FTAI - fixed time AI

Tried it for a few years but it’s bloody expensive and I couldn’t get good conception rates. A friend of mine done sixteen cows last spring, all calved plenty of time, twelve came bulling all ai’d and he had four calves out of that. He won’t be doing it again.

i’ll often try to pull back a late calver but it’s hit and miss.

heifers are a different story, I’d usually just estimate and ai when a bulling. I actually done a batch today to try calve down in plenty of time before Christmas.

Is there any need to synchronise heifers with cidrs, would a shot of estrumate not bring them bulling?

I've got 3 heifers that I'm planning to introduce to the herd.

What should I do to make sure they are cycling? I put heat scratchcards on them a few days ago and one has shown heat - i didn't get her AI'ed as I thought I was too close to end of the window when I noticed her.

Was thinking of getting them scanned prior to FTAI i unless natural heat comes sooner.

For those who AI - do you just use natural heats or FTAI?

I currently use FTAI and then natural cycles for the repeats. I find that FTAI getting them cycling in unison means that I know roughly when to expect the repeats so helps management.

Never got better than 50% with FTAI. Mopping up could take 2or 3 attempts. This pushes out the calving window which I don't like. Will have to be a bit more ruthless with ceasing AI attempts on those that don't hold. Waiting on a BBX to calve, really should have been put the hook, but she was given a final chance and took it.

If you target the time to say 10am, how close to the 10am remains the optimal window. As in is 11am terrible depending on AI men at peak time

7 out of 8 cows held for me when I did it recently. I stuck to the same time pulling the device as the first AI and GNRH injection. Then AI’d again the following morning. It’s best to work the time around your AI tech. I did 14:00 and 07:00 the next morning.

I’m happy with the result and will sync a lot more next year. Or what I’ve seen recommended for cows is inject estrumate to induce a heat before breeding, then AI on the repeat at the start of the breeding season. I’ve read a lot of posts the last 2 years that this works even better than FTAI while also being cheaper.

Day 1 - Insert Device + 2ml Acegon

Day 7 - 14:00 - Remove Device + 2ml Estrumate

Day 10 - 14:00 - AI + 2ml Acegon

Day 11 - 07:00 - AI again

Cows were checked for signs of heat a week before the program and AI’d naturally if seen. Remaining cows were on 2KGs of meal 3 days before and up until Day 11. For nutrition but also to keep them coming into the yard and up the crush easier. Cows were checked twice a day to make sure they still had the device. I didn’t pay much attention to heats on day 9 but one cow was already leaving heat on day 10. She held but I wonder if really fertile cows would benefit from a morning evening AI on day 10.

the important thing is to book a time in with your AI tech and have all the straws ordered in advance. I didn’t bother scanning since they were cows but in the future I will scan all heifers before the program.

@BeGrand2025 - thanks. That looks like a variation of the protocol I'm using. I tried double serving in past without much success.

Or what I’ve seen recommended for cows is inject estrumate to induce a heat before breeding, then AI on the repeat at the start of the breeding season.

Have you any more info on this or can you expand out on it? How long post calving are you waiting to inject?

I asked my AI man about resetting the cycle with Estrumate and he said it depends where she is in her current cycle that will define whether it will have an effect.

Are those articles talking about restarting the cycles post calving?