Anyway, having the cows divided up by breed allows us to analyze (mostly for curiousity's sake) the production and reproduction of the different breeds. I will mention that we do not have a large amount of animals in these different groups so please keep that in mind. It is very easy to have one or two cows throw the whole group average with some wacko numbers, and it happens.
This year we did notice an interesting trend with our breed groups as far as conception rates go. I am hoping it is a fluke, but I will talk more about that after the data.
First up, the Ayshire crosses (because we have so many mixed and mashed cross breeding, I separated them into their groups by having at least 50% of that breed from either her sire, her dam, or a combination. Some are closer to 85%.
Okay, so back to group #1 - the Ayrshires
With our first service conception rate being 53% (not counting natural services), the Ayrshire/XX fell a little behind in that category with only 44%. Our overall conception rate (not including natural services) was 52%, which the Ayrshire/XX still were not catching up to at 43% total conception rate.
Group #2 - the Normandes and Normande/XX
This group was our biggest disappointment as far as what we were hoping for with AI conception rates. We have to remember that this group is not nearly as big as our Ayrshires, so we have to take the minimal numbers into account. I still don't know what happened. They fell far below our expectations, but I am not ready to give up on them yet. In seasonal herds we have what is known as "clearing out the tail-enders." Basically, when buying, combining, or moving a herd of cattle you will have some that will not adjust to the change, some the have been allowed to stay in the herd (in a non-seasonal operation) far past their grace period, and some that just weren't great cows to begin with. Since moving to the farm three years ago and buying in three separate herds and putting them together, then adding Dad's milking cows two years ago, this was our first year of "non-transition," and I still feel like we are tweaking the processes, fixing things in the parlor and starting a new vaccination protocol...hmmm I forgot about the new vaccination protocol. Well, that kind of scraps the year without transition :). That gives me something new to look at later.
Group #3 - Linebacks
Suffice to say - they did well this year :). Still this is a very small group, and even with this data, I am not compelled to continue breeding to Linebacks as pretty as I think they are, but that is a different issue for a different post.
Group #4 - Jerseys and Jersey/XX (not including Je/Ho --they have a group of their own)
The Jerseys did well for us this year. I say this year with emphasis, because our first year of breeding our Jerseys performed terribly reproductively. I am not even kidding. I can't access that information because we have changed how we have categorized the groups since then, but I believe the Jerseys' conception rate was 40% TOTAL for our first year. I could be wrong. It may have been lower, but it was beneath that of our other breeds. I do actually like the Jerseys, but I use them carefully.
Group #5 - Jersey/Holstein Crosses
This group has always performed well for us--both reproductively and production wise. As well as they perform, we haven't been moving too much in that direction, mostly because I LOATHE the idea of breeding pure American Holstein genetics back into the herd. Most of that loathing comes from calving problems. I can't afford to knowingly require a cow to throw a huge calf (one that we will most likely have to pull) and then expect that cow to be ready to breed back in two to three months time. I don't have a desire to get rid of cows that way. Then, there is looking at the Holstein reproductive performance, and being that we require a very strict schedule, they weed themselves out pretty quickly. I am, however, going to experiment with some Kiwi Crosses, and I am excited to see how they will perform.
Group #6 - Swedish Red Crosses
Now this group is comprised completely of first lactation animals, so I was actually hoping for a little more from them. This group came about from buying a group of cows from a man who had a prolific Swedish Red bull running with his herd and he threw a BUNCH of heifers.
Group #7 - Milking Shorthorn Crosses
I am glad that the Milking Shorthorns have reproductive vigor on their side, but it is not enough to cause me to continue using this breed.
Group #8 - Dutch Belt Crosses
Now, to be fair, this group is the exact opposite of the Swedish Red group and most of these ladies are on their 5th or 6th lactation. This is another breed that I have not continued the use of in our herd. All of these ladies are what is left from when my father-in-law used them in his herd many years ago. Though, their coloring will remain long after this group is no longer here. I have found their coloring to be one of the strongest among the cross breeds. The only other breed that we have used who has a very dominant color trait to rival them are the Normandes.
and finally Group #9 - the Holstein Crosses
I can see that these ladies are going to make me eat my words from before, but they still probably won't have much of a place in our breeding program besides possibly being used for clean up.
There is a lot of information to digest from all of this, but the basics are that our biggest surprise was the Normandes' conception rate. I have wondered whether the extra flesh on our Normandes' would keep them from cooling down as quickly in the summer months and thus not breed as well. We sill definitely be looking into that a little closer.
Until another time. May our Lord Jesus Christ bless you and keep you in His perfect peace.
