Mart Watch: Top Belgian Blue calves from dairy cows making €400+

Newsletter June 2011

• Bulk Milk Scheme• Tag & Test• Vet Services• Limousin Soc Scheme

Bulk Milk SchemeIn Ireland, at present, there are a number of infectious diseases in the dairy herd which are not subject to governmental regulation but that can be introduced onto farms, often with devastating consequences. The diseases in question are;• Bovine Viral Diarrhoea (BVD),• IBR• Leptospirosis• Johnes Disease• Neosporosis• Parasitic infections e.g. Liver Fluke

The relatively recent development of bulk milk screening tests for the diseases listed above means that detection and monitoring of these diseases within a dairy herd has eased considerably. The use of bulk milk samples also provides a very cost effective means of tracking these diseases within a herd.Call 01-4502142 for details

BVD Tag & TestNow available from Progressive Ge-netics in conjunction with Enfer. Tag & Test is an excellent way of testing for BVD Virus.

Continued on Page 3

New Belgian Blue: Adhemar (AKH)

ICBF Active Beef Bull ListOn weaning index NCBC has:• 9 of top to Charolais overall• 9 of top 10 Charolais <€15 /straw• 6 of top 10 Limousin <€15 /straws• 6 of top 10 Belgian blues <€15/

straw

Our Top Bulls on Weaning indexTag Bull Name Breed WeanDEP DESPOTE BB 133CF71 BALTHAZAR CH 123TOH TROPHEE CH 119ICR ICARE CH 113AZL ROSS ALO BB 109ANX ROSS ANON BB 104CF85 BALTHAZAR CH 104KLU KILBLINE CUPIDON CH 102FHZ FAKIR BB 101MDO MOGADOR CH 100MVO MANDELA VERON CH 100

Independent Milk Laboratories

Disease testing from Progressive GeneticsImprove your herds health status and tackle problems

Dairy Sire Program

2011/12 Active bullsCODE Name of Bull EBILHZ (IG) LAURAGH EVERT €229LKX (IG) LYNBROOK SULTAN C €218DSU (IG) DERRINSALLOW ARTHUR €215CWP (IG) CARROWMANAGH PADDY €202LCM (IG) LAURAGH CAMELOT €197AXN (IG) ARDNASALEM SEVEN €197CHQ (IG) CACANODE HAROLD €193MXZ (IG) MONAMORE ELECTRON €191BSH (IG) BALLYBRIDE SHAMROCK €185RFN (IG) ROSSBANE FRANK €182

Top Imported BullsCODE Name of Bull EuroHYZ SCOTTS VHA HYDRAULIC €239ROF RALMA O-MAN CF CRICKET €218MDW MONOWAI HOM DELUCA €193CGH CROCKETT-ACRES EIGHT €192S711 HSS OMAN MEGABUCK €191HZY HAZAEL VHA DYLAN-ET S3F €182MMU MACOMBER O-MAN BOGART €181

Top Jersey BullsCODE Name of Bull EuroWGB WAIKARE MAUNGA BIGGLES €254PKA PUKEROA TGM MANZELLO €209LXK LYNBROOK EXPOSE TREAT €205MJS MULLINS MAUNGA ORION €194

MonamoreOmanRavenEXDamofArdnasalemSeven

ProvenEasyCalving.UsedinHollandondairyherdswithgreatresults

NCBC has been working with farmers all over Ireland and indeed farmers from as far away as New Zealand to identify top new bulls for the 2012 breeding programmes. To-date we have genotyped over 1000 calves in Ireland and we have se-lected over 100 young dairy bulls for the programme with EBIs up to €297. Many of the new crop of bull will not be related to Oman and some have exceptionally high EBIs up to €287. NCBC along with Progressive and Munster continue to build Irelands leading dairy stud to benefit Irish dairy farmers.NCBC along with its share holders is making substantial investments on behalf of Irish farmers we thank you for your support and look forward to delivering better stock for your enterprises.

