generation.  The three-way crosses will see Holstein bulls like Supersire used on them and I think I’ll save some of my Robin semen for the ones that need Montbeliarde.

Arbelunda (Viking Red) - I’m happy with how they are coming into second lactation and producing.  First lactation they were typically bottom of the pack with some having me scratching my head a little bit.  But I will say they are doing much better the second time around.  Some can be a little frail.

Braut (Norwegian Red) - The oldest ones are in second lactation, more will be coming in, and more will be hitting the ground.  Definitely one of my all-time favorites.  For those that understand American football, I’d say that the Brauts are built like a middle linebacker.  Short, strong, and athletic.  Above average production, sometimes elite.  An udder might get a little deep here and there.  Maybe not a bull for deep-uddered HoJos.

Velsvik (Norwegian Red) - A shame he died.  These have Braut bodies with Gunnarstorp udders and the components of a Jersey.  A little lower in total volume but the excellent components make the daughters I have about middle of the pack for production.  I’ll have ten Velsvik daughters when all is said and done but wouldn’t have minded a few more.

Raastad (Norwegian Red) - Raastad daughters fly under the radar somewhat.  They mostly go unnoticed for reasons both good and bad.  That’s not at all a bad thing.  I don’t know how often a cow shows up in my old cow pen that I really never realized was there because she goes about her business unnoticed.  That’s how the Raastads will end up.

Bosnes (Norwegian Red) – I don’t hate the Bosnes daughters but I don’t necessarily like them when I compare them the three bulls I mentioned above.  No regrets that I used him but no regrets that I didn’t use more.

Pell-Pers (Viking Red) – This bull passed our initial test for creating pregnancies so we are going to make him our main Viking Red service sire for heifers and I’ve been using him some on cows too.  We’re going all in on Pell-Pers.

Foske (Viking Red) - We have 31 daughters with the oldest being close to breeding age.  There are also 46 cows carrying Foske pregnancies.  He’s going to make a major impact in my herd.  While we’re going to elevate Pell-Pers into our main Viking Red bull, I can’t find another to supplant Foske.  So we’ll keep rolling with him as choice number two.

Ravn (Norwegian Red) - I’ve sort of gravitated to this bull as one of our main Norwegian Red service sires outside of Braut.  Outside of calving ease, I like his proof all-around.  His major hole can be covered up by not using him on heifers.  Being polled helps.  I might find some use for him in my Red Absorption program to introduce polled.

Tangvoll (Norwegian Red) - I’m looking at getting some semen from this bull.  I recently calved in a few Oygarden daughters, which is his sire.  If Tangvoll has Oygarden production with better udders, he’d a great bull to use.

The post Random Thoughts on Random Bulls (Nordic Reds) appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

LINK

We’ve got some new data to digest from the University of Minnesota.  Notable for me is the inclusion of data on Montbeliarde sired animals from Jersey X Holstein crosses.

Check out the link for the full analysis but I’ve included the relevant numbers in the table below:

The post Some Recent Figures From the University of Minnesota appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Discussion at Xbred Xchange

OK, time to vote. Thank you to all who put forward candidates and good luck with the voting. A nice group they are too. The voting format will be the same as last years contest and as for Bull Of The Year. Most of you will be familiar with this now. Simply leave a comment stating the chosen 3 cows your voting for like this:

1. First choice cow

2. Second choice cow

3.Third choice cow

The only rule here is no one can vote for their own cow. There is no set criteria for voting, just go with what you feel makes a great crossbred cow. Please attach a name to you vote. Anonymous votes that aren’t clarified won’t count. Any discussion should be saved until after the winner is announced and the polls will remain open for one week.

