The April Top 10 genomic Type list sees an interesting split between five sires that ranked in the December Top 10 and five newcomers to the list.
Retaining his number one spot is Dairy Daughters’ Mr Atwood Brokaw (Atwood x Regancrest-HFF Mac) with a Type Merit of 3.95 and 68% Reliability, both up slightly from December. Slotting in at number two with 3.90 TM is newcomer Ladys-Manor Savior (Lauthority x Shottle) from Semex. Bred from the Jean family at Ladys-Manor, Savior has Reliability of 67%.
December’s second ranked sire, Gibbs-I Claynook Dude (Atwood x Bolton) from Semex, now fills the number three spot with 3.87 TM and 65% Reliability, keeping him one place ahead of Bitz-Butler Atwood Brady. The Kingstreet Sires-sourced Brady has a Type Merit of 3.79 and Reliability of 69%. Making up the top five on an equal footing with Brady at 3.79 TM is another from the Semex stable, Val-Bisson Doorman (De-Su 521 Bookem x Shottle) with 60% Reliability.
The sixth and seventh ranked young sires are both complete newcomers; Holbric-ML Spa (Destry x Shottle) from Semex with a Type Merit of 3.73 (67% Reliability) and Groves-Vu S-Rock Marcell from Genus (Shamrock x Regancrest-HFF Mac) at 3.72 TM (60% Reliability). They push Butz-Butler Benji from Semex down to eighth spot despite his Type Merit rising to 3.67 (70% Reliability), whilst MR Aubrey Observer Art from Dairy Daughters rises from sixteenth in December to ninth position with a new Type Merit of 3.65, up from 3.39, and 63% Reliability. Completing the Top 10 is another sire improving his ranking, JK Eder-I Control from Semex. Ranked fifteenth in December, Control has seen his Type Merit rise from 3.40 to 3.60 with Reliability of 65%.
Ranked in fifteenth spot this time is the first UK-bred genomic sire; Dulais Asteroid from Sterling Sires. He’s a Windbrook son of Dulais Shottle Ashlyn and traces back to Tri-Day Ashlyn EX96.
In welcoming the April rankings, Simon Gee, Holstein UK’s Marketing & Membership Executive, also issued a note of caution about the genomic sire rankings. “At the risk of sounding boring, breeders should remember that these genomic evaluations are based solely on genetic information and do not include any data from milking daughters. Whilst the initial results look very encouraging, breeders using genomic sires are advised to use a group of sires rather than relying heavily on any one individual.”
Source: Holstein UK
