Dairy Cross Breeds

zetorman

Small dairy farmer here. Have abandoned Holstein completely and have used Montbeliarde and Norwegian Red bulls for the last few years. Happy enough with them so far.....they look far better and while they might not milk as good they are easier managed. Would like to hear how other cross breeding farmers are getting on if there are any more out there .

Finno59

had montbeliardes aswell but gone back to fr now to improve fertility. May consider crossing with NR and jersey. to save time i'd get a crossbred bull out of high ebi ai jersey and NR sires that would leave me with an F1 cross Nr X Je if i used him to bull the cows id get an animal 50% fr 25 Je and 25 Nr which would be better than waiting years crossing pure breds.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcjG9T-EK7M

snowman707

like OP we have steered clear from holstein for over 20 years and have never looked back

main X breeds are Br Fr, MO MR, and and this year have calved our first NRX heifers (mostly from MOX dams)

we were depopulated in the 80's and we imported MO incalf heifers and a stock bull, and sourced the friesans from 5 or 6 Irish herds.

higher milk solids and more milk at the back end of the year coupled with lower feed/vet costs, lower replacement rates, higher value of offspring and cull cow value have more than compensated for lower yields

mattthetrasher

have a couple of jerseyy xs but think i might sell them in the next 12mths. they nice looking cows ok but their offspring even british fr crossed on to them are rubbish.i building up a pedigree herd of frs so they dont fit the picture

red bull

Have mox cows, 5 calved so far 5 calves sold, avg price €376

pms7

I have NRX milking with 2 years. Better fertility. Slight drop in milk will be more than made up in calving earlier and staying in herd longer.

The man in red and black

Sorry to drag up an old thread but I thought it would be easier than starting a new one.

Had a guy here asking me about Montbeliardes for crossing his Holsteins with. Most fellas out in Canada have never even heard of Montbeliardes. I could give him the basics on the breed on paper but is anyone using them for crossing that has good or bad things to say about them. The Holsteins out here are similar to the US cows, super high yielders but it's a rare cow that see's her fourth or 5th lactation. You have lads milking 150-300 cows and they are buying replacements as they cull so many with transition cow problems, milk fever, displaced abomasums etc.

I think the Montbeliardes could help out massively with getting them to last longer without hitting the milk too dramatically as a cross?

zetorman

I find them great but they seem to have "gone out of style" here in Ireland ????? Don't know why. Very few ads in farmers journal any more for them and the society website has also gone dead ?? I was at the last open day up in Co Louth during the summer and was very impressed with the cows I saw there. The price of semen straws however has not fallen !!!

Future Farmer

Looking at dairy on dairy births in Ireland in 2013:

JE have dropped to 3.2% from there "high" of 3.7% in 2011

MRI are around 0.8% dropping from 1% in 2010

MO have dropped from 1.8% in 2009 to just under 1.0% in 2013

Looking at the figures I saw XBred bulls are counted with FR or JE depending on dominant breed...

The man in red and black

zetorman wrote: »

I find them great but they seem to have "gone out of style" here in Ireland ????? Don't know why. Very few ads in farmers journal any more for them and the society website has also gone dead ?? I was at the last open day up in Co Louth during the summer and was very impressed with the cows I saw there. The price of semen straws however has not fallen !!!

Thanks for that, do you find it is true to say they generally are a sturdier cow than a holstein so yeah? Better feet, frame, mastitis rate, fertility, all/none of the above? On paper they look like the ideal solution for the holsteins out here who have poor fetitlity, awful feet in tie-stall barns, high rates of displaced abomasums/mastitis/culling for infertility

djmc

I have tried most dairy crossbreeds
I found the hardiest and best feet and longest lasting with good fertility are jersey cross
You pay for this by having a worthless bull calf a poor cull cow price and drop in milk yeild.
I would think the next best would be Swedish red cross Norwegian red are also hardy cows
British freisan ,montbeleard ,and l found brown swiss soft enough much like the holstain fr.
The grass based system in Ireland would be different in Ireland compared to Canada.
I would think for feet jersey or Norwegian red would have more milk and a bigger frame.

