Dairy Farm Guide - Best dairy farming information from trusted resource!
A bull can hardly serve about 100 cows in a year by natural service. With the method of using chilled semen through artificial insemination (AI) nearly 10,000-30,000 doses could be made from the same bull in a year. However, due to lack of keeping quality 80% of the doses goes waste thus resulting in the wastage of superior germplasm. With the introduction of frozen semen technology more than 80% of the doses produced from a bull during one year period can be used successfully thereby increasing the use of a superior bull 100-300 times compared to natural service. Frozen semen offers a wide range of benefits as given below:
Semen Bank is the nucleus of the Artificial insemination organization. Sometimes it is part of a farm (dairy farm /bull mother farm) as well. In addition to meeting the requirements of the field, it should also function in coordination with other components of the farm to which it is attached. Semen bank should be planned in such a way that it has the required number of bulls and is located in a place where the natural resources and physical characteristics are sufficient for maintaining a bull farm. It’s main objective is quality frozen semen production so as to ensure better fertility and conception rate, and faster genetic progress.
Wherever only liquid semen is in use for AI, it is the practice to establish bull stations of 5 to 10 bulls. However by shifting over to frozen semen, better advantage is achieved by maintaining sufficient number of bulls in the station. Further the cost of production of semen doses is considerably reduced as the no. of bulls per station is increased. It offers a better scope of surveillance for health, regular semen collection, better utility and maximum production. The major factors influencing the decision of the size of the bull station are:
Other factors determining the size of the station are size/type and different enterprises of the farm, physical and financial resources for production and extensiveness of utilization in the field. Considering the heavy investment for the necessary equipment and infrastructural facilities it is not advisable to plan a bull station with less than 40-50 bulls. Further it should not be so large that it becomes difficult to manage.
Keeping this in view it is felt that strength of 100 bulls is optimum for a bull station. Of these nearly 60 bulls are in service and the remaining are under training. In case the requirement of semen exceeds the production capacity of the bull station, second on can be established in another convenient place.
