How have your breeding season gone this year.

[sidjon]

How have the spring calvers breeding season gone? Speaking to a couple of people it seems to be very variable this year. We are at the end of week 7 and the bulls seem to be very quite, submitted 98.6% within first 3 weeks and seem to have a incalf rate of 87% which seems very high as the best I have done has been 78% , just waiting for the tb test to mess things up in a few weeks and thinking will pull bulls out in week 10 , so I have some cows to cull or will be overstock again.

 

[Cows 'n grass]

Submission rates were good but conception rates have been poor and there are still too many bulling.

 

[lazy farmer]

Too scared to say out loud ! I too have heard from various farmers saying its been a very variable season.personally I don't think the hot weather 3-4 weeks back helped at all.

 

[Beef farmer]

All of you.... pull your bulls out now. Put them back in October the 28th, and when you turn your cows dry on the 24th December we will have a deal on your new autumn calvers. You get a nice tight 8 week block and get to help me out at the same time. Win win

 

[sidjon]

Too scared to say out loud ! I too have heard from various farmers saying its been a very variable season.personally I don't think the hot weather 3-4 weeks back helped at all.

How did the flash mate perform? One farm on our Ai round had used them and very high submissions rate and very high return rate but this seems normal for said farm at the moment as new to dairy.

 

[Clay52]

56% conception and 96% submission for the first week of breeding( sync Holstein's and pg on crosses). Was hoping for higher conception but poor forage quality and cows lost some weight so really can't really complain.

The next three weeks are tracking like they will go 65-70 conception rate as we got some better feed. Stopped breeding today. 7 weeks breeding total, target is around 90% preg.

 

[lazy farmer]

How did the flash mate perform? One farm on our Ai round had used them and very high submissions rate and very high return rate but this seems normal for said farm at the moment as new to dairy.

sadly didn't get on with them I used them without tail paint (reason for using them was to reduce tail painting) I couldn't see the point of tail painting as well even though its recommended. anyway without tail paint we ended up with 10% false positives which is double what we usually get. now as I went off spec you could argue quite rightly that was my fault and not the flashmates fair enough.
My main issue with them was retention, a few fell off early on which is what we were warned would happen . But what we weren't told at the demo meeting was that around day 17 due to hair growth they would need removing and re gluing this did not go well and losses within 2 days were so high I began tail painting again.
submission rates were around avg for us but NRR have been better than avg but then its been a kinder yr here weather wise and grass management is better in the sense that some management is taking place where it wasn't before.
So would I use them again? no, would I try and put off other people from using them? No I wouldn't I'm sure in the right hands they could be a useful tool.

 

[In the pit]

97% sub rate at 4 wks and it looks like we had 65/70% conception rate ,, very little bulling going on in the herd and haven't seen any bullers in the heifer bunch ( we are at week 11) need bulls out this week. Deciding not to pd this year to oct ,so will have exact results then

 

[Glaswellt]

sadly didn't get on with them I used them without tail paint (reason for using them was to reduce tail painting) I couldn't see the point of tail painting as well even though its recommended. anyway without tail paint we ended up with 10% false positives which is double what we usually get. now as I went off spec you could argue quite rightly that was my fault and not the flashmates fair enough.
My main issue with them was retention, a few fell off early on which is what we were warned would happen . But what we weren't told at the demo meeting was that around day 17 due to hair growth they would need removing and re gluing this did not go well and losses within 2 days were so high I began tail painting again.
submission rates were around avg for us but NRR have been better than avg but then its been a kinder yr here weather wise and grass management is better in the sense that some management is taking place where it wasn't before.
So would I use them again? no, would I try and put off other people from using them? No I wouldn't I'm sure in the right hands they could be a useful tool.

Anybody using kamars from LIC? Tail paint for 5 weeks here and then kamars, a lot less work and bulling cows v easy to find, still carrying on with AI now as we get on so well with them.

 

[lazy farmer]

that does sound like a good idea how much are they ?

 

[Glaswellt]

£1.20 i think, used 200 so far (150 cows) low on bull power this year, so currently kamars and diy AI during the week and 2 bulls in everyweekend. Would have to use a hell of a lot of kamars to get anywere near the price of a good working bull. Pull red kamars of when serving and replace them once a week, a lot less work than the daily topping up of paint. Would still use paint for the first month of AI though because i find it working well until I start to get complacent.

 

[lazy farmer]

do you get any fall off ? do you use any extra glue?

 

[Glaswellt]

1 fallen off i think, 1 or 2 fallen of if a cow is bulling very strong. Spray carpet adeshive and leave for 30 sec at least before applying kamar.

 

[Grassman247]

1 fallen off i think, 1 or 2 fallen of if a cow is bulling very strong. Spray carpet adeshive and leave for 30 sec at least before applying kamar.

Sorry to drag this thread up again but we are heading for mating shortly and I usually just use a bit of paint and visual checks but I’d like to go to kamar, paint and visual because my fertility could be better. Interested to know if you clip the cows before applying the kamar? I tried the LIC ones yesterday and could not get them to stick after the rep told me not to clip the cows. Had similar trouble with flshmate when I tested it back in 2016 with the cows shedding there coats and them coming off

 

[Durry cows]

Sorry to drag this thread up again but we are heading for mating shortly and I usually just use a bit of paint and visual checks but I’d like to go to kamar, paint and visual because my fertility could be better. Interested to know if you clip the cows before applying the kamar? I tried the LIC ones yesterday and could not get them to stick after the rep told me not to clip the cows. Had similar trouble with flshmate when I tested it back in 2016 with the cows shedding there coats and them coming off

Out of interest when do you start breeding?

 

[jerseycowsman]

Sorry to drag this thread up again but we are heading for mating shortly and I usually just use a bit of paint and visual checks but I’d like to go to kamar, paint and visual because my fertility could be better. Interested to know if you clip the cows before applying the kamar? I tried the LIC ones yesterday and could not get them to stick after the rep told me not to clip the cows. Had similar trouble with flshmate when I tested it back in 2016 with the cows shedding there coats and them coming off

Why bother with all the fuss of messy glue with the kamars? Just use the scratch cards, they come self adhesive and are far tidier and give virtually zero false positives

 

[Grassman247]

Why bother with all the fuss of messy glue with the kamars? Just use the scratch cards, they come self adhesive and are far tidier and give virtually zero false positives

Good point! Do you trim the cows before applying the scratch cards?

Edit: BTW the lic kamar is self adhesive

 

[Grassman247]

Out of interest when do you start breeding?

1st of may for the cows and heifers on the 23rd of April. Pre mating will start at the end of this month though

 

[Glaswellt]

Sorry to drag this thread up again but we are heading for mating shortly and I usually just use a bit of paint and visual checks but I’d like to go to kamar, paint and visual because my fertility could be better. Interested to know if you clip the cows before applying the kamar? I tried the LIC ones yesterday and could not get them to stick after the rep told me not to clip the cows. Had similar trouble with flshmate when I tested it back in 2016 with the cows shedding there coats and them coming off

We started using them after 5 weeks of AI, so there wasn't any hair to clip! We used carpet adeshive in am aerosol, no mess at all, spray a full row in the parlour then go along the row with the kamars. They stuck very well, with no issues with them coming off, so i would say yes, you would be netter of clipping them if they ar quite hairy.

 

[jerseycowsman]

Good point! Do you trim the cows before applying the scratch cards?

Edit: BTW the lic kamar is self adhesive

No, give it a brush to make sure it's clean and no loose hair