Animals with a +2 or -2 lie within the top or bottom 2.3% of the For more information and for all
population updated January 2010 UK Type
Animals with a +1 or -1 lie within the top or bottom 16% of the
and Production proofs, visit the
population
Holstein UK Website when the
• Be more wary of figures with a low reliability, since these are more likely
proofs will be made live on Tuesday
to change in the future with the addition of more information – which
essentially means more classified daughters being added to the proof.
the 12
th
of January 2010 www.
holstein-uk.org or for a very easy,
Handy Hints:
free and independent way of
Key thing to remember about Type proofs:
• The difference between an SD of -3, -2, -1, ‘0’, +1, +2 +3 is NOT equal! This
searching, short listing and creating
is where the old ‘Bell Shaped Curve’ comes in!
your own bull list based on you
criteria, try the ‘BullSelector’ tool
Remember, don’t dismiss a bull because he isn’t over +2, because a bull at +1
on the CDI website www.thecdi.
is still in the top 16% of the bulls for that trait, he is just not as ‘extreme’ as a
co.uk, click on ‘tools’, ‘Bull Selector’
bull at +3. A bull at +1 will still give you a significant improvement.
and then select your chosen breed.
CALVING EASE INDEXES - JANUARY 2010
O
fficial calving ease indexes for Holstein and Friesian sires are being published from January 2010 onwards to help
dairy farmers make more informed breeding choices.
The indexes are expressed as ‘percent Easy Calvings’, on a scale of about -3 to +3 and are centred around a breed
average of zero, with positive figures indicating that calvings are predicted to be easier than average and negative
figures predicting more difficult calvings.
These independent calving ease indexes are the result of an industry-wide collaboration and the analysis of some
400,000 UK calving records. These have been gathered by British farmers as either part of their regular milk recording or
as part of their participation in progeny testing.
The two genetic indexes which result from the study - Direct Calving Ease and Maternal Calving Ease - together give a
complete picture of a bull’s ‘calving performance’.
Direct Calving Ease (dCE %) gives a prediction of the ease with which a calf by that sire will be born.
Maternal Calving Ease (mCE %) predicts the ease with which a daughter of that sire will give birth
Direct Calving Ease is likely to be of most interest in the first instance, and is naturally going to be important when
breeding maiden heifers, where the use of negative dCE% should be avoided as these are predicted to give a higher
proportion of difficult calvings. However, dCE% shouldn’t be ignored in older cow matings either, where it would always
be wise to avoid bulls which are likely to produce very difficult calvings.
Attention should also be paid to Maternal Calving Ease, as long-term selection for dCE% without any regard to mCE%
could set up problems for the future.
As part of a broader breeding strategy, it is recommended to select primarily for Profitable Lifetime Index (PLI) and
using the Calving Ease indexes - as well as other fitness traits - as secondary criteria, with careful judgement made on a
case-by-case basis about their relative importance.
For the time being, dCE% and mCE% will remain as stand-alone indexes although they may be included within PLI at a
future date.
The industry project that got the index off the ground – which was largely funded by Defra, had additional support
from the Scottish Government, DairyCo, NMR, CIS, Holstein UK, Genus ABS and Cogent, and was undertaken by SAC –
was led by Dr Mike Coffey.
Explaining why it has taken until now to come to fruition Dr Coffey says: “We have had proprietary indexes from Genus
ABS and Cogent which many farmers have used, but there has been no real appetite until now for a national programme.
“But now that Interbull (the body responsible for international genetic evaluations) regularly publishes international
calving ease indexes we need independent national figures from the UK in order to participate.
“We’ve been very pleased with the accuracy of the UK data,” adds Dr Coffey, “as there have been high correlations
between our own figures and those from other key countries, so I’d like to thank farmers for taking the trouble to
complete their calving ease surveys and for doing it with obvious accuracy.
“It’s extremely
The top ten UK proven sires currently available in the UK ranked by daughter and calving ease (dCE) are given below.
important to resist any
temptation not to record
Name £PLI Rel% TM
Milk Fat Prot Fat
difficult calvings, as it
kg kg kg %
Prot % mCE dCE AI Co
is only with reliable
O-BEE MANFRED JUSTICE EX94 256 99 0.58 624 28.5 26.3 0.05 0.07 0.5 3.4
Dairy
information that genetic
Daughters
progress can be made.”
COGENT AZURE 114 82 1.12 463 12.4 14.4 -0.07 -0.01 3.1 Cogent Remarking that Calving
ABS SEATTLE EX94 30 94 1.02 414 4.8 9.7 -0.14 -0.05 2.4 Genus
Ease indexes will remain,
WOODMARSH METALIC 59 84 2.06 300 10.8 1.7 -0.01 -0.10 2.4 Cogent
for the short term, as
stand-alone indexes,
OLIVA LAUSAN CREW 41 99 1.19 152 8.7 2.8 0.03 -0.03 -1.0 2.3
Worldwide
Marco Winters from
Sires
DairyCo says: “They may
HUDDLESTONE SPOOKY EX90 112 95 0.79 198 10.9 14.9 0.04 0.10 2.2 Cogent well be incorporated
KICK-IT-UP ACTIVIST VG 118 98 0.55 369 20.1 11.0 0.07 -0.01 0.6 2.0 Alta
into PLI in the future but
BARTELS O-MAN JOBBER EX91 163 90 0.09 328 20.7 16.0 0.09 0.07 1.8 Genus
for the time being, they
won’t be included and
SANDY-VALLEY ONYX EX92 70 99 1.6 -209 6.3 -1.5 0.19 0.07 0.9 1.7
Worldwide
won’t affect the overall
Sires
rankings.
LISCABANK CONCORD 53 89 0.59 732 15.2 16.6 -0.16 -0.08 1.7 Cogent
84 THE JOURNAL FEBRUARY 2010
Proof Run Base Change - Jan 2010.indd 4 28/01/2010 15:28:07
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