Cow A: #27 Patches from Chris & Brenda Conley

Cow A

Cow A

DOB 3/7/2009 Sire: Milgene Cole Justify-ET. MGS: Botans (Swedish Red)

2010 Grand Champion Any Other Breed for Dodge County Junior Fair

Production:

2-5 305d 15496 3.70 574F 3.05 473P

3-6 305d 17748 3.87 687F 3.05 473P

4-7 170d 11391 3.87 441F 2.98 340P

Daughters:

#82 Peanut. Sire: Arbelunda (Swedish Red) Current Production 2-2 143d 7533 4.12 310F 2.95 222P

#108 High-Gem Redondo Payton. Sire: Redondo

#137 High-Gem Redondo Paige. Sire: Redondo

Cow B: Boji 158 from Sylvia Reda

Cow B

DOB: 13/10/2002  50% Jersey, 25% Holstein, 17% Ayrshire, 8% Sahiwal. BOLD Venture Daniel X Paradise-R Roebuck

Her first 4 lactations are:

02 00 7149 ltrs in 411d

03 04 7950 ltrs in 429d

04 09 6489 ltrs in 342d

05 10 8768 ltrs in 475d

We sold her end of 4th lactation. As she represents an almost extinct and very successful maternal bloodline we decided to trace and buy her back last year. We are hoping for a bull calf from her who will continue her line.

When we bought her back she was aged 11 years and had completed another 4 lactations. The farmer we bought her from ceased dairying after almost his whole herd was wiped out by a grass poisoning incident. Not only was Boji one of only 4 survivors of this disaster but according to him she was the best cow he ever possessed.

This production was achieved under extreme tropical conditions with no cooling and poor quality feeding.

Cow C: OA Sugar Grove Legal 1404 “Blacky” from Mathew Steiner

Cow C

1404 is currently in her second lactation. She is almost 300 days in milk, 4 months pregnant (we flushed her, delaying her breeding back).

Her records are:

1-11 365 days 24,524 lbs 4.6% F 1131 lbs 3.4% P 837 lbs

3-03 284 days 23,793 lbs 4.7% F 1118 lbs 3.5% P 842 lbs

Appraised 86% by the AJCA

Her natural calf by BW Renegade was genomic tested and currently stands at 241 GJPI( currently ranked 84th on the top 500 GJPI) and 670 $CM.

Cow D: ‘Blue’ from Carrie Mess

Cow D

This is Blue, she is finishing up her 2nd lactation and will be going dry next month. She is a Poker (Milking Shorthorn) x Warrior (Holstein).

1st lactation 296 DIM, 22295 actual 763F 638P, 305 ME 31,090 lbs. Avg LSCC 2.4

2nd lactation 266 DIM, 30189 actual 1184F 869P, 305 ME42,023 lbs. Avg LSCC 3.2

She is due with a Oliver-P bull calf in August and she is pictured halfway between milkings.

We are a conventional dairy. Feed TMR with Protein. Cows go outside on good days to stretch legs but grazing isn’t part of our overall diet.

Cow E: ‘Swede’ from Tracy Janikula

Cow E

This is Swede, shes a Swedish Red x Holstein and sired by Botans.

Aprils test showed 72 Fat Corrected Milk with 19646 lbs milk, 804 lbs fat, 599 lbs protein, 4.1% fat, 3.0% protein and average SCC of 19.

She is pregnant to Corsica (Montbeliarde). First lactation she calved 1 year 11 months and had 19216 milk, 721 fat, 595 protein, 3.8 fat and 3.1 protein at 298 days.

Cow F: #2076 from Jon Lundgren

Cow F

Cow F

She is an Oran JB (Montbeliarde) x Mysterious (Holstein).

Her production figures:

Lact 1: 23990 lbs milk 961 lbs fat 762 lbs protein 283 days milked

Lact 2: 26380 lbs milk 1030 lbs fat 896 lbs proein 281 days milked

Lact 3: 30320 lbs milk 1327 lbs fat 1019 lbs protein 297 days milked

Lact 4: 32710 lbs milk 1395 lbs fat 1132 lbs protein 323 days milked

Lact 5: 4150 lbs milk 158 lbs fat 138 lbs protein 45 days milked

She has had a total of five units of semen used on her in her lifetime and those five units have produced five pregnancies.

She has had four daughters. Two milking by Arbelunda (VR) and Facet (VR). One Brown Swiss by Vigor is breeding age and the Guernsey by Challenge is deceased (imagine that!).

