What is your farms purpose for A/I ?

Years back I was pretty up on the AI process and semen stuff. I have to admit my knowledge about sexed semen is very limited. If I recall correctly, sexed semen is packed at about 12 million per straw.


I also thought that doing cervical using 1 straw of standard semen per doe meant the straws should be packed at about 20 million. I would guess this is assuming good to excellent post thaw results.


If my memory stated above is accurate, (and I could be way off in the numbers) then packing sexed semen at 20 million and using 1 straw per doe cervical should work.


However when I asked about this idea I was told it couldn't be done. Now I am not sure why it was felt it couldn't be done. Was it because the techs prefer Lap AI over cervical for better results? Was it because they make more per farm doing Lap instead of cervical? I don't know.


 


Obviously when the buck is collected he will give you only so many male cells and so many female cells. If your providing the sexing service it looks better to the client to get him more straws, and packing the straws at a lower amount will accomplish that. However I would prefer less straws and be able to save the Lap AI costs and risks associated with Lap AI .


I don't know what today's current price structure is for sexing semen. However I know I won't be doing it at $5,000 per buck per collection. Not based on the success rates and numbers I have heard.


If I could collect a buck and get a reasonable number of male cell straws and not have to do Lap AI to utilize those straws, and if the AI success rate with those sexed straws was say 80% or better consistently year after year then I could see eliminating live breeding on my farm.


For me feed costs are high and down sizing the number of females I carry each year would greatly increase my profit margin. For me personally it isn't about producing more bucks each year as it is about producing the same number of bucks at a lower cost.


 


I am not a super smart guy, however as I see it we all need to find that "happy place" where profitability is at its highest. Based on my pen acreage, number of pens, feed costs, vet costs (which includes the current retesting schedule), my desired goal for number of bucks sold each fall, and the purchase price structure I have been given to expect from hunt ranches I intend to do business with, I need to.....


1. Sell my bucks each fall at age 2 and have each buck top the 200" mark.


2. Using live breeding or a combination of AI and live breeding I need to run 12-13 total breeding age females.


3. I should have a way to separate and live load the stocker bucks for shipment. This is tricky due to confining antlered bucks becomes dangerous with the fighting. However the cost savings on drugs and darts adds up fast.


4. If sexed semen was a viable option I could raise less breeding females (this frees up one pen) and possibly then hold back stocker bucks an additional year IF the likelihood of bucks topping the 250" mark was the norm. Because this is where the sale price to hunt ranches appears to make its next bump up.


5. Lower feed costs. I like my feed mixture and pellet consistency so changing feed suppliers is not my favorite option. Over the past 20 years finding a quality pellet supplier was a struggle. I won't go back to a loose feed again simply because I don't feel it is effective nor cheaper in the long run. Plus the logistics of how my farm is managed makes pellets and gravity feeders more viable. So I am limited in how much I can lower feed costs unless the sexed semen is an option.

Bell916411399149154

I guess another good question for us all would be "what is your farms purpose for AI stacking or breeding?" Without thoroughly educating ourselves on the% of heritability and influence of both the sire and dam throughout the whole pedigree it could be surmised that we are all just stacking.


I don't have necessarily scientific data that I followed associated with hereditary traits in whitetails that I used for my line breeding program. However I very closely tracked what I was doing on both the sire and damn sides. In years past I had both line breeding and stacking going in my herd. The past 3-4 years my program has floundered along with a messed up direction compared to previous years. I will say to run a good and true line breeding program you have to have access to a good selection of options. Some folks think it is bad that many farms all have such similar pedigreed deer. However what it does do is give anyone with those bloodlines a bigger pool to operate from. Note, similar and not exact. That actually was one reason I had good success with the Flees bloodlines. The pool to search through for the right breeding combinations was quite vast. Not only on their farm but off other farms of similar breeding.

I haven't decided if I will return to a dedicated and specific line breeding program or not. I guess it depends on how various things go for me the next year or two both in deer and outside of deer.

I will just add this. Line breeding does not mean breeding related animals. That is a very simplified way of describing it. I think many have the wrong idea of what line breeding really is. But hey whatever works and they are happy with so be it. It's their farms and can run them anyway the government, ah I mean to say they want. LOL