April 2019 Jersey Updates

The April 2019 sire summary evaluations reflected adjustments and changes from the American Jersey Cattle Association (AJCA) and the Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB).

Sires less than 90 for Breed Base Representation (BBR) are receiving Multi-Breed Predicted Transmitting Abilities (PTA) created using pure-bred population data from their component breeds as determined by BBR. These sires will be identified with the evaluation type as April 2019 CDCB-M or by their BBR value. Sires possessing BBR values between 90 and 100 have an evaluation computed on an all Jersey data and reference population and are identified with the evaluation type as April 2019 CDCB-S. While there are noticeable changes on a few bulls from the December 2018 sire summaries, this change will create more stable and consistent evaluations in the future.

Unregistered Jerseys, identified with the UR prefix, have the previous Jersey Performance Index™ (JPI™) and Jersey Udder Index™ (JPI™) notations replaced with URPI and URUI.

Select Sires is also excited to offer Jersey breeders additional selection tools with the introduction of new wellness traits. Sourced from the Zoetis CLARIFIDE ® Plus genomic test, this data predicts lifetime profitability for Jersey lineup sires. On the following pages you will find indexes for Dairy Wellness Profit Index ® (DWP$ ® ), Wellness Trait Index ® (WT$ ® ), Calf Wellness™ (CW$™) and other individual wellness traits that predict resistance to health events like Milk Fever, Mastitis and Metritis. These predictions are presented as STAs, meaning any value greater than 100 is above breed average.