About Lynbrook Sultan (LKX)

This Ramos son is our No. 2 EBI sire. His Dam is full sister to Germany’s No. 1 bull, She is classified EX91. Her highest lactation is over 12,000 Kgs with 3.84% protein. Milking on her 4th lactation she has a better than 365 day calving interval. Little wonder then that LKX gets €130 for fertility. He is also a great production bull with very low SCC.

Dam of LKX: Lynbrook Oman Classic EX-91 2E

www.progressivegenetics.ieThe source for up to the minute news and information.• Beef Sires on-line catalogue• Dairy Sires on-line catalogue• Health & Disease information• Milk Recording• Heatime• Video & Photo gallery• News Updates• Find us on Facebook• Follow us on Twitter

On-Line CataloguesQuality Weanling Video

Ever Increasing Interest in Better Beef Genetics.Progressive Genetics over the last two months held two mart events one in Balla Co Mayo and the other in Stranlor mart in Donegal. Both events saw crowds that the marts could hardly hold. A word of thanks to the inseminators that helped to source stock and to the farmers that supplied them. Progeny of bulls such as FHZ, SEU, BIG, and DEP represented the blues, while CF71, KLU, KIB, and CF85 were in the Charolais corner, and other progeny from CVV, FL21,NSQ and IS4 were also pre-sent. All stock was of excellent quality, and it was noted that most of the Charolais could be used for the home market or the export trade.

Guest speakers on the night were Aidan Murray Teagasc Beef Specialist and Justin Mc Carthy Livestock Editor Irish Farmers Journal. Both men made the comment that “using AI as a tool in your breeding program can help increase farm profit, and by using maternal tested bulls you can select your best cows, with high fertility, good milk, docility and function and breed from these cows to get the ideal suckler cow.The aim of the breed-

ing program is to deliver excellent quality, profitable

beef cattle whether they be weanlings, finished cattle or herd replacements. This quality needs to be delivered without high calv-ing difficulty. Farmer feedback on the nights were very supportive of the breeding program because it works for them.

Suckler Beef Quality Made Easy DVD a big success.Thanks to all the farmers and industry people that gave their input. This DVD has made a positive impact for people looking to improve their beef output and profitability. It highlights what the market demands and how people are using elite A.I. bulls to meet these needs and achieve high prices.The Video is on our website or DVD can be ordered from our office.

www.progressivegenetics.ieTel: 1850 20 20 50

Quality Made Easy

Tel: 1850 20 20 50 Tel: 022 43228

Suckler A.I. for Pro�t

@progressivegen

facebook.com/progressivegenetics

Genomic ServiceGenomic EBI’s for your animals• Higher reliability • Increase genetic gain • Identify potential A.I. Bull dams • Select the best genetics for your herd

Option 1: 3K Chip€50 per animalSire must have 54K genotype on file. i.e. Not all animals are eligible for 3K chip

Option 2: 54K Chip€150 per animalFor animals not eligible for 3K chipGeneral eligibility requirements:Dairy animalSire & maternal grand sire recordedMinimum 50% holsteinMaximum 6.25% breed other than HO/FRProcedure:• Select animals for genotyping by tag number. Your breeding advisor can help with this .• List nominated animals on form provided or email to your breeding advisor.• We will notify you of chip size required for the genotyping of each animal & confirm prices.• DNA hair sampling kits will be sent• Hair samples returned by post. via freepost envelopes• Genomic EBI’s will be returned in 4-6 weeks

Contact: Patricia on 1850 20 20 50or your local breeding advisor

iML news continued from Pg 1

Vet ServicesiML lab is now offering blood tests for the main infectious diseases:• Bovine Viral Diarrhoea (BVD),• IBR• Leptospirosis• Johnes Disease• NeosporosisVeterinary practitioners can now avail of the superb value and service from iML.

Limousin Society SchemeThe Irish Limousin Cattle Society has launched an initiative aimed at en-hancing herd health among breeders and commercial users of Limousin cattle. Called LIMO LEADER HERD HEALTH, the initiative is being run in association with Independent Milk Laboratories (IML). It will focus on BVD, IBR, Johne’s disease and Lep-tospirosis. Other diseases such as Salmonella, Neospora and liver fluke may be added later. It was launched at the Limousin breeders first premier sale of the year at Roscrea mart.