Mehaffey1

Working with a herd of around a third each of Friesian, Jersey and crosses. Friesian's struggling feet wise majorly and only half way through season. Most crosses high yielding and good health. Jerseys remaining the tough little b1ches that they're famous for. Big jersey fan here for the long walks on our platform and better at grazing lower than Friesians which act quite spoilt and soft.

just do it

Mehaffey1 wrote: »

Working with a herd of around a third each of Friesian, Jersey and crosses. Friesian's struggling feet wise majorly and only half way through season. Most crosses high yielding and good health. Jerseys remaining the tough little b1ches that they're famous for. Big jersey fan here for the long walks on our platform and better at grazing lower than Friesians which act quite spoilt and soft.

On kgMS how do your JE and FR compare?

Mehaffey1

Looking for an average of around 450kgMS per cow which ain't gonna happen. Not sure on exact figures for our farm between Friesian and jersey. Jerseys certainly are much more feed efficient and definitely pumping out more solids compared to volume.

Mehaffey1

Largest housed cow farm in Southern Hemisphere here in NZ breeding to Montbellaerds from his FR JR cross herd. Says he's sick of jerseys and wants to move back towards the big framed Friesian producer. Not great when the payout is 4.70 per kgMS and its costing them 5.50 to produce

trixi2011

Mehaffey1 wrote: »

Largest housed cow farm in Southern Hemisphere here in NZ breeding to Montbellaerds from his FR JR cross herd. Says he's sick of jerseys and wants to move back towards the big framed Friesian producer. Not great when the payout is 4.70 per kgMS and its costing them 5.50 to produce

What farm is that mehaffey ? the few shed units are really impressive over methven way

Mehaffey1

trixi2011 wrote: »

What farm is that mehaffey ? the few shed units are really impressive over methven way

The dutch guy, Van Leuwen, it's his 2nd housed cow farm and with robotics. 1300 cows, all year milking and 440ha or so in crop and grass for cut and carry. Bunch of nonsense if you ask me.

I'm just 14km out of Methven, really couldn't beat it compared to the rest of Canterbury anyway

trixi2011

Mehaffey1 wrote: »

The dutch guy, Van Leuwen, it's his 2nd housed cow farm and with robotics. 1300 cows, all year milking and 440ha or so in crop and grass for cut and carry. Bunch of nonsense if you ask me.

I'm just 14km out of Methven, really couldn't beat it compared to the rest of Canterbury anyway

methven is a nice spot to farm over there lovely little town. Nice few irish farming around that area too. High input farms made some money over there last year I would think some of them were doing over 700ms a cow

Mehaffey1

trixi2011 wrote: »

methven is a nice spot to farm over there lovely little town. Nice few irish farming around that area too. High input farms made some money over there last year I would think some of them were doing over 700ms a cow

Place is packed with Irish, not just dairy but plenty of contractors and the odd builder/tradesman. Plenty of cost in that, near on 6 dollar a kgMS to produce. Very impressive alright, but in a well paid year and the budget to feed cows flat out on supplement and great weather how could you go wrong lol.

On breeds just driving past our sick/lame her. 15 animals, 11 friesians, 1 jersey, 2 crosses and a Hereford bull. Have to love jerseys for out all year

Coonagh

The ideal cross bred for me is the f12 j4 cross, good capacious cows round 500-550 kgs body weight. Good milk volume with high fat and protein %. I've seen herds of cows where lads have used too much jersey or jersey on the wrong cows and have bred themselves into a corner, lads need to remember that litres are still important to carry the kilos of solids.

trixi2011

Mehaffey1 wrote: »

Place is packed with Irish, not just dairy but plenty of contractors and the odd builder/tradesman. Plenty of cost in that, near on 6 dollar a kgMS to produce. Very impressive alright, but in a well paid year and the budget to feed cows flat out on supplement and great weather how could you go wrong lol.

