John Hogan, a degree student from University of Dublin and night calver at Glenapp got more that than he was bargaining for on Valentine’s night – a set of triplet heifer calves.
The dam was a fourth lactation cow and part of a cross-bred breeding project which has developed the world's first cross bred snip key. All breeding females on four co-operating farms in South West Scotland have had their genotypes and phenotypes analysed through a programme developed by geneticist Prof Mike Coffey at SRUC.
Read more: Extra calves put pressure on dairy cows – John Harvey
The programme not only analyses past performance but selects future breeding decisions. Hence these three heifers are all sired through using sexed semen by Koepon Raptor +£535 SCI (+£798 PLI).
The four co-operating farmers in the project are Rory Christie at Dourie, Michael Kyle at Linns, Graham Armstrong at Kirvennie, and Charlie Russell at Glenapp, who are all enjoying early stage progress and remain focused on producing ever more efficient and carbon friendly cows.
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