Select Sires

Reproductive Management Practices and Breeding Cows after Calving
Transcript of Select Sires' Reproductive Moment Program
on DairyLine Radio, Which Aired April 1, 2004
with Jodie Pennington
professor and dairy extension specialist,
University of Arkansas

This week’s Reproductive Moment is with Dr. Jodie Pennington, professor and dairy extension specialist at the University of Arkansas. This week, Dr. Pennington, we are finding out when to breed your cow.

Well, we do recommend that we start breeding the cow as soon after calving as possible. Most people try to breed her at the first heat after sixty days after calving. However, in some herds where they want to get the cows calving earlier, or perhaps where they have heat detection problems, they actually will breed at the first heat after forty days after calving. It is very important that if a cow hasn’t shown heat by sixty days after calving to have the veterinarian check her to make sure that she has a healthy, normal reproductive tract. If she happens to have some type of uterine infection, it can delay her breeding in the next pregnancy period.

Heifers should be bred according to size and not their age.

Yes, that is a good point. Usually for Holsteins we recommend that they be bred around 750-to-800 pounds, which for most breeders will be around fifteen months of age. However, some with accelerated growing programs will have heifers at 750-to-800 pounds by fourteen months. Some of those will then begin breeding, and will calve at twenty-two to twenty-four months. With the color breeds, we would recommend, of course, somewhere around 550-to-700 pounds for breeding.

The best time to breed your cow would be in the middle or the end of standing-heat.

Yes, that is correct. Generally speaking, we recommend that if you catch a cow in heat in the morning you breed her in the afternoon. In some herds where heat detection is not that good, or in other herds where they only breed once a day, cows may be bred just at that one time. But, a lot of the classic studies indicate that if you can breed a cow as she is going out of heat, you are more apt to get her pregnant because she will then be ovulating. When she is ovulating there is going to be more overlap of time between when the egg is alive and fertile and there is fertile sperm in there to breed her. We do occasionally have problem breeder cows where we may breed them when they first come in heat and then perhaps twelve to twenty-four hours later. In other cases, we have producers who will inject a cow with GnRH when she first comes into heat, and then breed her perhaps twelve hours or so later. Generally speaking, we don’t see much of that unless they are problem breeder animals.

Thank you, Jodie. We will continue our discussion next week when we talk about PTA, the Predicted Transmitted Ability for dollars, and how to breed your cow or heifer to a bull with the high PTA. That will be on next week’s Reproductive Moment. This week we have been with Dr. Jodie Pennington, professor and dairy extension specialist at the University of Arkansas.

Select Sires Inc., 11740 U.S. 42 North, Plain City, Ohio 43064 / Phone: (614) 873-4683 Fax: (614) 873-5751