Pictured are (l to r) Joe O’Flaherty, CEO Animal Health Ireland, John McInerney, president ILCS, Dr. Riona Sayers, CEO IML. Front row ILCS council members Dr. Frank Buckley and Dan. O’Mahony.12% Increase in

Milk Recording• SCC Data• Herd Improvement• Management information• Disease compensation

The large increase in herds recording this year reflects this. Milk recording is flexible and great value. If you do not record yet you need to start now.Once off SCC testing also avail-able.Contact 01-4502142 for more information.

Independent Milk Laboratories

Herd Health & Disease Testing

Services from

Bulk Milk Screen Scheme

Ideal Screen to establish herd Status & basis for design of

herd health plan

Blood & Milk Antibody tests

Johnes, IBR, BVD, Lepto, Liver Fluke, Neospora

Tests can be performed on Blood or milk

BVD Virus Tests

Bulk Milk PCR

Ear notch virus test

Individual Blood Antibody, Antigen & PCR

Mastitis ID

• Identifies Mastitis pathogens on Bulk or individual cow

sample• Help in identifying source of mastitis or SCC

• Allow for identification of appropriate treatment

• PCR test for bacterial DNA

• Highly accurate

• Only bacteria actually in milk

• No after-sample contamination

• Not reliant on bacterial culture

Disease Control Information:

Guides to control of:

• BVD page 2

• IBR page 3

• IBR & A.I. page 4

• Johnes page 5

• Neospora page 6

• Leptospirosis page 7

• Mastitis page 8

iML is comitted to being a leader in the

provision of disease testing and also

advice relating to Herd Health.

These step-by-step guides are for illustra-

tive purposes only. Detailed guides may

be requested by IML customers.

Disease situations differ between herds

and between locations and your veteri-

nary practitioner is best placed to assist

you in deciding which control programmes

are best suited to your farm.

Testing Services

Independent Milk Laboratories

A new joint venture business designed to

provide Irish agriculture with high quality,

accredited and independent milk & disease

testing services.

Progressive Genetics is Ireland leader in

cattle breeding, herd improvement and

mangement services. All iML tests are

available through Progressive Genetics.

For more information:

www.progressivegenetics.ie

www.imlabs.ie

email: enquiries@imlabs.ie

Tel: 01-4502142

Providing Vets & farmers with positive

solutions to improve their businesses

iML Disease Guides available:BVD,IBR,Johnes,Lepto,Neospora,Mastitis

About Lauragh Evert (LHZ)Bred from one of Ireland’s highest EBI herds it is fitting he is now our highest EBI bull. He is one of the best bulls available for milk solids at +0.20% Protein. He also scores well for main-tenance so they are very efficient cows and ideal for low input systems.If you want to know where these genes come from we only have to look at his dam who produced 3 lactations over 4% protein. She is currently on her seventh lactation.

iML Milk TestingIndependent milk testing is now being car-ried out for Lakeland Dairies and Progres-sive Genetics.This means both organisations can enjoy an independent, professional lab operating to the highest quality standards and produc-ing results that can be relied upon.

Accuracy of iML Independent Testing confirmed by European Reference Labs Qlip are the principal independent milk testing lab in Holland testing 30 million samples per year. They are ISO accredited for reference chemistry testing and for administer-ing proficiency schemes. • Qlip ring trail is the principal

European wide accredited scheme which is recognised as the gold standard

• iML first Irish lab to partici-pate

• Completely blind ring trial• Z score is the statistical

indication of lab accuracy used by organisations such as FPAS

Graph shows iML performance in Qlip ring trials:

Best Performance

Protein z-score

Poor Performance

Top performer Angus in Tully purchased : Jumbo King

The top Angus bull at the per-formance test centre in Tully. He achieved the highest average daily gain (2.9kgs ADG) across all breeds, Goulding Jumbo King, achieved the top weight across all breeds. He was purchased by NCBC. An An-gus bull with such performance is of great interest to farmers in the Angus schemes.

