Iarlaith Collins farm manager on Newford Suckler demonstration farm in Athenry gives a brief update on the breeding season so far on this earlier maturing herd
As the Newford Farm calving season came to an end, the 2020 breeding season began on the 27th of April. The breeding season will last 10 weeks and 100% AI will be used.
There are 92 cows for breeding in the herd this year. All cows received their mineral bolus four weeks ago and had their tails clipped to make AI easier.
Cows were showing heat at the beginning of April this has been encouraged by the excellent weather and ground conditions. The majority of Newford cows are in an ideal body condition score of 2.5 to 3 for breeding.
In the first week alone there was 43 Cows AI’d – 47% of herd
Selecting bulls
Newford Farm selects its Terminal bulls for breeding from the Active bull list on the ICBF web site. The criterion takes into account of the new calving difficulty rating
Iarlaith the farm manager spends a few evenings looking over the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) list of terminal sires. There is a very simple filter function on the list of ICBF AI bulls that allows a farmer to identify bulls with traits that are desired.
The Newford Farm 2020 breeding season criteria is as followed
5 Star Terminal Index bulls (within & across breed)
- < 7.4 % calving difficulty for strong mature beef cows;
- < 5 % calving difficulty for young beef cows;
- < 7 % for 1st calvers (beef heifer);
- > 70 % reliability on the calving difficulty index;
- > 2.00 score on Conformation> 35 Kg predicted carcase weight for mature cows;
- > 25 Kg predicted carcase weight for young cows.
Based on these criteria the following bulls will be used on the Newford farm breeding season 2020
AI 5 star sires selected for 2020 Breeding season (main herd)
|
Code |
Sire name |
Breed |
Terminal index |
Calving difficulty % |
Reliability % |
Carcase weight (kg) |
Reliability % |
Conformation |
|
HJD |
Hideal |
CH |
€173 |
7.4 |
99 |
46 |
99 |
2.54 |
|
FSZ |
Fiston |
CH |
€156 |
5.8 |
99 |
40 |
99 |
2.31 |
|
LM4330 |
Meelickaduff Lamborghini |
LM |
€200 |
5.9 |
81 |
53 |
56 |
2.61 |
|
LM4185 |
Laurel |
LM |
€173 |
4.8 |
93 |
40 |
74 |
2.70 |
|
LM4366 |
Gstaad |
LM |
€185 |
6.4 |
80 |
43 |
64 |
2.72 |
|
LM4471 |
Tomschoice Lexicon |
LM |
€171 |
3.7 |
77 |
33 |
49 |
2.57 |
|
BB4492 |
Kilconnolly Kodaline |
BB |
€208 |
3.2 |
73 |
38 |
47 |
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