The identification of beef sires that produce calves of above average conformation from dairy cows

The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food routinely publishes price i nformation for S-week-old beef + dairy calves sold at major livestock aucti on centres in England and Wales. For the period 1993/94 to 1996/97, there w ere average price premiums of pound 51 for male and pound 38 for female cal ves classed as 'first quality'. We have shown previously that choosing an e asy calving beef sire for use on dairy cows will generally lead to calves w hich are smaller in size and of poorer conformation. To enable dairy produc ers to maximize returns from calf sales, we propose that beef sires be eval uated for the predicted incidence of 'first quality' calves, which can be d erived from the sire's evaluation for calf conformation and the breed incid ence of 'first quality' calves. Dairy farmers may then jointly consider a b ull's predicted merit for calving ease and calf quality when choosing a sir e for use in their herd.