The full sister Goulding Jane K434 was a first prize winner at Balmoral show in May.

New Belgian Blue BullsEasy calving , short gestation, high muscle pedigrees

Manitou DBZ

Messager FTK

Coming Soon.....New Belgian blue bull

Rosemount Cash (Joker x Tintin)

New Simmental Bull

Curaheen Apostle. New Blood-line for Ireland

Breed replacements from your maiden heifers with two proven French Sires: Ozeus and Ultime.

New Charolais: ICARE (ICR), best bull ever proven in

France for beef capacity.

Ozeus (OZS) Ultime (UTL)

Ozeus Daughter Ultime Sons

SUCKLER/PEDIGREE BEEF SIRES UPDATE 2011Beef Sires Update now available

British FriesiansBarrowvale Odessy (YSD)Brother to VML. Dam is EX91 4E, still milking on 14 th lac-tation!! Lifetime production over 100 tons of milk.

BarrowvaleMartell(VML)

NCBC along with PG and Munster will introduce up to 28 new beef bulls many have already been identified and some have already appeared in the GeneIre-land test programme. All the major breeds will be represented in this new intake including Belgian Blue, Aberdeen Angus, Charolais, Limousin, Hereford and Simmental. NCBC is adding to its complete beef stud that will cater for all seg-ments of the market, from the dedicated beef finisher, to the dairy farmer using beef on his herd and from the weanling specialist to the suckler replacement breeder.

iML BVD Guide

What is it? BVD is a highly con-tagious viral disease of cattle.How it is trans-mitted?Direct animal contact is the most ef-ficient method of BVD virus transmis-sion. Both transient and persistently infected animals will shed virus parti-cles in all bodily secretions, such as nasal and oral discharges, tears, milk and semen. Persistently infected ani-mals shed significantly higher levels of virus than transiently infected animals. Indirect transmission by contaminated housing, veterinary equipment and farm visitors can also occur although of lower risk.Clinical Signs• Poor fertility (conception rates), hav-ing ruled out other causes• Poor calf health i.e. unprecedented or undeserved level of calf scour and/or pneumonia• Increased number of abortions, still-births and/or deformities• Birth of weak calves• Occurrence of severe acute BVD• Occurrence of fatal mucosal disease (only possible in persistently infected animals)

Steps in tackling BVD

Step 1: Establish Herd Status• Bulk Milk Antibody• Unvaccinated Youngstock ScreenTests • Bulk Monitoring Scheme • Blood Antibody

Step 2: Establish if P.I. Present• Bulk Milk Virus• Test all newborn calves for virusTests • Bulk Milk Virus PCR • Ear Notch test • Blood Virus test

Step 3: Find P.I.• Test all animals individually for BVD virus• Test all calves born following year for BVD virusTests • Bulk Milk Virus PCR • Ear Notch test • Blood Virus test

Step 4: Remove P.I.• Once confirmed, slaughter PIs• DO NOT SELL ON

Step 5: Continous MonitoringTests • Bulk Monitoring Scheme• On-going management of herd• BiosecurityFull Guide BVD available plus other diseases

Independent Milk Laboratories

Are Genomic Sires Too Risky?Summary of Article produced in US publicationNote: LNM is US equivalent of EBIWe can all think of an individual bull that “disappointed” us as he transitioned from first-crop status to adding second-crop daughters. But, for the most part when a sire adds second-crop daughters, we consider the process fairly stable. Yes, his genetic evaluation does alter slightly but there is not a large undertone of nervous-ness as a sire goes through this process. The changes are acceptable.Since we are already familiar with the transition from first to second-crop daughters, perhaps comparing it to the transition from genomic proven to daughter proven will allow us to determine how “risky” genomic-proven sires are. This sire compari-son is demonstrated in the scatter graph below. Here’s how to interpret the graph:• Each orange dot represents a first-crop sire in February 2005 that is now (as

of August 2010) considered a second-crop sire. There are 455 bulls in this dataset. As of the August 2010 sire summary, bulls averaged 2,665 milking daughters.