On breeds just driving past our sick/lame her. 15 animals, 11 friesians, 1 jersey, 2 crosses and a Hereford bull. Have to love jerseys for out all year

ya the jerseys are some animals all right just not enough milk in them. Are ye using jersey ai bulls ? a lot of guys have stopped using straight jerseys due to the far better genetic gain from using crossbreed bulls

Coonagh

Read an article about that set up on dairy exporter, savage risk to take. Couldn't help but think that some kiwis have seriously taken their eye off the ball while I was reading it, very difficult to cut costs on a system like that in a low milk price year.

Greengrass1

Coonagh wrote: »

The ideal cross bred for me is the f12 j4 cross, good capacious cows round 500-550 kgs body weight. Good milk volume with high fat and protein %. I've seen herds of cows where lads have used too much jersey or jersey on the wrong cows and have bred themselves into a corner, lads need to remember that litres are still important to carry the kilos of solids.

I've a few jerseys here that can pass out the jex on solids but by far my favorite type cow is the f12 j4

mahoney_j

Greengrass1 wrote: »

I've a few jerseys here that can pass out the jex on solids but by far my favorite type cow is the f12 j4

F12 j4 explain please ???

trixi2011

3/4 Friesian 1/4 jersey

mahoney_j

Coonagh wrote: »

The ideal cross bred for me is the f12 j4 cross, good capacious cows round 500-550 kgs body weight. Good milk volume with high fat and protein %. I've seen herds of cows where lads have used too much jersey or jersey on the wrong cows and have bred themselves into a corner, lads need to remember that litres are still important to carry the kilos of solids.

One of the best posts ive read re x breeding.really hit the nail on the head.too many c breeds I've come across are the small runts(no offence lads)with low milk potential and poor udders .x low milk volume cows to je will do nothing,ideal cow to x s Jersey with would be a 8 k plus a year hol.ive seen them in places andvtheor fine looking ainmals but the lads that had them had big scale

Coonagh

Next year I am going to use all NZ daughter proven bulls I'm going to give genomics a break for a year. Going to use wds and bgj both nz Holstein with good milk volume for anything needing milk, pka a jersey bull on good strong milky cows, and xbred lic bulls on the rest haven't decided what ones to use yet I'm waiting to see what's available.

frazzledhome

trixi2011 wrote: »

3/4 Friesian 1/4 jersey

Need 2nd cross to get f12 j4

Mad4simmental

frazzledhome wrote: »

Need 2nd cross to get f12 j4

Je x fr bull crossed with pb fr cow should give you f12 j4 ??

frazzledhome

Mad4simmental wrote: »

Je x fr bull crossed with pb fr cow should give you f12 j4 ??

Yes it does. But you have 2 cross as bull is j8 f8 ?

That's where the daughter proven Kiwi X comes in

Greengrass1

frazzledhome wrote: »

Yes it does. But you have 2 cross as bull is j8 f8 ?

We shouldn't have told Mj what this f14 j4 business is we could have our jex vs ho debates no bother then

stretch film

Coonagh wrote: »

Next year I am going to use all NZ daughter proven bulls I'm going to give genomics a break for a year. Going to use wds and bgj both nz Holstein with good milk volume for anything needing milk, pka a jersey bull on good strong milky cows, and xbred lic bulls on the rest haven't decided what ones to use yet I'm waiting to see what's available.

I'd get moving on that

Coonagh

stretch film wrote: »

I'd get moving on that

Already moved

stretch film

Coonagh wrote: »

Already moved

Good stuff , ditto. .. its handy the way a genomic bull under ebi will have a proof for calving ease initially and daughter recordings out there lessening the risk here. Flipside is they cotton on to good ones and they're sold out here never to return.. msf gxy wds rippa not avaiable. Bgj next?

mf240

frazzledhome wrote: »

Yes it does. But you have 2 cross as bull is j8 f8 ?

