Dairy Chitchat 4, an udder new thread.

Body depth is quite negatively correlated with longevity in Holstein cows. So too are stature and angularity, albeit much more negatively. Rump width is neutral to negative, while chest width only has a minor influence. In other words, big capacious cows don't last as long. Anyone who has worked with herds of any range in type or scale will know this!

The most important linear traits for survival are body condition and udder height and depth. Cows with shallow udders who hold condition tend to stick around for longer.

Not popular with certain members of the breeding fraternity, but them's the facts. (One's feelings on the matter are irrelevant).

Any clown wud know both projects wouldnt work without doing the project

entertaining stuff here last 2 days 🤣🤣….just on above ….chest width ,udder feet/legs and stature are crucial in bulls I’m now picking also strength …..this is a big fault within ebi for me ….far far too general and not enough emphasis on it especially on an index to give a suitable cow for grazing…I’m using all international bulls last 3 years …..I was big advocate of ebi for years ……it did breed good cows until the emphasis on fertility and x breeding came in …far too heavy emphasis on fertility and milk and solids kg suffered ….i want an 8/8500 litre herd doing 600/650 kgms …..picking high ebi bulls won’t get me there ….just too unreliable and can’t have faith in Irish genomics at rate bulls fall off once daughters hit ground

Used yamasaka pereseus Batman ,parser Lawson Larry ,wikitiionary,hailstone and renegade sons last few years ….the power ,strength and more important milk and solids use of high ebi bulls bred out is coming back ….slow process but getting there

can’t say I’ve changed my views on Tegasc advice there was an over emphasis with no outside the box thinking on a kiwi style system ….there was a add the cows and worry about worry about everything else later …..we are where we are now with water quality and dero cuts partly due to that attitude …..only one man pat dillon admitted that during dairy promotion and expansion what will become of extra calves was not considered ……saying all that Tegasc have done a lot of good ….greenfield project showed all the flaws of the system it promoted ….and now the farms promoting clover ,MSs and min n the flaws there are been shown

I hope I don't sound nosey asking these questions but I just think that any dairy farmer renting land and also setting barley whether its grown on owned or rented land should be charging the land rental against the barley crop and then lads would very quickly realise its far cheaper to just ring the merchant or just buy grain from a tillage man at 10 or 20 a ton above what the feed mills are paying for barley and forget about setting crops themselves

I am farming at max deregoation level and I could never see it paying me to grow crops on 400+ per acre rental land to feed my animals I just see many lads renting land and saying I must rent it for deregoation and then I must do something with it like growing crops instead of first of all going through every animal in their herd and asking is that animal actually paying its way or should it be kept at all, most cattle marts will have stock selling every day like 1and a half year old dry stock poor weight for age which are 1 owner and not from herds that were restricted and you'd just say to yourself why is that man renting land and keeping these animals l that's just my way of looking at things

Greenfields was a waste of money any farmer with half a brain knew it wud be a disaster.The only winners were the farm owners who got there farm converted for free

There was supposed to be one of them heroes in this area too. They were supposed to be the benchmark that would take land if you didn't. Talk this year was last years rent went unpaid and others then all went looking for payment.

It may or may not be getting paid. Lots put out the big figures to get more land but eventually they only shoot themselves in the feet when they can't pay the high figure or the landlord won't renegotiate down.

Remember bertie ahearn and the upwards only rent

The biggest problem I find with Teagasc is they are a government funded body and the advisor many who are great people are mandated to hand out advise to farmers that are contrary to what they actually believe. They have to push protected Urea, clover , less slurry and ebi. If you talk to alot of these guys in private you'll get good advise but if you put them in a public setting they have to sing what's on the hymn sheet and there is no point in getting angry with them about it in the majority of cases as they would get reprimanded for saying anything else. That being said I would always encourage people to challenge them on figures and facts in public settings.

Respectfully don't agree with any of that.

Using protected urea, normal urea and can this year can't say anything gave a great response.

Looking at met data mixtures of very wet weather mixed with cold spells in summer had biggest effects on grass growth around here.

On the sexed semen did you just make that up? Post a link there to teagasc material where they advised not to use it, can't ever remember it.

Using only sexed semen the last four years, select the right cows and it works fine. Something that was said regularly at farm walks.

Don't use foliar nitrogen here, but all for something that will work, been on a couple of farms that use it and one farm in the discussion group bought and tow and fert machine. It's not a silver bullet. Those farms had the same problems as the rest of us growing grass

Also teagasc aren't the only research group in the world. If foliar is so much ahead of granular nitrogen why haven't all the tillage farms in Europe changed over to foliar. To the best of my knowledge most nitrogen is spread as granular in agricultural systems around the world.