Recipients for embryo transfer

Amateur Farmer

I’m going to flush a Limousin cow this summer and I’m after some advice on recipients that I am going to synchronise with the flush for transplant. Depending on the quantity and quality of viable embryos that we get from the flush I will freeze as many as possible. I plan to have a number of recipients on hand to receive embryos that aren’t good enough to freeze but could still be good enough for implantation on the day.

My question is in relation to the profile of the recipients; I have some maiden heifers (Limousin dairy cross) who would be calving down at 28 months that I can use. I also have some heifers that calved down in late January that are back cycling and have scanned with no issues at 30 days, would the first calvers be suitable to use?

tismesoitis

Amateur Farmer wrote: »

I’m going to flush a Limousin cow this summer and I’m after some advice on recipients that I am going to synchronise with the flush for transplant. Depending on the quantity and quality of viable embryos that we get from the flush I will freeze as many as possible. I plan to have a number of recipients on hand to receive embryos that aren’t good enough to freeze but could still be good enough for implantation on the day.

My question is in relation to the profile of the recipients; I have some maiden heifers (Limousin dairy cross) who would be calving down at 28 months that I can use. I also have some heifers that calved down in late January that are back cycling and have scanned with no issues at 30 days, would the first calvers be suitable to use?

Only use heifers!! Too expensive to be wasting good embryos. Did a good bit of this back in the day maybe 15-20 years ago and in hindsight it was madness! You could spend lots of money flushing,on semen,prepping recips and get nothing. Unless you have the top of the tops don't bother with it. Theres limo breeders everywhere now and good pedigrees can be picked up at resonable value. Best of luck with whatever you decide.

Amateur Farmer

tismesoitis wrote: »

Only use heifers!! Too expensive to be wasting good embryos. Did a good bit of this back in the day maybe 15-20 years ago and in hindsight it was madness! You could spend lots of money flushing,on semen,prepping recips and get nothing. Unless you have the top of the tops don't bother with it. Theres limo breeders everywhere now and good pedigrees can be picked up at resonable value. Best of luck with whatever you decide.

Thanks for the advice. I've no great intentions to be doing more it more than once but a good cow came my way and I'm thinking why not try it, also I wouldn't normally have recipients but I bucket reared calves and my better cows had heifers last year so I have a few spares. Fingers crossed I get something from it....

whelan2

We did et years ago. Only maiden heifers to be used. These had to be scanned beforehand that they were suitable. One time we did a flush we got 6 eggs, 6 pregnancies and 6 bull calves. Other times we got nothing. A lot of work

Grueller

Lad here in the next parish does it in a big way with blues. Gets a lot of success with pregnancy rates and embryos per flush. He always uses maiden heifers. Make sure they are vaccinated for lepto, rotavirus, salmonella, ibr and anything else that you can think of.
This lad has spent a fortune in the process and made next to nothing as the blues were out of fashion. A bit of luck with the market is the whole thing.

lakill Farm

I see a few agri clients at it, and on paper its only viable if you have sought after bloodlines and getting premium prices , and factor in then that you will probably keep any heifers for yourself so your only selling bulls then .


Some of the embryo transfer service providers will also provide recipient heifer and they will have them on a suitable drugs cycle to match the flushing of the donor cow. So you buy the heifer with your embryo implanted and scanned in calf.


Best advice is to go have a discussion with the embryo transfer provider to put a plan in place for you. Its to expensive of a game not to be getting steady results

Amateur Farmer

lakill Farm wrote: »

I see a few agri clients at it, and on paper its only viable if you have sought after bloodlines and getting premium prices , and factor in then that you will probably keep any heifers for yourself so your only selling bulls then .


Some of the embryo transfer service providers will also provide recipient heifer and they will have them on a suitable drugs cycle to match the flushing of the donor cow. So you buy the heifer with your embryo implanted and scanned in calf.


Best advice is to go have a discussion with the embryo transfer provider to put a plan in place for you. Its to expensive of a game not to be getting steady results

I could see how the service where you buy the heifers in calf with your embryos makes sense. It means it is only the recipients that are in calf are relevant to the flush, where as preparing your own recipients means you could end up with too many or not enough recipients depending on the flush. I would imagine all of this is factored into the price of the service though.

I've been on to my provider a couple of times and he's playing a stormer so far and I'm looking forward to the process and attending to the small details of it and seeing how it goes. I'm approaching it as a non commercial venture and if it works out leaving some money then so much the better.

Niallers87

Sorry for resurrecting an old thread, but how did the flushing work out for you?

Amateur Farmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121527967#Comment_121527967

No need to apologise at all, everything went very well after all. I decided against using any calved females and went with maiden heifers, luckily I found a man with a bunch of heifers suitable and bought 12 from him in 2021 and another 12 last year as well, black Limousin x Dairy. We flushed in October and she gave us 8 embryos that were implanted on the day and we got six calves from the 8 put in. We flushed her again at the end of November (9 embryos - frozen) and then again in January (5 embryos- frozen). The only time we used a CIDR was for the initial reference heat, all of the other flushes were carried out using Natural heats.

She came bulling on the 24th of February and I AI'd her with Sympa and she held and had a bull calf last December. I was going to flush her again but the man that flushes for me couldnt get Foltropin so I AI'd her last February to Bavardage. After AI'ing her I found out that it was possible to do IVF when the pregnancy is less than 90 days for I went ahead with this and she gave us 10 embryos that are frozen with Paddy Buckley.

She's going to be 12 this year and is due to calf shortly. She has proven to be a super donor and owes us absolutely nothing - she gets well looked after I might add!!!!

Base price

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Hard Knocks

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528053#Comment_121528053

What weight and ages are your receipts when implanting

Niallers87

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528053#Comment_121528053

Ah that’s great, fair play to you, the very best of luck to you. That cow certainly owes you nothing.

charolais0153

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528053#Comment_121528053

What are the calves like ?

Lime Tree Farm

Just curious, does genomic testing identify the Dam or the donor?

Hard Knocks

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528562#Comment_121528562

The donor dam

Amateur Farmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528288#Comment_121528288

They were all 500Kg plus and between 18 & 20 months

Amateur Farmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528559#Comment_121528559

I used Sympa, Bavardgae and Lodge Hamlet in the first flush. Sympa worked best with some very good bulls, I'd one Bavardage heifer who is nice but not extreme - should make a very good cow. The Lodge Hamlet was a small screw and I was lucky enough to get 700e for him as a weanling.