September Evaluation Update and the COW Index with Margaret Kelleher, ICBF

Dr. Margaret Kelleher, Genetics Operation Manager at ICBF, joins Stuart Childs on this week’s episode of the Dairy Edge podcast to discuss the most recent update in September and to learn more about the COW index that farmers should be using more in their herd to identify the cows that require career changes.

Margaret explains that September evaluations were relatively stable, as they tend to be at this time of year in the seasonal system that we have here in Ireland. However, ICBF continues to receive and update large volumes of data, including milk records, calving records, factory data, mart data and genotypes on a daily basis that they then compile and add to the existing information to update the details of the animals on the database.

This is a job that takes about two months to do and as soon as an update is published, ICBF start on the process for the next update almost immediately.

The conversation than moves on to the Cow’s Own Worth (COW) Index, which Margaret outlined as a live herd-specific tool that ranks cows using current performance, predicted future performance and replacement cost.

Where good data is entered, this index can be used by farmers to identify the bottom 10–15% to be considered for culling. It has the advantage of pulling milk performance, calving date and future potential together to help cut through the noise when trying to make culling decisions.

For the tool to be most effective, accurate recording of information is essential. Milk recording, fertility and scanning data have a major impact, while recording mastitis, lameness and temperament would make the COW Index more accurate and useful for the individual farmer. EBI is the tool to use to identify the most profitable cows to breed from, COW is for culling decisions.

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