It’s the little decisions that can really effect the overall success of a business, and with dairy, there’s no exception to this rule. In this case, “little decisions” can mean choosing bulls that improve calf health and ultimately improve your investment in genetics. Select Sires’ Adam Oswalt recently talked about Calf Wellness and the ways that our Select Sires lineup can improve that.
The Calf Wellness traits for CLARIFIDE Plus tested sires can be found on each bull’s web page in the Wellness data block just below the sire’s pedigree. If the space happens to be blank, it means the bull has not yet been tested. Like Cow Wellness traits, the Calf Wellness traits are also displayed in a STA where 100 is average. The higher the STA, the higher the resistance. Calf Wellness Dollars (CW$) combines calf livability (43%), scours (28%) and respiratory disease (29%) to estimate a potential profit contribution of the three wellness traits.
Zoetis Resource: WELLNESS IS A PROFITABLE CHOICE
Following the April sire summaries, Select Sires will publish resources that will include CLARIFIDE Plus results across all lineups. In the meantime, here are several bulls on our current lineup with superior qualities for improving Calf Wellness…
Proven Lineup
Already a customer favorite, 7HO11169 PETRONE is leading the pack when it comes to Calf Wellness. His daughters are hearty, cost less in the hutch and later become those trouble-free milk cows we expect from PETRONE. Check out 7HO11985 TETRIS as well. This highly fertile SUPERSIRE son transmits one of the higher Calf Scour STAs among our proven sires. PETRONE, TETRIS and the others below are high for Calf Wellness along with higher reliabilities.
| CW$ | Calf Liv | Liv R% | Calf RespDis | RespDis R% | Calf Scours | Scours R% | |
| 7HO11169 Petrone | $56 | 110 | 97 | 105 | 97 | 106 | 96 |
| 7HO11383 Morgan | $28 | 107 | 96 | 95 | 94 | 110 | 93 |
| 7HO13093 Damaris | $23 | 107 | 92 | 95 | 90 | 108 | 96 |
| 7HO12222 Kian | $35 | 106 | 90 | 103 | 88 | 106 | 58 |
| 7HO11985 Tetris | $25 | 103 | 75 | 99 | 71 | 111 | 69 |
Super Samplers
With little to no daughter data, Super Samplers and other genomic sires will have significantly less wellness reliability. However, we offer a great lineup that are expected help speed the genetic progress for calf wellness.
| CW$ | Calf Liv | Liv R% | Calf RespDis | RespDis R% | Calf Scours | Scours R% | |
|
7HO12556 Pageone |
$59 | 110 | 62 | 104 | 53 | 108 |
85 |
|
7HO12788 Frazzled |
$52 | 109 | 43 | 103 | 37 | 108 |
42 |
|
7HO12970 D-Rock |
$49 | 105 | 38 | 108 | 32 | 108 |
35 |
|
507HO13628 Pizazz |
$46 | 110 | 37 | 107 | 32 | 100 |
38 |
|
7HO13572 Gomes |
$45 | 106 | 38 | 106 | 32 | 107 |
41 |
|
7HO13774 Chancellor |
$41 | 105 | 42 | 104 | 37 | 109 |
44 |
| 7HO13551 Amazing | $39 | 105 | 39 | 107 | 34 | 105 |
45 |
Rearing calves will always have expenses, but a reduction in expenses (e.g. health incidents, mortality) through genetic selection enhances profitability.
Adam Oswalt – Marketing, Dairy Sire – Select Sires, Inc.
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