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Reproductive Health and Management Practices for Beef Heifers

Date:
By MFMG Admin

 

Project code: P.PSH.1280

Project manager: Elke Hocking

Project duration: January 2021 to July 2024

About the project

The purpose of this project is to work with the Limestone Coast Beef Group to quantify and reduce the reproductive wastage that occurs from first time heifer joining through to second calving, by understanding and adopting best practice monitoring and management practices for animal health, condition scoring and nutritional management.

Producers in the group are focused on adopting best practice guidelines, along with collecting on-farm data to assess the effectiveness and practicality of guidelines for animal health and management practices to improve the reproductive efficiency and profitability amongst their herds.

This project will aim to demonstrate improvements in cattle reproductive performance through the demonstration and adoption of best practice management techniques for the higher rainfall zone. Management techniques to be demonstrated and skills to be developed include:

  • Replacement heifer selection, nutritional management (age and weight at joining, body condition score and nutritional targets) and length of joining;
  • Nutritional management following first calving;
  • Condition scoring of cattle;
  • Keeping good reproductive records from joining to weaning to identify where wastage is occurring (including pregnancy scanning: foetal aging and identification of twins for separate management).

The project will also address animal husbandry and welfare issues by:

  • Demonstrating and assessing effective methods for monitoring worm burdens prior to key reproductive stages;
  • Monitoring and testing for reproductive diseases and quantifying the cost-effectiveness of different management strategies;
  • Educating participants on the use of EBV’s for reproductive traits and minimising dystocia; and
  • Educating participants on nutritional management through joining

The project is a user-led extension program with coordinated technical and practice change support from experts.

This project is funded by:

MLA logo, colour, jpg format

This project is delivered in partnership with:

Sean McGrath, Millicent Veterinary Clinic

Tim Prance, T Prance Rural Consulting

Ashlee Carslake-Hunt, Tailored Livestock Consulting

 

Project resources:

Maximising beef production with Dean Eastwood and Sean McGrath - The Prosperous Farmer Podcast

Reproductive health and management practices in beef heifers - MFMG Seasonal Newsletter Summer 2022 / 2023

MLA project page

Benchmarking Beef with Michael Cobiac and Elke Hocking - The Prosperous Farmer Podcast

2022_Beef PDS Key Profit Drivers Nathaniel Modra Presentation

2022_Beef PDS South Killanoola Dean Eastwood Presentation

2022_Beef PDS AI in Beef Heifers Sean McGrath Presentation

2022_Beef PDS Heifers Pregnancy Diagnosis Sean McGrath Presentation