Cow G: #6424 from Lance Johnson

Cow G

Here is cow 6424. She is a Micmac daughter in her 6th lactation and she is the type of cow i wish my barns were full of. She has bred back on her first service in each of her lactations. She has produced over 30,000 lbs in each of her last 4 lactations and is on pace to make it 5 lactations in a row. Her most impressive lactation to date was her 5th where she made 38,170 lbs of milk, 1601 lbs of fat, and 1189 lbs of protein. Her lifetime milk is over 182,000 lbs and she looks the type of cow that could make it another few lactations. She is currently pregnant to VR Foske.

Cow H: From Oscar Camara

Cow H

Cow H

This is the same heifer i entered last year. The difference this time is she’s 60 DIM. Shes already been serviced 15 days ago. No production data to show.

Her breed make up is Jersey x Fleckvieh x Holstein and shes sired by a Jersey herd bull sired by Q Impulse.

Cow I: #88 from Mark Birkett

Cow I

Cow I

#88 is a Swedish Red (Peterslund) x Holstein

She was part of my ‘Judging Group’ on this blog two years ago coming second in that group. Currently in her 5th lactation shes one of my oldest crossbreds and has remained trouble free throughout.

#88 has calved around the same time each year, holding to first service each time. She has one daughter breeding age by Ulcoto and is currently served to Crasat. At 85 DIM shes giving 45 litres per day on a low input system. This cow epitomizes everything i strive for in my breeding program.

Cow J:#5688 from Ben Anderson

Cow J

Swedish Red (Tabor) x Holstein

6th lactation pictured at 323 DIM, just completed milking.

Lact#1 1-11 291 DIM, 25370 lbs milk, 916 lbs 3.6% fat, 810 lbs 3.2% protein

Lact#2 2-10 290 DIM, 24830 lbs milk, 867 lbs 3.5% fat, 848 lbs 3.4% protein

Lact#3 3-9 357 DIM, 37170 lbs milk, 1310 lbs 3.5% fat, 1085 lbs 3.3% protein

Lact#4 4-11 284 DIM, 26280 lbs milk, 1014 lbs 3.9% fat, 905 lbs 3.4% protein

Lact#5 5-10 365 DIM, 33420 lbs milk, 1195 lbs 3.6% fat, 1136 lbs 3.4% protein

Lact#6 7-1 311 DIM, 31920 lbs milk, 1380 lbs 4.3% fat, 1056 lbs 3.3% protein

Lifetime 7-11 1954 DIM, 181970 lbs milk, 6802 lbs 3.73% fat, 6109 lbs 3.35% protein

Her average daily production since 2 years of age is 83.1 lbs milk, 3.11 lbs fat, 2.79 lbs protein.

The post Vote: Crossbred Cow Of The Year 2014 appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Winner

Runner up

The votes have been tallied up and the winner of Crossbred Cow Of The Year 2014 is Lance Johnson’s cow #6424 (cow G). This Montbeliarde cross sired by Micmac, impressed with her sturdy type, 30,000 lb lactations and superior fertility. Congratulations to Lance and his cow.

Hot on her heels in second place was Sylvia Reda’s Boji. This Jersey cross got the most first place votes. She is a great illustration of productive longevity in unfavourable conditions. I have put a link to Sylvia’s website here, which is well worth a visit.

In third place is Jon Lundgren’s Montbeliarde x Holstein sired by Oran JB.

The table below displays the final scores. Thank you to all who entered candidates and took the time to vote.

The post Crossbred Cow Of The Year 2014 appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Norwegian Red Trio: (left to right) third lactation Raastad X Jersey X Holstein, third lactation Sand X Holstein and second lactation Braut X Jersey X Holstein.

