Jersey cross/ purebreds, costs, outputs?

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
we got stung last year, on 2 small pure jersy cows, sent direct to abattoir. £69 and £72, below min carcass weight. Assumed killing out 33%, based on the lowest price, for a bag of bones, at local mkt, they would have been £175 each, and they wonder why they don't get many culls from us, anymore, either jx or fr. But that is the problem with the small x cows, but you can't have both small cows, and high barren/calf price. Dad used to say, abattoirs would screw you on 1 lot, pay very well for the next, if you had moaned, and about right for the next, but still end up a head !
@Jdunn55 , is about right, a good solid fr, does work for both, and you have the option of hol, if you need more milk at some stage.
 

LTH

Member
Livestock Farmer
They’re good cows (fleckveih) was going to suggest them, used to milk for someone who had them, he had a fairly pure heifer at 6%BF. CRV bulls are better. But they are well fed not just off grass, they milked just as well if not better than his Holsteins. The blue cross calves are fair things
 

Mosston

New Member
So jersey average could be
6000 kg @ 10.5% or 630 kgms at LW 375 kg = 1.68 kgms/kgLW ??
Fuelled by 1.5 t cake and 3200 kgDM forage ??

How would something black & white and short & dumpy compare? 🤪🧐

As said above your only option with a jersey is to make money on the milk as bull/beef calves and culls won’t buy the baby a new coat.
 

LTH

Member
Livestock Farmer
Yes just looked at uk sires and most flekveih look higher than bf
You also get better calves after all bf lives are just black and white £10 things
Have to disagree on calves, we just sold two 18month pure Friesian bullocks for 30 quid less than a blue from a Holstein they’d all had same feed and treatment. And the calves don’t make £10, they’re worth more than Holsteins not all black and whites are the same, might get a bit more for a fleckveih bull calf. Friesians are a more hard waring cow.
 

LTH

Member
Livestock Farmer
I still can’t make my mind up about the flecks. The people that I have asked really like them. Are they too heavy for a grazing type system though?
They can graze guy I milked for grazed them, but they’re a big cow and take a bit of feeding a lot of spots have them inside all time. The heifers he had coming through by crv bulls were smart and gave a lot of milk but they were well fed tmr on a night through summer as well as grazing. But his older ones by genus bulls poorer in udder. I just don’t think you can beat a good Friesian or Frisian Holstein that still looks like a Friesian compared to a good Holstein, fleckveih etc. Yield, quality, cull cow, beef cross, fertility etc. Don’t think fleckveihs will last as long in the udder as a Friesian. Just looked at UK sires and arrival has components nearly twice that of the best fleckveih and a massive milk yield. There’s two fleckveihs with decent quality scores but others are less or same as the rest of the modern friesians.
 

LTH

Member
Livestock Farmer
What about NZ Friesian/Holstein definitely out do the BF on solids and yield plus more efficient and yet not to small an animal and proven on grass systems.
Aren’t they pretty much a Holstein cross jersey originally, and don’t have the dual purpose ability of the BF and in the UK wouldn’t be able to preform like they do in New Zealand in most cases ie being housed in winter. I was meaning all round a good British Friesian ticks all the boxes, not saying all friesians do but the best Friesian against the best of other breeds can’t be beaten, but I’m incredible biased so I would say that😂
 

Hill Dairy

Member
Location
Pembrokeshire
Aren’t they pretty much a Holstein cross jersey originally, and don’t have the dual purpose ability of the BF. I was meaning all round a good British Friesian ticks all the boxes, not saying all friesians do but the best Friesian against the best of other breeds can’t be beaten, but I’m incredible biased so I would say that😂
No they have a lot of Holstein in them but when it comes down to the numbers they beat our pure bf on production and solids off grazing. Although they do get beaten on cull/calf value but no where near as much as jersey/kiwiX horses for courses i guess.
 

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quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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