Jenny Trigwell

Data on life time production /net merit should be very interesting. From personal experience I am tipping that the Holstein x European breeds will last in the herd a whole lot longer than pure Holsteins. It can take two lactations for Brown Swiss/Holstein cross breds to add significant volume to their higher componenet milk. The mature cows really milk on across the whole lactation, and do so for ...

Our system is more closely aligned with your propsal rather than the traditional cow cycle. We have delayed mating too soon and average calving interval is out to 400 - 420 days. We find this boosts a cows fat and protein production yield over a lactation. In late lactation they are often returning similar kg of milk solids to cows more recently calved and doing it with less stress on their bod ...