• We are up one pound of energy corrected milk for April, continuing the slight upward trend in production.  While this year has so far shown that one can survive without any alfalfa haylage in the diet, it is still not ideal.  These April results are reflective of a small amount of haylage in the diet.  May will not have any haylage in the diet as our haylage stores ran out, though we did have some sudan grass to go along with the heavy corn silage diet.  First cut alfalfa will begin today so sometime in June we will return to a diet we are more accustomed to feeding.
• Numbers remain fairly steady.  We’re a few months off from seeing the start of a herd demographic shift.  The Valfin daughters are coming soon which will give me a boost in Montbeliarde numbers along with the emergence of a handful of Fleckvieh daughters.  I haven’t forgotten Normande either, as we have 15 more Normande sired heifers entering the herd by the end of the year.

• I also wanted to post this table to illustrate how energy corrected milk (ECM) doesn’t necessarily reflect what I get paid for the milk.  The above table shows the deviation from the herd average in terms of milk value produced per day based on my actual April milk price.  For example, the 87 Jersey sired animals each made $0.68 above the herd average in terms of output.  This is not a statement of profit, merely a statement of income produced per day over or under the average.
• I’ve been watching these numbers for a few months now but have been hesitant to post them.  Don’t get the impression that the Norwegian Reds or Reds in general are a drag on my income.  The numbers aren’t adjusted for age.  Small sample sizes can fluctuate those numbers and it seems when dollars and cents get mentioned, people can run with the wrong conclusions.
• If anything this should show that ECM does not reflect the pay price we get for protein.  In April, my price for a pound of protein was $2.58 higher than for a pound of fat.
• It looks like my four Normande sired crosses milking gave me the best output per day.  Of course we all know that a four cow sample is almost meaningless.  But I really do like the few Normande crosses I do have milking.  I’m genuinely excited to see some more come in later this year alongside the Montbeliarde and Fleckvieh.  A fifth Normande just entered the herd and looks to have a load of milk potential.

The post Test Day Results: April appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Second Lactation ProCross Plumitif (Mont) X Peterslund (VR) X Holstein.
Top production cow last month in the whole herd with 169 lbs ECM/day 

Second Lactation Red Absorption – Royal Treble (Illawarra) X B Jurist (VR) X Holstein. Currently at 110 lbs ECM/day

Second Lactation Arbelunda (VR) X Holstein. The Arbelunda’s are doing much better in terms of production after first lactation!

Starting to see some Holstein sired crosses from better bulls. This is a Super (Hol) X O Brolin (VR) X Jersey X Holstein

Third lactation Montbeliarde (Natif) X Holstein.

First Lactation Grey Holstein – Emerald X Binky X Blitz. The Grey color pattern is odd. We lose it when we breed to Red but keep it when we breed to Black and White Holstein.

Third Lactation Grey HoJo – Impuls X Blitz.

Story on this one below

The above cow deserves more than a caption because of the story behind her.  She is a Norwegian Red (Braut) X Holstein (Marion).

Marion was a Holstein bull that I used in spite of his health traits (-1.6 PL, -2.4 DPR).  The upside of using Marion was the big production potential.  The bull was born in the year 2000 and today he still has a PTA Milk of +2499 and PTA Fat and Protein of +56 and +51.  I had a handful of Marion daughters and they mostly fit that proof.  One thing I liked about the Marion’s was that they did have strength unlike the skin and bones of some other high producing Holsteins.  Fertility was usually the problem with them in my herd.

The cow pictured above came from the typical Marion.  Her mother was big and strong and had loads of milk.  Naturally she was a pain in the rear to get bred.  She finally held to Braut on her 10th or 11th service.  Things were going well until about a month before she was due to calve.  She could no longer carry her size.  But I was very interested in that Braut calf inside of her.  Realistically, she needed to be euthanized.  My vet didn’t necessarily like the chances of a terminal caesarean birth a month out.  So we put her on a bed of sand and straw for a week and a half before performing the surgery.  It was a risk, I didn’t know if it was even a heifer calf.  But the risk paid off when my vet delivered a healthy heifer calf.

Fast forward to today and that heifer calf is now one month fresh.  We tested her at 16 days in milk and she was already producing 110 lbs ECM/day.  For a heifer that fresh, her production potential is amazing.  Braut moderated her size, though she is still quite large.  Easily my biggest Braut daughter.  If she is fertile (one service as a heifer, good start), the question I ask is could I have made a better cow using a Holstein instead of Braut?  I doubt it.

