Cow Success is All About EFFICIENCY

By Sarah Thomas

If it’s your first time meeting brothers Dave and Rick Conrad, it won’t take long to realize they are some of the most humble and passionate dairy farmers in the industry - but not because they’re the type to tell you that about themselves.

Quietly nestled in Grafton, Ohio, is Conrad Farms LLC, a fourth-generation dairy operation established by Dave and Rick’s grandfather in 1946 after moving from Avon, Ohio, to its current site in Penfield Township. The original purchase of the farm was 240 acres and 35 cows; half were Holstein and half were Brown Swiss. Today, the farm is a 100 percent registered

Holstein herd (98 percent homebred) with 250 cows and more than 1,000 acres. It is managed by Dave and Rick in addition to Dave’s son, Bradley, the fourth generation.

The brothers’ father, Clarence, and Uncle Larry farmed together until Larry joined the military. At that point, Clarence Conrad sold the Brown Swiss to focus on Holsteins. Both Rick and Dave began farming with him in the 1970s and attended The Ohio State University’s Agricultural Technical Institute. After obtaining some young-farmer loans, Rick bought 25 cows, many of which came from Steinbeth Farms near Rittman, Ohio. Heifers were grown

Elsewhere To Keep Total Investment Costs

down.

In the 1980s, Rick and Dave became official partners with their father in Conrad Farms. The herd grew to more than 100 cows and they went from milking in a stanchion barn with bucket units to a pipeline. By the turn of the century in 2000, the herd had 200 cows. Many cattle were purchased locally and in Canada, thanks to friend Dave Dyment of Ontario. A freestall barn and a double-eight herringbone parlor were built to get the herd milking three times a day.

In 2002, the brotherly duo bought out their father’s portion of the farm. It was then they started hyper-focusing on the game of efficiency. This meant investing in genetics, artificial insemination, flush work and some top-notch heifers.

One of these heifers included Ri-ValRe Finley Carol-ET EX-91. “We bought her in 2004 at the Buckeye Classic Sale during Spring Dairy Expo as a small calf. Delbert Yoder helped us pick Carol out, and she topped the sale. The sale staff wanted a high-seller photo, but we loaded her up and took her home because we didn’t want anyone to know how much we paid for her,” recalled Rick, laughing.

“She did okay as a calf, but she was a great-looking milking yearling when she calved out. Delbert advised us to take her to Louisville (for the North American International Livestock Expo) as a fall milking yearling. She was nominated All-American.”

At that point, the All-American nominations were printed in Holstein World. Ernie Kueffner purchased Carol, but she left a lasting impact at the Conrad residence. She produced four daughters and one son of note, including her Lucky Mike daughter that sold for $11,000 at the 2006 Buckeye Classic Sale and her Lucky Mike son that went into the Select Sires Young Sires A.I. Program.

Another animal that changed the game for the Conrads was out of the same cow family as Carol: Ri-Val-Re Shtle Desirae-ET EX-93, also purchased at the Buckeye Classic Sale. She earned merits in the ring and was even showed in the futurity at the Ohio State Fair. At the time, the closest Trans Ova Genetics facility was in Maryland, so they drove Desirae all the way to Boonsboro for IVF.

On the home front, the Conrads still yearned for efficiency. A spanking new double-10 rapid exit parlor with computerized milk weights was installed. “In 2012, we invested in our young stock and built a heifer facility to bring all of our heifers back to the home farm,” said Rick. “Over the years, our herd size increased to 250 cows and 250 replacements. We’ve been focusing on cow comfort and genetics.”

Over the years, their rolling herd average has drastically boosted from 19,000 pounds per cow to over 32,000 pounds. They began genomic testing five years ago to identify lower-performing genetics for culling and good-genome heifers to reproduce those through sexed semen and flushing. “We find value in our registered Hol- steins,” said Dave.

The current breeding program calls for all sexed semen on all virgin heifers and only on the top milking cows. The majority of the herd, or lower-end genetics, receive beef semen.

“In the last three years, we have purchased high-genomic heifers from sales in Ohio, and we are now flushing and IVF those heifers to elite genomic bulls looking for additional genetic sales,” said Rick. “We have used sires from all studs, but we do have a fair amount of GENEX daughters, but our main focus within the past seven or eight years has been with COBA/Select Sires and using bulls from their NxGen program as well.”

The Conrad herd has a current grasp of 2700 GTPI and its top 10 are extremely close to 3000, with three of those even over that mark. “The focus on functional type, components and genomics has given us the ability to become more efficient without adding cow numbers,” Rick stated. “Current production has cows at over 32,000 pounds of milk with a 4.2 butterfat and 3.4 protein.”

The family harbor a passion for grain farming as well. After purchasing and rent- continued on page 10