| |
Genetic Progress
By David Selner
After analyzing the latest genetic evaluations, an overall impression of the rate of genetic progress has become cloudy to a great many breeders. Most of the breeders in the Holstein breed are used to a rapid turnover in the Top TPI sires every few months. Traditionally that has been the case because of the AI studs having large, well-organized sampling programs, large young sire daughter numbers for increased accuracy and a common goal to raise the genetic level of each year’s class of young sires. So usually, hot new sires came on every sire summary evaluation.
For the last two years, we have had one sire dominate the top of the list. This could be because he is so genetically superior to any other bull that has ever led the pack, and in this case, that’s probably true. However, in the last evaluations several other second crop sires also moved to high levels on the TPI list. This indicates that the newer graduates are not keeping pace with the older genetic elite. Why is this happening? There can be several explanations.
- The goal of today is different than the goals of selection years ago. When matings were made six and seven years ago, the emphasis was on different traits or had different trait emphasis than today’s TPI formula.
- The information available in the past was not accurate on these new health traits or was not available at all.
- AI personnel were not emphasizing the switch to the new health traits quick enough in their selections of young sires.
- The selection of sires of sons was not rigorous enough or didn’t include enough available sires.
While the first two reasons listed are certainly lending to the problem, the third is untrue. Having the greatest impact of all, however, is reason #4.
The availability of sires, and the resulting information on those sires, is a key to making wise choices for AI studs or just everyday breeders. Have we done a good enough job getting this information out to the public in a form and method that invites interest and thorough screening of the potential sires? Are we scouring the world for the best available sires? I believe this is an area that the industry has not done as good a job as they could have and have not looked as carefully at foreign sires.
Some of the breed greats proven in other countries have not recently had much impact in the United States. Sires like Jocko Besne, Lancelot and Ramos have all been used as sires of sons but have not been widely used by the dairymen themselves. This compares to other previous foreign breed leaders like Celsius, Addison and Mtoto, who were used more widely to create females. Why have we been less aggressive in this search for top genetics? Certainly we have had enough high US genetics that dairymen felt it not necessary to look elsewhere. Secondly, these sires may be harder to obtain and are found in different straw packages than we are accustomed to. Thirdly, their information is harder to obtain and less available to the public. Also there is a fear of the accuracy of this foreign information and how it relates to the results in the US, a less valid reason today than before because our evaluation methods are better.
The big issue in this whole scenario is the lack of timely information. The US is very efficient in getting out information on domestic sires as it compares to foreign sires. There is some natural time lag because of distance and dates of evaluation but this should not be a valid reason. Most of the domestic lists include foreign sires if they have been actively marketed before, but this often excludes others not currently marketed or newly on the scene. The other list you see offering foreign sires includes sires only after they reach a minimum reliability of 80% for type and production in the US. This reliability limit allows only second crop sires to emerge on the list which is certainly not timely from a genetic standpoint as these sires should have been used much earlier. The reason to limit this release of information is to protect the US buying public against some inaccuracies in the international systems. I believe the US breeder is capable of determining those risks themselves and would be better served by offering the information freely. Some of the elite breeders have taken advantage of this system to utilize foreign genetics early and have reaped those benefits. But the Holstein breed as a whole has not benefitted.
In an effort to reveal the complete list of foreign sires with higher than 1700 TPI, I am including a list of sires that has no reliability restrictions. This should be a list you should view closely. Remember that all of these foreign countries have large sampling programs as well and have utilized US genetics extensively in the past. It is certainly easy to believe that some outstanding genetics can be found in some foreign sires.
I certainly feel that the US is the leader in global Holstein genetics. However if we are not careful in making use of some of the best genetics in the Holstein breed we will no longer maintain that lofty pedestal. I encourage all breeders and AI studs to maintain a vigilant watch of the top lists from every country for all traits. This strict regimen will insure that the US is the Holstein breed leader for the future.
|
