Carol and I flew out to Vancouver to join the 2010 World Guernsey Conference Tour, which is in three stages the first tour starting from British Columbia crossing to Calgary. There are 21 tourists, 5 from Australia, 2 from New Zealand, 6 from the UK and 7 from the USA.
We were able to meet up with a cousin of Carol’s and her husband and spent 2 days with them seeing some of the local sights and learning about living costs etc. Joined the group on Sunday morning and then were given a tour of Vancouver city before a meal on top of Grouse Mountain (3,700 ft) accessed by cable car. Unfortunately the top of the mountain was swathed in mist so denying us what would surely have been the most spectacular views.
Day 2 Farm visits
The first visit was to Lindrian Farms owned by the Tamis family, this farm was affected by the new dual carridgeway which gives access to the USA and so had the opportunity to build a new set up in the last five years, and the new unit is working well. A six a side Herringbone ajoins a cubicle shed (free stalls), where the cows are bedded on deep sand over rubber mats and fed a mix of maize and grass silages fed behind self locking yokes and topped up with concentrates through out of parlour feeders. Cows are milked twice daily and the emphasis is on keeping the system simple.
The herd was mainly of Holsteins averaging 11,000 kgs, but the Guernseys are averaging 9,000 kgs and the feauture were the P family, where 5 members are iin milk, with a tremendous bodied Big Spring Roger cow having a Challenge son at Semex Lindrian Pinto, but it was her sister Lindrian Garrett Pippy Ex91 who made the most impression, this cow gave over 11,000 kgs at 5.90% in her third lactation and went on to produce 15,500 kgs in 550 days. John Tamis emphasised that at the yeild levels that he is achieving there is no point in serving cows before two hundred days in milk as they can not be dried off at the usual three hundred days.
Pippy had just calved again a bull calf by Aaron and a quick calculation of the GMI suggests that the calf would have a GMI of +250.
The second visit was across the border into the USA, where the highway men (the border guards) ripped us off, as apparently the visa waivers that all of the party had applied for, only covers access by air or sea but not by land! Anyway after a delay of forty minutes it was back on the bus to visit Leon Zweegman and Family at Linden in Washington state, where we were joined by the newly crowned Guernsey Queen (a local girl) and several Guernsey breeders.
The Rozelyn herd has had a big impact in the UK through the sires, Greg, Glacier, Holiday all of whom were selected for high components and have delivered that. There are about 50 Guernseys who share facilities with 150 Holsteins (the average herd size in Washington state is 340 cows). There were several daughters of Idle Gold E Challenge, who has had three sons, Mint, Dynamite and Marksman used in the UK and generally they impressed and none more so than Rozelyn Challenge Val Ex 92, she had produced 12,500 kgs at 5.3% and had a very milky Option daughter in the herd.
The tour party are having a competition at each farm to pick the best three cows and whilst at Lindrian there was almost univerasal agreement on the winner, at Rozelyn there was support for Rozelyn Greg Tiffany who had done 9500 at 5.3%. A heifer that caught my eye was a Banger grandaughter of Rozelyn Enhancer Judith, the dam of Jordan and also the dam of Accelerated Golden Julius the No 1 bull in Australia.
Because of the delay at the border time was limited at the farm but as ever on these trips the hosts had put on a “spread” and the Guernsey Queen was asked to reprise her speech given to the AGA Convention the week before in Pennsylvania and it was a really impressive effort promoting agriculture and the Guernsey farmers role in it.