Agriland Media Group is delighted to collaborate with LIC Ireland to bring you the Breeding For Efficiency Series.
The Breeding For Efficiency Series takes us to Sean O’Connor’s farm, who is milking 85 New Zealand Friesian cows just outside Tipperary town, where the New Zealand genetics are producing the goods.
The New Zealand Friesian has proven to be a great success on the farm, and although New Zealand genetics don’t translate well to the Economic Breeding Index (EBI) system, O’Connor’s herd are performing in every aspect.
O’Connor is milking these cows on the home farm which is a 30ha milking platform. He went back milking in 1995 and was “just getting bits and bits of quota at that time”.
The key driver of profits on the for O’Connor is the grass-based system while breeding a cow that can convert that grazed grass into high milk solids.
O’Connor’s passion is for grassland management and breeding and said that he “still absolutely loves dairy farming and would like to see myself doing it well into the future”.
Farm system
O’Connor told Agriland that the farm grows about 13.5t of grass every year, with a utilisation rate of roughly 85%. His cows are bred for management traits, capacity and fertility converts that grass to top quality milk.
O’Connor admitted that he “was hugely influenced by the New Zealand advisors that came here in the early nineties” and he hasn’t looked back.
He believes that farmers are really well served by excellent advice and research from Teagasc and through ICBF, as he said “we have lots of data at our fingertips from milk recording figures”.
Speaking to Agriland about this advice , he said he “enjoys the new young blood that’s coming through with vets, advisors and discussion groups, however, I am still very careful of where I take my advice from”.
O’Connor said that the main goal he is chasing on the farm is to put top quality grass into cows, as much as he can of it, so that the cows are fully-fed and can reach their full potential.
For O’Connor’s farm, the objectives are simple, to focus on “leaving good residuals in the most simple and uncomplicated system as possible”.
NZ Friesian
O’Connor said that “whether I’m right or wrong, I never look at EBI but I do look at breeding worth (BW) and now I just leave all the bull selection up to LIC“.
The Tipperary man stuck with the black and white herd of cows, as he felt the New Zealand Friesian could do him the business without performing cross breeding.
His herd of cows is exactly what he has set out for in his breeding programmes, as he said he “wanted to be grass focused with limited meal and let the cows out to grass to do the business”.
The type of cow O’Connor wants, is a 520kg cow that can produce 500kg/ milk solids (MS) from as little meal as possible (fed 800kg of meal/cow this year).
The cows produced 500kg/MS/cow last year with 4.66% fat and 3.7% protein, which is exceptional figures for a black and white herd.
O’Connor doesn’t want to increase the litres on the farm and has never bred for that, as he focuses on achieving high fats and protein percentages.
For O’Connor to do this, he needs a cow that is capacious, hardy and robust, while having a high fertility and will hold their body condition score (BCS).
Breeding worth
When it comes to the breeding decisions on the farm and breeding the next replacements, he breeds from his highest performing cows in the herd rather than his highest EBI cows.
The best New Zealand Friesian bulls from LIC are then used on these cows selected using the BW index that is used in New Zealand.
These bulls do not transfer over to the EBI system well and have a low EBI as a result, but have been consistently breeding a high EBI herd of cows for 30 years.
O’Connors 2024 inseminations were only ranked as two stars for EBI, but performance of the herd reflected a five-star herd and can been in his co-op report below:
Although O’Connor is breeding with what is recognised as a low EBI bulls and using high BW bulls, his herd still has an EBI of €234, which is the top 5% in the country.
These low EBI New Zealand bulls provided by LIC are in fact breeding a high EBI herd and the results can be clearly seen in O’Connor’s co-op report where he has a five star for fat and protein in kg and percentages and five star for average milk price.
What we can take from O’Connor’s herd of New Zealand Friesian cows, is that high BW bulls breed a high EBI herd.