That's where the daughter proven Kiwi X comes in

F8 j8 plus 16 f j0 = 24f 8 j divided by two = 12f 4 j. This is very basic stuff frazz:D

Timmaay

I gave a fairly milky sexed high ebi HOs to most the jex here, should end up with a nice 3/4 bred fr and hopefully retaining the solids and survivability of the JE. Almost all our own poor fertility HOs got a beef bull. My only problem is it will take too bloody long to filter through, maybe I should consider more crossbreds sires on my own FRs

mahoney_j

Greengrass1 wrote: »

We shouldn't have told Mj what this f14 j4 business is we could have our jex vs ho debates no bother then

That's all too feckin comicated for me,I'll stick with my pure holstein ta,sure tis a far superior ainmal anyway😄😄😄,rushes out the door to the pub!!!!

frazzledhome

Timmaay wrote: »

I gave a fairly milky sexed high ebi HOs to most the jex here, should end up with a nice 3/4 bred fr and hopefully retaining the solids and survivability of the JE. Almost all our own poor fertility HOs got a beef bull. My only problem is it will take too bloody long to filter through, maybe I should consider more crossbreds sires on my own FRs

Kiwi X is your job, skip Je

Greengrass1

frazzledhome wrote: »

Kiwi X is your job, skip Je

Alot if lads putting jex kiwi cross bulls on milky ho and getting good results

Future Farmer

frazzledhome wrote: »

Kiwi X is your job, skip Je

If you use a Kiwi Cross you only get 50% of the hybrid vigour, to maximise HB you should you the best pedigree bull available of an other breed, and essentially breed a mongrel.

Lot of the comments on this thread seem to be in NZ, CAN & US, but for me I think EBI is working as an index in Ireland we are getting the right kind of high fertility, high protein bulls into AI and you would be mad not to use a high EBI bull on your FR HO cows in Ireland.

frazzledhome

Future Farmer wrote: »

If you use a Kiwi Cross you only get 50% of the hybrid vigour, to maximise HB you should you the best pedigree bull available of an other breed, and essentially breed a mongrel.

Lot of the comments on this thread seem to be in NZ, CAN & US, but for me I think EBI is working as an index in Ireland we are getting the right kind of high fertility, high protein bulls into AI and you would be mad not to use a high EBI bull on your FR HO cows in Ireland.

Totally agreed but the thread is about x breeding and I can't see too many jersey bulls that'll pass muster

just do it

Is it just JE have failed to keep up in the last decade? Matt Dempsey wrote a while back that B&W's have improved dramatically over the last decade thanks to the EBI. However JE just don't have the base numbers to make such big advances.

Timmaay

just do it wrote: »

Is it just JE have failed to keep up in the last decade? Matt Dempsey wrote a while back that B&W's have improved dramatically over the last decade thanks to the EBI. However JE just don't have the base numbers to make such big advances.

Yeh that largely sums it up. It's a pure numbers game also, alot more high ebi FRs than JEs also, so much bigger pool of selectively bred Frs, the top ebi fr is 350 or so, I don't think any pure JE has crossed 300?

Greengrass1

just do it wrote: »

Is it just JE have failed to keep up in the last decade? Matt Dempsey wrote a while back that B&W's have improved dramatically over the last decade thanks to the EBI. However JE just don't have the base numbers to make such big advances.

Was always that way but yes more so in last 20 yrs that's why we got out of purebreds couldn't get good enough bulls. Aswell as that with the high butterfat je gives no one in ire wanted to use them.
That might change now

Greengrass1

Timmaay wrote: »

Yeh that largely sums it up. It's a pure numbers game also, alot more high ebi FRs than JEs also, so much bigger pool of selectively bred Frs, the top ebi fr is 350 or so, I don't think any pure JE has crossed 300?

Don't forget they are proven. The top ebi ho bulls are genomic