I was able to spend a couple of days visiting farms in Cornwall and with the brilliant spring sunshine and hedges and verges in full bloom the county was looking fabulous but then so were the cows. I visited Tredinnick. Trewarnevas, Carne and Lower Keigwin having travelled down for the Judges workshop hosted by the Warren family at Tredinney. James had turned out 3 classes of six in show ring order and of very similar quality and 16 of the 18 were home bred.
The Tredinnick herd at Tregony of the Thomas family has expanded in the last two years and contains a lot of good young cows including Tredinnick Anneka 3 Ex 90, she is improving with age and Matthew has high hopes of her son Tredinnick Augustus who is running with his heifers.
Tredinnick Tiny 4 H83 is a very correct daughter of Boskenna Junes Royal Oak, whose many daughters are catching the eye as they calve for the second time , Tiny 4 has a very smart heifer calf by Ezekiel in the calf house.
The Grose family at Trewarnevas have used quite a quantity of “sexed” semen onm their maiden Guernsey heifers as both Elizabeth and Nicola are keen to see the Guernsey cow families prosper.
Trewarnevas Fayette Willows Precious EX 92 is still part of the herd at 17 years of age, and whilst she would appear to be no longer fertile she is a testimony to “high type” giving longevity.
Melville and Nicki Jelbert at Lower Keigwin after an uncertain time now have the bit firmly between their teeth and it was good to see a lot of very impressive young cows and in calf heifers in the herd in particular Lower Keigwin Megan 5 H84, Lower Keigwin Molly 12 H85 and Lower Keigwin Giselle 10 who are both daughters of Thornton Hercules.
My final visit was to the Hichens family at Carne who feel that the smaller cow suits there system better than the larger cow and that raises an interesting issue for EGCS, the GMI with a balance of 60% Production and 11% for Legs/Feet and 24% for Udder Improvement has definitely led to improvement across the breed, but should we be flexible enough to use GMI to recommend bulls for “special situations” ie extended grazing where the daughters of lower GMI bulls certainly are better suited.