Implanting embryos

reilig

Does anyone do it or have you done it in the past??

There's a guy advertises on Donedeal all the time http://www.donedeal.ie/for-sale/livestock/1419264

Has anyone used his services or similar and implanted belgian blue embryos into heifers?? If so what did it cost and what was the success rate? Did you need to have sections for any or for them all?

Would it be financially worthwhile or are you just flushing money down the drain???

Dan

vanderbadger

you would feel kinda sorry for the poor old heifer going in calf to one of those monsters, surely end up being sectioned? still i suppose it might be a good way to obtain some top stock

pajero12

reilig wrote: »

Does anyone do it or have you done it in the past??

There's a guy advertises on Donedeal all the time http://www.donedeal.ie/for-sale/livestock/1419264

Has anyone used his services or similar and implanted belgian blue embryos into heifers?? If so what did it cost and what was the success rate? Did you need to have sections for any or for them all?

Would it be financially worthwhile or are you just flushing money down the drain???

Dan

We don't use him but our lad charges €65 a pop.
They say there is a 50% success rate with them.If you buy an embryo and it doesn't hold your money is gone! Flushing and implanting is a very expensive job.It doesn't always work well and in my opinion the calves are inferior to normal calves in terms of general hardyness! And don't forget the €240 to section that heifer if needs be.The bills rack up quickly

reilig

pajero12 wrote: »

We don't use him but our lad charges €65 a pop.
They say there is a 50% success rate with them.If you buy an embryo and it doesn't hold your money is gone! Flushing and implanting is a very expensive job

From reading the advertisements on the internet, it costs an average of €400 a pop to have them implanted (For pedigree BB's). Success rate the same as AI if the embrios haven't been frozen and 10% less than this if they have. They advise to use them on heifers because they will normally be more fertile than older cows so as to increase the rate of conception. You can see why pedigree BB bulls are making an average of €4000 in sales.

pakalasa

At 4k a pop, I'm sure you'd still make a nice profit. You'd have to vaccinate for everything though and house on straw.

Until the supply meets the demand, you should be fine.;)

reilig

pakalasa wrote: »

At 4k a pop, I'm sure you'd still make a nice profit. You'd have to vaccinate for everything though and house on straw.

Until the supply meets the demand, you should be fine.;)

Wasn't really planning on doing it, I was just really wondering if anyone else is doing it and what percentage of calves were born through sections??

pajero12

reilig wrote: »

From reading the advertisements on the internet, it costs an average of €400 a pop to have them implanted (For pedigree BB's). Success rate the same as AI if the embrios haven't been frozen and 10% less than this if they have. They advise to use them on heifers because they will normally be more fertile than older cows so as to increase the rate of conception. You can see why pedigree BB bulls are making an average of €4000 in sales.

Well we have our own embryo's and it costs 65 euro..If you get that success rate you should definitely be doing the lotto.You're probably thinking i'm doin an LC job on you but from our experience we got on better with older cows than maiden heifers..Much easier calved too! Really? do they still make that price?? Who's buyin them?

vanderbadger

pajero12 wrote: »

Well we have our own embryo's and it costs 65 euro..If you get that success rate you should definitely be doing the lotto.You're probably thinking i'm doin an LC job on you but from our experience we got on better with older cows than maiden heifers..Much easier calved too! Really? do they still make that price?? Who's buyin them?

so how does it work, you flush your best cows, fertilize and implant into lesser cows? would they be pedigree cows?

pajero12

vanderbadger wrote: »

so how does it work, you flush your best cows, fertilize and implant into lesser cows? would they be pedigree cows?

Yep that's basically it! The cow is put on a hormone program which causes the ovary to release several eggs(Instead of just one normally).She comes in heat a few days later and is inseminated at first standing heat.She is then inseminated 12 hours later.Though it's not on the program we a.i her a 3rd time 8 hours later,as we found we get better results that way! The cow is flushed and the eggs are frozen like a.i straws. Then they are implanted.We use black whit heads as they are easy calved and have good milk.

Not necessarily I know of lots of lads that flush commercial cows that have won at shows!

vanderbadger

interesting..seems like a nice bit of work involved though

vanderbadger

pajero12 wrote: »

Yep that's basically it! The cow is put on a hormone program which causes the ovary to release several eggs(Instead of just one normally).She comes in heat a few days later and is inseminated at first standing heat.She is then inseminated 12 hours later.Though it's not on the program we a.i her a 3rd time 8 hours later,as we found we get better results that way! The cow is flushed and the eggs are frozen like a.i straws. Then they are implanted.We use black whit heads as they are easy calved and have good milk.

Not necessarily I know of lots of lads that flush commercial cows that have won at shows!

what about the cow you flushed, will she actually be incalf herself or have you literally flushed all the egg outta her?

reilig

pajero12 wrote: »

Well we have our own embryo's and it costs 65 euro..If you get that success rate you should definitely be doing the lotto.You're probably thinking i'm doin an LC job on you but from our experience we got on better with older cows than maiden heifers..Much easier calved too! Really? do they still make that price?? Who's buyin them?

Thanks Pajero,

I honestly don't know anything about it, so its great to get first hand information from you. The information that I wrote in the above post was what I read on various websites, most notably genexcel who seem to have a lot of BB Embryos for sale.

