As a farmer, fertile beef sires have a crucial impact on the economic efficiency and productivity of your herd. Using fertile semen can guarantee improved conception rates, shortened calving intervals and reduced costs. Determining which sires are most fertile and ideal for your operation is essential to your genetic strategy.
How can you find the most fertile beef sires to breed from?
To help you to ensure you are breeding from the most fertile genetics, Genus ABS created the FertilityAdvantage Index which is used to evaluate the fertility of beef sires who have been used in the dairy herd.
This index includes insemination data from BoviSync herds, which use Reproductive Management Systems, and industry data, including insemination events on our sires and competitor sires across the industry.
With over 720,000 inseminations from approximately 1000 herds and 400 individual beef sires, you can be confident in the validity of our results and findings.
The dataset of our FertilityAdvantage Index has recently increased by 44% as we now have access to data from over 200,000 inseminations from the last seven months.
Not only that, the number of herds from which the data is collected has also been increased, along with an additional 97 new bulls with insemination data that were not included in the previous assessment. Because of this growth, we are now able to publish FertilityAdvantage data on a greater number of cows.
Assessing the most fertile beef sires
Conception rates of our sires are determined with data on many environmental effects in the evaluation considered so that we can provide accurate and honest information to our dairy farmers.
Fertility of our sires is calculated with numerous variables in consideration. Those variables include:
- Herd
- Year of insemination
- Quarter of insemination
- Days in milk
- Service class
- Lactation class
- Age of cow at insemination
- Age of bull at insemination
- Breed of sire (random intercept)
Upon assessment evaluation, each sire is ranked into three tiers; Platinum, Gold and Silver. Those with the most superior fertility performance will be awarded a place in the Platinum tier.
Those which fall into the Silver and Gold tiers also have excellent fertility performance. Due to our rigorous assessment criteria, any animals who do not display great fertility will not fall into any of the tiers listed.
Meet some of our fertile beef sires
Angus Bulls:
Skaill-Dalton-W214
- 0.8% Calving ease
- 284 Days gestation length
- 60% Calf quality
- 2.2% Calf survivability
- £44.02 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Plus
- He is well recognised to deliver easily born calves when used on both cows and heifers, coupled with producing good quality calves that have good growth and performance for calf buyers and beef finishers
NuEra T14 0142
- 1.4% Calving ease
- 281 Days gestation length
- 62% Calf quality
- 5.7% Calf survivability
- £40.10 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Plus
- He is proven within the dairy herd to produce easily born calves with a gestation length of 281 days. His progeny have proven to grow and perform well for calf buyers and beef finishers, having quick growth rates, improved feed efficiency and high carcase value
NuEra 0072
- 0.4% Calving ease
- 281 Days gestation length
- 59% Calf quality
- 2.0% Calf survivability
- £57.60 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Standard
- Based on over 300 calvings, this sire is proven to deliver easily born calves which have good conformation with 281 days gestation length
British Blue bulls:
Northpole
- 1.0% Calving ease
- 279 Days gestation length
- 62% Calf quality
- 2.0% Calf survivability
- £86.74 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Plus
- Northpole is a heavily proven sire that has been created to generate more profitability for the dairy herd. His off-spring are easily born with a gestation length of 279 days, five days shorter than the average British Blue. Calves are blue roan and good quality
NuEra Nightrider
- 1.3% Calving ease
- 282 Days gestation length
- 66% Calf quality
- 2.6% Calf survivability
- £78.59 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Plus
- Nightrider is a great all-round sire. He delivers easily calved off-spring with an average gestation length of 281 days. He ranks as a platinum FertilityAdvantage sire, meaning he delivers up to 7.5% points higher conception rate compared to silver sires.
Croftends Monty
- 2.8% Calving ease
- 281 Days gestation length
- 68% Calf quality
- 3.6% Calf survivability
- £74.46 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Max
- Monty is a popular sire who has been widely used in the dairy herd. He is noted for his exceptional calf quality and above average calving ease. Monty is a platinum FertilityAdvantage sire. He delivers up to 7.5% higher in conception rate compared to silver sires
NuEra Oracle
- 2.0% Calving ease
- 281 Days gestation length
- 63% Calf quality
- 1.7% Calf survivability
- £68.82 BeefAdvantage
- NuEra Profit Max
- Oracle is a highly proven sire in the dairy herd. His offspring are of exceptional quality, easily born with an average gestation length of 281 days. He is proven to have high growth and performance for calf buyers and beef finishers, making him profitable for the beef supply chain.
Ensure your herd is being bred to the most fertile genetics available by contacting your local Genus ABS representative today, or visit our website for more information.
01270 616681