Report on Canadian crossing project with Norwegian Red (NRF)

Sixty farmers on a crossing project in Canada, who bred and owned over 1000 F1 NRF x HO heifers were surveyed and 37 responded in the busy harvest season.

The survey shows that the Norwegian Red breed is an excellent breed of choice for crossing with the Holstein breed in commercial settings, because of its unique superiority for health, calving ease and female reproduction, and fat and protein yields, since it complements the Holsteins in superior additive genetic merit for these traits and also brings significant heterosis to the crosses.

The farmers in the Canadian study rated the two heifer groups which had calved out for first lactations on a scale from 1=not satisfied through to 9=very satisfied. Over 600 of the 1000 heifers have calved.

The overall ratings for dairy merit were not significantly different for HO purebreds and NRF x HO crosses, at 6.79 for Holstein heifers and 6.76 for NRF x HO crossbred heifers in the same herd. When the two contemporary heifer groups were ranked and the rankings were analysed on their relative merit for 14 individual traits, Norwegian Red x Holstein crosses were significantly more satisfactory for calving ease, and for health traits, mastitis, digestive problems, feet and leg problems and reproductive problems. The NRF x HO crossbreds were also rated significantly more satisfactory for feet and legs conformation.

Purebred Holstein contemporaries excelled over the crossbreds significantly only on milk yield, udder conformation, and temperament. While not significantly superior the crossbreds had higher scores for fat and protein yields, for low stillbirths, for body condition score, and reproductive performance.