The post Some Pictures and a Story appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

I took a few snaps of my Normande heifers the other day. They are growing well, maybe not as tall as the Montbeliarde sired heifers but well fleshed. It’s fair to say I’m itching to see a new breed with milking daughters in my herd. Maybe later this year I will.

They are all out of Swedish Red X dams except the last one which is a 4 way cross out of a Monty sired dam. Redondo and Arnica are the sires of them.

Most were served via AI during Winter but all are running with the bull now they are at grass. Please excuse our poor de-horning on some!

The post Normande X Heifer Group appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

• The Brown Swiss sired animals performed quite well this month.  The Brown Swiss remains an enigma for me.  You can get a consistently productive animal using the Brown Swiss in crossbreeding.  Fertility can be an issue with the daughters though.  I seem to like Brown Swiss better when it’s not next to Holstein in the pedigree.  Brown Swiss X Swedish Red X Holstein and Brown Swiss X Jersey X Holstein are two three-way crosses that I’ve liked a lot in my limited experience with them.
• This month the crossbreds came out as producing more milk income than the Holsteins.  It was a little warmer when we tested in May and it seems like the Holsteins suffer through the heat more than the crossbreds in many facets including production.
• Jersey sired crosses continue to look great.  There aren’t many new Jersey sired animals freshening so their average lactation number has crept up from 2.3 in January to 2.6 in May.
• I believe this is one of the first months we’ve seen the Red/Jersey/Holstein crosses being above average in production.  There are a fair amount of these enter maturity.  While they may not have looked the best in terms of production in the past, perhaps as a greater number become fully mature we will see better production numbers from this cross.

The post Test Day Results: May appeared first on The Dairy Crossbred Blog.

Last week I was in Holland at the All Holland Dairy Show in Zwolle.  I was a guest for the Procross distributor meeting and did a presentation on Andersen Dairy and Seagull Bay dairy.

K & L is the distributor for Procross in the Netherlands and they had a display with live cattle.  The Petersland X Holstein was the highest production cow displayed at the show.

PeterslandXHolstein

305 days 15,683 KG 4.1% F 3.46P

SirXPeterslandXHolstein

305 days 10,106 kg 4.07%F 3.61%P

UrbanisteXHolstein

305 days 10,087 kg 3.94F% 3.62P%

Fleckvieh crosses displayed by CRV.

/                            Heat Rt Conc Rt Preg Rt
VrXMoXHo          59.4       55.8       32.9
HoXMoXVrXHo  58.2      55.3       31.8
MoXVrXHo          62.5      48.6       31.7
VrXHo                   57.7      42.3        24.2
MoXHo                 58         38.2        21.8
Holstein                55.6      34.5        19

This is actual rolling herd average for each group of cows.  I included age since there is no adjustment for age in RHA.  I ranked the cows by pounds of protein.

/                            #cows DIM RHA Fat% Fat# Pro% Pro# Age
Herd                      2185  188 26393 3.96 1044 3.26  861     3yr9mo
MoXHo                 122    185 29116 3.65  1064 3.29  959     4yr7mo
HoXMoXVrXHo 60     150 28148 3.69 1037  3.16  888     2yr6mo
MoXVrXHo         308   160 26634 3.89 1037  3.3   880     3yr0mo
VRXHo                229    202 25982 4.01 1041  3.28 853     4yr7mo
VrXMoxHo         145     181 25632  3.96 1015  3.3    846     3yr2mo
Holstein               268   199 27166  3.82 1038  3.11  845      3yr9mo
HoXVrXMoXHo 24    151 26477  3.85 1018   3.16   836     2yr7mo

This is a figure that shows the improvement that has been made in death loss as we transitioned from Holstein to Crossbred cows.

Year %died

2006 8.1
2007 9
2008 7.7
2009 7.8
2010 5.9
2011 5.2
2012 3.7
2013 4.1

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