More than just a research centre open day, the event brought together farmers, industry, researchers and policymakers to explore the future of Irish cattle breeding.
Held at Ireland’s national cattle performance testing and phenotyping facility in Co. Kildare, the event provided visitors with a unique opportunity to see first-hand how genetics, research and innovation are helping to deliver more profitable, efficient and sustainable cattle farming.
Attendees learned how Tully measures and evaluates animal performance, feed efficiency, sustainability and genetics, and how this information is helping to develop the next generation of cattle that are more productive, environmentally sustainable and better suited to the needs of Irish farmers.
Throughout the afternoon, visitors took part in guided tours of the centre, moving through a series of themed stops focused on key developments shaping the future of Irish cattle production. These included:
- The Gene Ireland Programme
- Traits Measured at the ICBF Beef & Dairy Research Centre
- Measuring Methane
- Breeding for Lower Greenhouse Gas Emissions
- AgNav: Supporting More Sustainable and Profitable Farming
- Benefits of the Commercial Beef Value (CBV)
The Gene Ireland Programme & Traits Measured at the ICBF Beef & Dairy Research Centre
The first stop on the tour of Tully was an overview of how the Gene Ireland breeding programme works. Emphasis was placed on the strong cross-industry collaboration required to ensure all stakeholders benefit from the programme.
The journey starts with pedigree breeders producing high-index bulls. The AI companies then purchase the best of these and make 500 straws available for the progeny test. ICBF oversee the distribution of the straws to commercial progeny test herds throughout the country. These herds record vital on-farm records, and finally a subset of progeny from each bull is finished in Tully. The traits measured in Tully include feed intake, methane emissions, growth rate, water intake, and even meat eating quality.
ICBF processes all this data and returns it to herdowners as Eurostar indexes, which help them make more informed decisions.
Measuring Methane & Breeding for Lower Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Methane is lost energy. Somewhere between 4 and 10% of everything a cow eats leaves as methane, so this is a feed-efficiency story as much as an environmental one. Ireland has committed to a 30% cut in national emissions by 2030, and genetics is the one mitigation tool that’s permanent and cumulative: a feed additive stops working the day you stop feeding it, but a bull’s daughters keep delivering for generations.
The two heifers on the board are the same breed, same age, same growth rate, same liveweight, finished together at Tully. Heifer A ate 7% less, produced 23% less methane, and still had a 4% heavier carcass. Per kilo of feed, she produced 19 grams of methane against 23. Same diet, different rumen. That difference is genetic, and it’s what we’re breeding for — not smaller cows, more efficient cows.
We measure methane with the GreenFeed units. An animal puts her head in for a bit of concentrate, the machine samples her breath, and every visit is linked to her tag and data lands in the ICBF database. Tully gives us controlled indoor data, and units on commercial dairy, dairy-beef and suckler farms give us the grazing and winter data that makes the breeding values relevant for Irish systems.
AgNav: Supporting More Sustainable and Profitable Farming
AgNav is Ireland’s national online sustainability platform for farmers, developed through a collaboration between ICBF, Teagasc and Bord Bia, with support from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. The platform helps farmers understand the environmental performance of their farms and identify practical actions that can improve sustainability while maintaining productive and profitable farming systems.
Built on the principle of providing a single, trusted source of information, AgNav brings together data from multiple industry databases and transforms it into clear, actionable insights for farmers and advisors. By combining environmental modelling, farm survey information, and production data, the platform provides a comprehensive overview of farm sustainability performance.
Benefits of the Commercial Beef Value (CBV)
The Commercial Beef Value (CBV) station demonstrated the real-world benefits of using CBV to identify genetically more efficient cattle early in life. From an analysis of 304 suckler bred heifers and young bulls, and 455 dairy-beef heifers and steers, cattle in the top 20% for CBV at birth produced heavier, better conformed carcasses, had a lower feed intake and methane production, and had superior kill-out percentages compared to cattle in the bottom 20% for CBV at birth.
At the same age at finish, higher-CBV animals delivered a significant profit advantage through greater carcass revenue and lower feed costs at finishing than low-CBV animals. Tully’s unique research herd provides the high-quality, hard-to-record data needed to independently test and validate genetic evaluations such as the Commercial Beef Value (CBV). This validation ensures the rankings predict real differences in animal performance, giving farmers confidence that choosing higher CBV animals can deliver greater profitability, efficiency and sustainability on farm.
The tours provided practical insight into the work taking place at Tully and showed how science, technology, and data are being translated into real on-farm benefits for both beef and dairy farmers.
In addition to the research and technology demonstrations, attendees had the opportunity to celebrate excellence in commercial beef production through the 2026 ICBF Beef Quality Awards.
Sponsored by FBD Trust and Ireland’s six major beef processors, the awards recognised some of Ireland’s leading commercial beef producers and highlighted the valuable role that genetics plays in driving profitable and sustainable beef production. The awards also celebrated farmers who are successfully applying genetic tools and Commercial Beef Value (CBV) principles within their herds.
ICBF would like to sincerely thank all visitors, speakers, exhibitors, industry partners and staff who helped make the event possible. The strong attendance and engagement throughout the day reinforced the importance of collaboration between farmers, researchers, industry and policymakers in delivering the next generation of improvements in Irish cattle breeding.
If you were unable to attend, you can view the Open Day Information Booklet here.
We will also be sharing video highlights from the day, along with profiles of the 2026 Beef Quality Award winners, over the coming weeks.
As Tully continues to generate the data and insights that underpin Ireland’s breeding programmes, events such as the Open Day play an important role in connecting research with practical on-farm application. By bringing together farmers, industry, researchers and policymakers, the event showcased how collaboration, innovation and genetic progress are helping to shape the future of Irish cattle farming.
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