11/03/2011 : Dovea Genetics Complete 10,000 Semen Dose Export Order of Angus Semen
Dovea Genetics have just completed what is believed to be the largest ever single export order of Angus semen from Ireland. The export of 10,000 doses of semen from Dovea Genetics was to the Turkish A.I. Company ‘Desma’. Demsa are based in Izmir and are one of the largest A.I. organisations in Turkey for dairy and beef semen. The exportation of semen was through U.K. based company Inimex Genetics. Dr. Ger Ryan, General Manager of Dovea Genetics commenting on the record breaking export order said ‘This significant export order for Dovea Genetics is very good news. The quality of our beef stud in Dovea is improving annually and is now achieving growing international sales. It is very encouraging to see Ireland as an exporter of beef genetics’.
The bulls involved in the record breaking export order were Laheens Larry, Liss Mirt, Mogeely Joe, Rawburn Lord Rocket & Bohey Corporal. The bulls were selected on their ICBF indices, pedigree of the bulls coupled with the quality of the progeny. The selected bulls will be used immediately on dairy & beef cows in Turkey.
Bohey Corporal
Mogeely Joe
2011 Coopex – Umotest Montbeliarde Show & Trip
This year Dovea Genetics had the pleasure of accepting an invitation to attend the COOPEX - UMOTEST SHOW in Besancon, France along with many other international visitors from all over the world. This show is an annual event held every year in the first week of February.
We arrived in France on Monday and went to the Coopex A.I. station where we had a tour of their superb stud and facilities. At the stud we had the pleasure of launching a new GRAZING GENOMIC PACK involving Dovea Genetics and Coopex Montbeliarde. This is the first time for Coopex to export genomic bulls to another country. (It chose Ireland because of its faith, knowledge and the high usage of genomic semen in the past few years.). It will be sold as a pack of 5 bulls. These bulls were selected specifically for the Irish grazing system with the traits included protein, milk, somatic cell count, fertility, longevity, temperament, udder, feet and legs and calving ease. This should be a great addition to our cross breeding programme.
After an early departure on Tuesday morning we saw three farms where many daughters were inspected. Also on view were the systems of farming, milk prices and production costs. One farm visited was getting 31 cent/lt for its milk, the two other farms were getting a whopping price of 43 cent/lt.This milk was being processed for Comte cheese.
The programme on Wednesday was focused solely on the show. This annual show is used as a launch pad to highlight the newest and best bulls the Montbeliarde breed has to offer. Daughters of these bulls were selected to compete against each other. Each daughter class was divided into groups for production; fat and protein; health; reliability and a new inclusion were a group of genomic dams. After looking at all the classes two groups caught our eye for use under Irish conditions. The sire of these two groups were RAPALLO and VANTEY. RAPALLO daughters were of height and body with a good rump and super udders this along with his daughter proof of positive milk volume, protein and fat % along with a plus for somatic cell count and excellent fertility made him stand out for use under Irish conditions. VANTEY progeny were also of medium height but with a bit more strength and condition to their body, this bull is also very easy calving and has a super temperament figure of 126! If someone was considering using a bull to use as a three way cross on crossbred jersey cows VANTEY looks ideal for this.
However the cow that caught everyone’s eye was number 73 a REDON daughter. This cow was part of the genomic class. She just oozed class with a beautiful balance in all her traits. She had a deep body with a level topline along with an excellent udder and legs and feet. After winning her class she went on to claim the overall champion of the show beating last year’s winner out of the sire UROCHER,the emotions of it all even got too much for her handler!.Another plus for REDON was cow number 49 who claimed best udder at the show, these two cows verified REDONS class considering he now has 3259 daughters in his proof!!
To conclude the day at the show we had the delight to witness an auction of some young female calves. Bids for these calves ranged from 1,900 euro to a top price of 4,200 euro for a URBANISTE calf. Average price of the calves sold was 3,275 euro. Hopefully this has given you an insight to the trip and will entice some more people from Ireland to visit this unique event for Montbeliarde breeders from all over the world.
Neil Lahart
Dovea Genetics
A group of the Dovea team visited Germany at the end of November 2011. They flew to Berlin and over the next two days visited farms and viewed daughters of the new Goldwyn son ‘Guarini’, one of the most talked about sires in Germany after the August 2011 index run. He is in the Rinderzuchtverband Berlin- Brandenburg (RBB AI station region), about 1 hour east of Berlin. The RBB stud is best known by the famous Holstein bull ‘Laudan’. The group saw eight milking daughters, four coming to the end of their first lactation and four calved one to two months in their second lactation. They were an impressive group, their udder quality was tremendous, they had high wide rear udders with a strong central ligament. The fore udders are really snugly attached, with ideal teat placement. Guarini has a foot angle of 102 in his linear but we felt that this score was a bit on the low side as they had really good legs and feet.
As most breeders are aware Goldwyn’s can be extremely dairy and narrow, but with Guarini’s pedigree coming from an Oman dam and a Jester granddam it is not surprising that these daughters had good chest width with outstanding rump width at the pins. They had good body depth and open rib, it was quite noticeable that the ones that had calved out for the second time had matured in this regard. Their rump angle was good but it is the one trait that needs protection when breeding as he would probably be unsuitable for cows with high pins. His daughters are tall but not extreme. 