• Each purple dot represents a bull that was genomic proven (zero milking dau) in January 2009 and as of August 2010 averaged 89 milking daughters. There are 1,375 bulls represented in this dataset.

• The closer a dot is to the thick black line, the less the bull’s evaluation for Lifetime Net Merit (LNM) changed as he gained additional daughters. If a bull is far above the black line, he largely improved in LNM as he added daugh-ters. If a bull is far below the black line, he dropped in LNM as he added daughters.

It is not surprising to see a downward skew to the data; in fact, this is normal. It is more important to observe that both sets of dots have a similar scatter pattern. This shows sires in both groups have a similar change in genetic merit.A closer examination of the LNM values shows the genomic- to daughter-proven sire group has a tighter distribution. In other words, the average change in genetic merit was less as these sires added daughters compared to when the first-crop sires added secondcrop daughters. (The standard deviation of change from first to second crop was 133. The standard deviation from genomic to daughter proven was 99.)One last observation: genomic-proven bulls are positioned more to the right side of the graph. This means they ranked higher initially for LNM than the first-crop sires.

1

Chan

ge in

LN

M=

Initi

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NM

- A

ugus

t 201

0 LN

M

Initial LNM

-500

-400

-300

-200

-100

0

100

200

300

-300 -100 100 300 500 700 900 1100

First to Second CropGenomic to Daughter Proven

900 1100

Second Cropc to Daughter Proven

Take-Home MessageGenomic-proven sires are similar

in risk to first-crop sires and, statistically, are actually less risky.

Sire C omparison

Dairy Farming: Shape and size of sector in 2018 ■ Dairy cow numbers will increase by 277,000 (1.104 million in 2008 to 1.382 mil-lion in 2018) or 2.5% per year.■ National milk production will increase to 7,101 million tonnes in 2018; an in-crease of 39% above 2008 or 43% above 2009 levels.■ Average milk delivered per farm will increase to 458,123kg. ■ Average herd size will increase to 89 cows

Are you getting ready?FromTeagascDairyRoadMap

Key drivers of Future ProfitabilityTurning Grass into Money• Maximise Grass Growth & Utilisation• Grazing Management• Higher Performance from Grazed Grass

Grass-based Genetics• Potential from High EBI• Crossbreeding option• Capitalising on Genomic technology

Getting Calving Pattern Right• Achieving 90% Submission Rates• Increasing Conception Rates

Achieving a Healthy Herd• Developing a Herd Health Plan• Improving Farm Biosecurity• Diagnostic Testing and Vaccination

Producing High Quality Milk• Reducing SCC• Reduce Mastitis

Helping you prepare for 2015

What we can Provide:Agrinet Grass• Grass Budgets• Discussion Group • Peer comparisons

A.I. Sires selected for Ireland• Highest EBI Sires• Jersey, Norwegian Red, others• Genomic proven sires, Genomic EBI for your stock

Fertility Genetics & Heatime• Heatime, Heat detection aids• Professional Service, high fertility genetics

iML Disease testing• iML disease control guides• Breed your own with A.I.• iML milk, ear notch & blood testing options

Milk Recording• High SCC & Milk Recording reports• Mastitis ID test & SCC testing

Lureck:theGoldwynforSexedsemen&protein

Eight:Fertility,Longevity&Protein

Semex Canada Proof Update

Windbrook:No.1LPIfromSemex

Jordan:BestGoldwynson

More Goldwyn Sons: Seaver, Dragon

Progressive Geneticsat Emerald Expo 2011, Kilkenny

Progressive Genetics sponsored the Shorthorn class won by Michael Manley

Semex Sponsored the Class won by Dermot McCarthy.Grand champion was by Semex sire Braedale Goldwyn

Come and see us at:

IHFA Open Day, Tuesday 21st June, Hurley Family farm, Arklow.

Tullamore Show, Sunday 14th August

Ploughing Championships, 20th to 22nd September, Athy.

Progressive GeneticsTel: 1850 20 20 50www.progressivegenetics.ie

Independent Milk Laboratories