The Dairy Gene Ireland breeding programme is the national progeny testing programme for dairy cows in Ireland. Since its establishment in 2005, it has played a central role in delivering sustained genetic gain and ensuring that Irish dairy farmers have access to reliable, high-EBI sires proven under Irish conditions.
While the programme is well established, farmers regularly raise practical questions about how it works, what is involved and whether it is suitable for their herd. This article addresses the most common queries and outlines how interested farmers can get involved.
1. What Is the Dairy Gene Ireland Programme?
Dairy Gene Ireland is a coordinated national breeding programme run by ICBF in collaboration with AI companies and dairy farmers. Its primary objective is to identify, progeny test and validate young, high‑genetic‑merit dairy bulls so that only the most suitable sires progress to widespread AI use.
Each year, young genomic bulls with high EBI’s are nominated by participating AI companies. These bulls are then progeny tested across a large number of commercial dairy herds, with detailed performance data collected on their daughters. This approach ensures bulls achieve high reliability in a shorter timeframe, reducing risk for farmers and strengthening national genetic evaluations.
2. Why Is Progeny Testing Still Important?
A common question from farmers is why progeny testing is still required in the era of genomics. While genomic evaluations provide early indications of genetic potential, phenotypic data from daughters remains essential for validating performance and increasing reliability. Data generated by Dairy Gene Ireland is fed directly into the national breeding database, improving the accuracy of evaluations for all animals in the system. This combination of genomics and phenotypic data collections is a key reason Ireland has achieved sustained genetic progress over time.
3. What is needed from Participating Farmers?
Requirements for herds to participate in the programme include recording inseminations, sire and calving-ease details, using all allocated straws in the current season, and providing health information as it becomes available for the daughters of these bulls. For most herds, this information is already being recorded, so there is little additional workload. Farmers receive semen in structured “packs of straws”, with each pack containing a number of different young bulls. Individual bulls within a pack are allocated at random to ensure unbiased progeny testing across herds.
4. Can Farmers Choose Individual Bulls?
One of the most frequently asked questions concerns bull selection. Farmers do not select individual bulls within Dairy Gene Ireland packs. Instead, packs are designed to represent a balanced group of high‑EBI young sires, with an average EBI close to the overall test group. This approach ensures that no single bull is over- or underrepresented.
5. What Are the Benefits of Participating in Herds?
Farmers involved in Dairy Gene Ireland gain access to some of the highest genetic merit young sires available each year, at a discounted price. Using these bulls accelerates genetic gain within the herd and helps improve long-term profitability through gains in fertility, milk solids and Health.
Participating herds are also of particular interest to AI companies sourcing future elite bulls, as they are among the first to use top genomic genetics under commercial conditions. At a national level, the Dairy Gene Ireland breeding programme has delivered significant economic returns to Irish dairy farmers through cumulative genetic improvement, with profitability per lactation substantially higher today than at the launch of the programme.
6. How many bulls are tested?
Each year, approximately 60–70 young dairy bulls are progeny tested through the programme. To date, over 1,100 bulls have been tested through Dairy Gene Ireland, with hundreds of thousands of straws distributed across several thousand herds. The resulting data forms the basis of the first proofs for many AI bulls and plays a crucial role in ongoing genetic evaluations.
7. How Does a Farmer Sign Up?
If you would like to take part in the programme, Sign‑up options include: