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JonnyLungs Profile
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Ex97
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Re: Taking the Plunge


quote:

foxleigh wrote:

we have 100 % holsteins with a rolling cell count well under 200,000 making it premium milk and NEVER blanket treat cows with dry cow .last year we treated 2 cows with dry cow.Maybe in 15 years we have treated 10 quarters with drycow.



I do dry treat everything... We've got a bit of a cell count problem lately, can't get it to stay under 200,000 for long...

But my Holsteins are by far the biggest contributor to the problem. BUT I will also add that the older cows are the problem and there aren't enough older crosses yet to contribute to the bad cell count. I don't think the Jersey-Holsteins will be all that good in terms of cell count but at a younger age the SRB-Holsteins are definitely the best for cell count.

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13/1/2011, 16:12 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
bmvf Profile
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Re: Taking the Plunge


quote:

JonnyLungs wrote:
Not sure if you caught that thread in the Loud and Proud section where I was trying to figure out what the ancestry is of my lineback?

But yeah, Taurus just sent me a note saying they will be in the area at the end of the month so I might decide to have them stop by.



Yeah, I missed that thread. I didn't know you used Lineback. Who do you use? My little Lineback is out of a a bull that is sired Abraham with a Lineback dam that supposedly gave over 30,000. My other is out of Allstar-Red (Taurus) who is sired by Ja-Bob Jordan Red. His problem is that he is only 50% Lineback so on a pure Holstein you only have a 25% chance of getting a Lineback pattern. Both are pregnant to Maximum-Red who is also sold by Taurus.
13/1/2011, 22:56 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
BUEHNEDAIRYFARM Profile
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Re: Taking the Plunge


all of our allstar calves out of holstein dams ended up being linebacks.
14/1/2011, 2:05 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


quote:

bmvf wrote:

quote:

JonnyLungs wrote:
Not sure if you caught that thread in the Loud and Proud section where I was trying to figure out what the ancestry is of my lineback?

But yeah, Taurus just sent me a note saying they will be in the area at the end of the month so I might decide to have them stop by.



Yeah, I missed that thread. I didn't know you used Lineback. Who do you use? My little Lineback is out of a a bull that is sired Abraham with a Lineback dam that supposedly gave over 30,000. My other is out of Allstar-Red (Taurus) who is sired by Ja-Bob Jordan Red. His problem is that he is only 50% Lineback so on a pure Holstein you only have a 25% chance of getting a Lineback pattern. Both are pregnant to Maximum-Red who is also sold by Taurus.




I haven't actually used any Lineback but I did buy a cow the last time we expanded that was a Lineback. She wasn't a very good cow, milked well for about a month or two before drying up. Before she left, she gave me a Blitz daughter that was also a Lineback. Blitz was a perfect match on the mother because this Blitz is a fantastic milker. The Lineback gene has gone away for the most part,although the Blitz has an Impuls daughter that has two narrow Linebacks down her back. I have a Binky daughter from the Blitz that has actually been one of my better heifers. Two generations of Holstein took a 30 lb/day beef cow into a fantastic milking cow that has a Peterslund daughter and a Bowser pregnancy waiting. Every single one of them has had a fuzzy Simmental-like coat no matter what we breed them to until I got a red bull calf from the Blitz recently.


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14/1/2011, 5:08 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


When you say challenging environment, can you go more into detail? What is it that is making it a challenging environment to get cows pregnant? Can you also go into detail over your vaccination protocol? I also have to wonder if your mid-lactation milk fever issue isn't playing a role. The reason why I ask about the mid-lactation milk fever and the vaccination protocol is this: I will definitely give you that crossbreds are more durable cows, they can handle more thrown at them than Holsteins - but my guess is they can only handle so much. If the ration isn't right, it will eventually cause a problem with crossbreds too, or if cows aren't vaccinated thoroughly enough, it will hurt crossbreds eventually too. So IMO if something is challenging your herd, you'll probably see it first in the Holsteins and second in the crossbreds. But even with all crossbreds, it'll still be a problem. Maybe not as severe, but a problem nevertheless.

