08/08/2005, Samen — the practical approach
Elite Mountain Donor, one of the top international bulls who is part of the Samen NZ bull team.
BREED company Samen has been operating in New Zealand since 1997 and offers the country’s most comprehensive selection of world-class genetics. Samen takes a practical approach to breeding by offering genetics to suit the various styles of farming in New Zealand today.
Farmers can select from a wide variety of bloodlines and from Australia, Holland, USA, Canada, UK and France at very affordable prices. This impressive selection is brought about through Samen representing CRI, the USA’s largest farmer co-operative, and K.I. Samen from the Netherlands.
Samen is now also affiliated with US based company ABS Global, which has been involved with cattle breeding in New Zealand from the early days with Ambreed.
Together these companies represent a genetic sire proving program in excess of 1200 bulls a year.
Their progeny are milking in all-major dairy countries around the globe, giving Samen very reliable data to select bulls for the New Zealand market.
Overseas genetics have been given some bad publicity in recent years, with research indicating fertility problems when these cows are placed on New Zealand grass feed farming conditions.
“I have concerns about the make up of these research trials and how they are conducted,” says Cees van Baar of Samen New Zealand.
The use of overseas bulls is only 2-3%, then how do we explain the high levels of empty cows in pure New Zealand herds?
It is widely recognised by farmers and scientist around the world that the more you breed for production this will be at the expense of reproduction.
It actually affects progeny from New Zealand born bulls as much as overseas bulls. “We do now have more reliable data to source more fertile daughters. No mention has been made about the negative effects of inbreeding of fertility. In the battle to produce higher BW bulls the major AB companies are using the same bloodlines over and over again.”
When it comes to selecting genetics most other dairy breeding countries use a stepwise genetic base which means Predicted Transmission Abilities (PTAs) are updated every five years.
But New Zealand still uses the base of animals born in 1985 therefore production and conformation proofs can be deceiving when looking to improve the genetics of the herd populations worked with today.
“I realise that when you have been told that you are the best dairy farmers in the world — you start to believe you have reached the highest peak of your potential and look no further. I advise farmers to keep an open mind and study all the options they have available to them.
In particular, farmers who are adopting higher input feeding systems.”
“The use of overseas bulls is only 2-3%,
then how do we explain the high levels of
empty cows in pure New Zealand herds?”
Cees van Baar
