Dairy professionals and producers are invited to participate in the Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB) Industry Meeting on October 20, focused on improving cow mobility through genetics. Meeting participants will be among the first to learn of the foundational work underway to measure, research and improve hoof health and lameness.
The 2021 industry meeting – the seventh for CDCB – will be held virtually on Wednesday, October 20, from 2:00-4:00 p.m. EST. Attendees may register here to participate via Zoom.CDCB, the University of Minnesota (UMN), and several collaborators are working to create a pipeline for hoof health data collection and better understand genetic improvement for cow mobility.
“Lameness in dairy cows is an important topic for animal health, welfare and herd profitability, with estimates that about one-half of dairy cows will be affected during their productive life,” stated Javier Burchard, Chief Innovation Officer at CDCB.
Without an existing data pipeline for hoof health, the essential first step is to mobilize the means to measure and record phenotypic data,” Burchard continued. “This coordination among researchers, hoof trimmers, veterinarians and dairy producers has exciting potential for future genetic evaluations and management tools to improve cow mobility.”
The new project, “Reducing lesion-related lameness using a combination of epidemiological, genomic and extension approaches,” is a key part of the plan to develop a hoof health and lameness data pipeline. The work is facilitated by CDCB in conjunction with lead researcher Gerard Cramer, DVM, associate professor at University of Minnesota.
Interactive session with researchers, project partners
The October 20 meeting will be opened by CDCB Chair, Jay Weiker of National Association of Animal Breeders, followed by an interactive session with researchers and project partners.
- Welcome, Jay Weiker, CDCB Chair
- Reducing lesion-related lameness using epidemiological, genomic and extension approaches, Gerard Kramer, University of Minnesota
- Hoof health and lameness: Overview of data collection and genetics, Kristen Parker Gaddis, CDCB Geneticist
- Scoring lameness through digital locomotion images, Terry Canning, CattleEye
- Roundtable and Q&A: Selection for hoof health and improved mobility, moderated by Javier Burchard, CDCB
o Terry Canning, Cattle Eye
o Gerard Cramer, University of Minnesota
o Kristin Parker Gaddis, CDCB
o Josh Vander Well, Black Soil Farms
- Dairy Genetic Research Update, Dr. Asha Miles, USDA AGIL
- 2021 Year in Review, João Dürr, CDCB CEO
All dairy professionals, producers, and genetic enthusiasts are invited to register here for the October 20 meeting. For more on the lesion-related lameness study by CDCB-UMN, click here. Questions about CDCB or the industry meeting can be directed to CDCB Chief Executive Officer, João Dürr.
*USDA AGIL = United States Department of Agriculture, Animal Genomics and Improvement Laboratory
