It does though provide a stopgap to solving many of the health and welfare issues currently being experienced in Holstein herds, reckoned Frank Buckley of Teagasc's Moorepark research centre.

"But breed improvement must carry on in purebreds to ensure their is a significant gene pool to draw on for future crossbreeding programmes."

Speaking at last week's Semex Dairy Conference, Glasgow, Dr Buckley said crossing Norwegian Reds with Holsteins improved these functional traits significantly, with somatic cell counts showing noticeable improvements in crossbred cows compared to purebred Holsteins.

"In a study of more than 1200 cattle, 400 pure Holsteins, 400 Norwegian Red x Holstein and 400 pure Norwegian Reds, in commercial herds in Ireland, average SCC for the Holsteins was 190,000, but in the crossbreds this was much lower at 137,000. Coupled with this, only 6.9% of crossbreds had SCCs of 400,000 or more, while 9.5% of Holsteins topped this level."

Source: Fwi