Top Holstein Bulls

The top two available Holstein sires in the UK have switched positions in the latest bull evaluations published by the Milk Development Council’s breeding+ division. Mascol moves from second to first place by adding £4 to his PLI and scoring £87.

This improvement is the result of improvements in his health and production traits. His somatic cell count (SCC) score is –26, which is a prediction of his ability to reduce his daughter cell counts by 26%.

Together with Picston Shottle, these two bulls are the second best SCC bulls in the top 100, after Manager with a SCC of -33. All three are sons of Mtoto.

Manfred Justice loses just £3 from his PLI and slips into second place on £84, despite adding UK daughter information and improving his milk score by 167kg. Justice’s fertility index at 0.0 attracts attention as he is the best daughter fertility transmitter in the top 10.

In third place is German sire Jardin. The first of three new bulls to the top 10, he is the first of 14 Jocko sons to feature in the top 100 PLI. Jardin has a PLI of £80 and since November he has improved his lifespan and SCC scores.

In fourth place is Italian sire Alfrag Marshall Gilles, the second newcomer to the top 10. Gilles has a PLI of £77. The first UK tested bull is Moet Lookout *CV in fifth place, dropping just £1 on PLI to £75. He now has more than 3000 daughters in his production proof, which have contributed to improvements in his scores across the board, from production to SCC, lifespan and Type Merit.

Kelstein Kilmer in sixth place reports improvements to his lifespan proof, helping him to improve his PLI by £2 to £7. Sharing sixth place is fellow Dutch bull Delta Canvas who is the highest production (£PIN) bull available in the UK. Canvas has also improved his lifespan and SCC in this latest proof run.

Picston Shottle stays in the top 10 in eighth place with the addition of the first handful of second crop daughters added to his proofs. With a Type Merit of 3.1, he is one of the highest type bulls available. With 20 points difference between his PLI and PIN (£74 and £54 respectively) he is also the best overall health transmitter amongst the top bulls.

This £20 is the result of impressive SCC, lifespan and type improvement figures.Skalsumer Jorryn shares eighth place and a PLI of £74, despite being the only negative lifespan bull among the top 10.

The third newcomer in the top 10, and in tenth place, is component specialist Urnieta Zelati II. Originally tested in Spain, he now has daughters milking in the UK. Now with a PLI of £72, Zelati added £11 to his PLI making him the biggest improver in the top 100 available bulls together with newly available Moet Brinstar Sirius.

Sirius ranks in 12th place with a PLI of £69, up from £58 three months ago. He is another successful graduate of a UK testing programme and he is the first of four new Jesther sons in the top 100. Sirius is yet another descendent from the famous Kimo family.

Just dropping out of the top 10 since last time and sharing 12th place with Sirius are Netherside Dynamo and Alta Tucano, both with PLIs of £69.

MDC breeding+ director Marco Winters highlights the wide range of attributes offered by bulls within a breed. “While producers focus on the top bulls ranked on PLI, it is important to also look beyond these and select those with attributes most suited to individual herds – and cows within the herd,” he says.

“MDC published top 10 Holstein bulls for a variety of traits and these bulls may not rank in the top 10 for PLI but can offer useful attributes to particular herds. A good breeding programme will draw attention to these bulls.”

The Holstein sire list includes HUK Type Merit values and the company marketing each bull. Every effort has been made to make sure that lists published by MDC breeding+ and HUK are the same.

Also published this week are the new genetic rankings for the specialist breeds. The published information includes top £PLI lists for bulls with UK progeny tests and international proofs as well as top cow and herd lists.

Further information is available from the breed societies involved and from MDC breeding+.