Would buy a BB bull myself, but I think that €4000 is too much for one - Its an awful risk to take to buy a bull, not knowing if he will be easy calving or not. You might not get the calves from the cows the first year - at least if you're using BB Ai, you can see the history of calving traits with the AI station.

Just thought that spending €1000 on embryos might yield 1 or 2 calves and chances might be that 1 would be a bull - even if it wasn't, you would have a well bred BB heifer that would be worth quite a bit.

pajero12

vanderbadger wrote: »

what about the cow you flushed, will she actually be incalf herself or have you literally flushed all the egg outta her?

No she wont be in calf, All the eggs she let down are flushed out of her,But she lets down another 3 weeks later

reilig

pajero12 wrote: »

You're probably thinking i'm doin an LC job on you QUOTE]


Low Calorie I presume :eek:

pajero12

reilig wrote: »

Thanks Pajero,

I honestly don't know anything about it, so its great to get first hand information from you. The information that I wrote in the above post was what I read on various websites, most notably genexcel who seem to have a lot of BB Embryos for sale.

Would buy a BB bull myself, but I think that €4000 is too much for one - Its an awful risk to take to buy a bull, not knowing if he will be easy calving or not. You might not get the calves from the cows the first year - at least if you're using BB Ai, you can see the history of calving traits with the AI station.

Just thought that spending €1000 on embryos might yield 1 or 2 calves and chances might be that 1 would be a bull - even if it wasn't, you would have a well bred BB heifer that would be worth quite a bit.

I know...would love a blue bull myself..Just the aul lad is fond of the a.i:rolleyes: I'd say calving difficulty would be the major problem Irish farmers would have!! Worth a shot...May be worth looking at buying a heifer already implanted..take out the risk of losing the calf!
Low Calorie I presume :eek:
Of course What else would it be

Casinoking

I know they're not exactly BBs, but we tried it with a pedigree Angus cow about 12 or 13years ago. Vet had sworn blind we'd get 9 or 10 calves out if it no problem. Went through the hormone and double insemination programme as described, but when we flushed her we only got 3 embryos. Implanted them in black white head heifers and got 2 calves. Can't remember the exact costs involved but I do remember it would have been a lot cheaper to simply buy 2 PB calves at the time, and a hell of a lot less hassle.

whelan1

Casinoking wrote: »

I know they're not exactly BBs, but we tried it with a pedigree Angus cow about 12 or 13years ago. Vet had sworn blind we'd get 9 or 10 calves out if it no problem. Went through the hormone and double insemination programme as described, but when we flushed her we only got 3 embryos. Implanted them in black white head heifers and got 2 calves. Can't remember the exact costs involved but I do remember it would have been a lot cheaper to simply buy 2 PB calves at the time, and a hell of a lot less hassle.

we did it on angus cows over the years - a guy called hugh mc govern did it- remember the last time we did it we got 8 embryo's , 8 pregnancies and 8 bull calves, that year the bull price was crap and we swore never ever again :mad: its an awful lot of work , we bought in some of the recipient heifers and one of them was a reactor to boot:eek:

pakalasa

Pajero12,
Whats the procedure for implanting in the recipient cow/heifer. Is there a hormone dosage programme also?
(This all new to me also.)

LostCovey

pajero12 wrote: »

You're probably thinking i'm doin an LC job on you

reilig wrote: »

Low Calorie I presume :eek:

pajero12 wrote: »

Low Calorie I presume :eek:
Of course What else would it be

Relax boys & girleens, it's my day off, so pretend I'm not here, just chat away among yourselves.

LC

LostCovey

And if yee have any questions left at the end of this fascinating debate, ask me and I will ask the Google.

LostCovey
Google Scholar

pajero12

Casinoking wrote: »

I know they're not exactly BBs, but we tried it with a pedigree Angus cow about 12 or 13years ago. Vet had sworn blind we'd get 9 or 10 calves out if it no problem. Went through the hormone and double insemination programme as described, but when we flushed her we only got 3 embryos. Implanted them in black white head heifers and got 2 calves. Can't remember the exact costs involved but I do remember it would have been a lot cheaper to simply buy 2 PB calves at the time, and a hell of a lot less hassle.

That's Just the luck of the draw..First flush we got 19 good embryos..Second flush we got 12 unfertilised eggs..Think that may have been bad semen though

pakalasa wrote: »

Pajero12,
Whats the procedure for implanting in the recipient cow/heifer. Is there a hormone dosage programme also?
(This all new to me also.)

Well there's 2 ways of doing it.1 You can go off the cow/heifers natural cycle. When you see her in heat,you wait 7 days then implant the embryo.
We do it this way because we've gotten better results off it!
Or 2. You use a cidr or coil and a programme of estrumate to get her ready..This method is used so you could have several recipients ready to take an egg the day you flush the donor cow!! We don't this simply because we thin it put's a jinx on us..They day we had 5 recipients ready was the day we got the unfertilised eggs! Didn't do it since

LostCovey wrote: »

Relax boys & girleens, it's my day off, so pretend I'm not here, just chat away among yourselves.

LC

Were only messin really

LostCovey

pajero12 wrote: »

Were only messin really

Bit of a messer meself to be honest!

No point giving it if I can't take it.

LostCovey