I'm working with a herd right now that is achieving a 30% PR on pure Holsteins averaging 85 lbs/day or more with a 3.9% fat test. So not sure what that is in FCM, over 90 I think. And I would consider their environment challenging. Mattress freestall herd with lots of concrete (no rubber flooring) and an alley on a steep slope between the barns - all of which tend to increase lameness. But they are using G6G and achieving 50% first service conception off of it. They consistenly have preg checks where 80% or higher are checked pregnant on preg check day. They do use pedometers some, but its mostly just heat detection and G6G.
18/1/2011, 2:39 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


Like I wrote in the milk fever thread, the mineral hasn't been distributed evenly in our premix lately so that has probably lead to some breeding problems lately.

As for vaccination protocol, I use Bovi Shield Gold FP5L5 at 30 DIM, Guardian at dry off, and Endovac before freshening and during summer.

Don't get me wrong, I'm always looking to improve the environment I put my cows. But the crossbreds will also be the beneficiaries of the any environmental changes we make. I'd still expect the crossbreds to outperform the Holsteins.









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18/1/2011, 4:13 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


Yea, my point was that a problem for Holsteins is still a problem for crossbreds, just to a lesser degree. But its a problem that still has to be fixed.

And while I'd expect any improvement made to the cows environment to benefit crossbreds, my guess is a bigger response would be seen in Holsteins - because its bothering them more so than crossbreds.

Last edited by PADairymen, 21/1/2011, 3:46
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Re: Taking the Plunge


Pad can I just say in my herd the environment and the way we look after the cows is gettig better every year yet the fertility has still been dropping. The holsteins genetics for fertility are getting worse quicker than we can improve there environment. And me personally I don't want to be having to do more and more just to get the cows pregnant.

21/1/2011, 13:20 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


quote:

PADairymen wrote:

Yea, my point was that a problem for Holsteins is still a problem for crossbreds, just to a lesser degree. But its a problem that still has to be fixed.

And while I'd expect any improvement made to the cows environment to benefit crossbreds, my guess is a bigger response would be seen in Holsteins - because its bothering them more so than crossbreds.



I will agree and say that one of the reasons I may need to keep a few Holsteins around is so I can know when something is off.

But isn't there something inherently wrong with that statement?

I don't really buy the argument that we'll see a bigger response in the Holsteins in any environmental changes. Take milk production for example. During the worst of the heat this summer, milk production lagged. And right now we are hitting on all cylinders for milk production (guessing when we test Monday we will be over 100 lbs/day FCM). If your theory were correct, the Holsteins should be well in front at this point, but that's not the case at all. In fact, in the opposite has been true in the case of the Swedish Red crosses.

So for traits like fertility that are acknowledged weaknesses of the Holstein breed, I can't see how any environmental changes would only impact the Holsteins. Maybe they'll close the gap slightly, but I doubt it. A 10% difference in preg rate is a pretty wide gap to traverse.


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21/1/2011, 18:13 Link to this post PM via Email   PM via Forum
 
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Re: Taking the Plunge


I'm saying the Holsteins will have the biggest response. Meaning the most improvement. So lets say your barn was a nightmare (which it isn't) but for argument's sake, its a disaster. We remodel it and now its heaven. Your crossbreds might jump 1-2% in Preg Rate, while your Holsteins jump 5%, or something along those lines, Holsteins probably will never bred back as fast as a crossbred would, but the change in environment gives them a bigger boost. Hope that's clearer. Its easier to take a 15% Preg Rate and make it a 20, than it is to make a 20 a 22.

bazza - Let's be fair - you are in a different world in the dairy industry. Most Holstein genetics come from where - the US I'd assume. How many bulls in AI do you think come from herds that graze their cows as a major source of feed? All this time you've been using Holstein genetics that come from a completely different environment than your own - and then wonder why they aren't working as well as you'd like. I'm not going to say that they can't work, because I know many people on here who I am sure have made them work in the past, but I have a feeling they won't work as well. To further my point, you love Oman because of his health traits, but continue to say that your Holsteins continually cannot get bred back faster even though your DPR genetics should be improving. So there's obviously a dis-connect somewhere.

Last edited by PADairymen, 22/1/2011, 0:57
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