By Rex Powell
Cows in the 99th percentile (and lower in some breeds) are designated as elite, or high ranking grades. With the advent of the American ID, the designation of registered has been shifted to the registry status because it no longer can be determined from the ID itself. For Holstein, a registry status of 87 or higher is required for the elite list. The Holstein Association provided registry status on many cows to support this designation. Other breeds designate as registered any animal for which the registry status is not blank.
By George Wiggans
The designation of the first and last herd for a cow on the format 105 evaluation file has been corrected. The sequence of the file that supplies this information had been changed so the usable record occurred first. This caused the herd designation to be incorrect for some cows changing herd during lactation. The original sequence has been restored.
By Jill Philpot
For cows changing herd during lactation, the designation of the herd's data to be used in the evaluation was corrected. Data after 305 days sometimes had caused the incorrect herd to be used.
By George Wiggans
In an effort to reduce the number of test day errors generated, the errors were summarized and analyzed. Some conditions are now accepted and no longer generate errors. A report summarizing the errors is prepared following each submission to assist the DRPC's in identifying systematic errors, or possible missing data. The summary report contains entries for herd test days in the last 6 months where four or more records had a specific error code. Cow data is matched with herd data to assist in detecting conflicts, and data for a single cow is provided as an example.
By Leigh Walton
The test day data were analyzed to determine where cows had had a change in ID that had not been detected so there appeared to be 2 cows. The herd and cow control number were used to detect these missing cross references. A procedure to check cow control numbers routinely is under development. The cross references that were applied will reduce the number of daughters for some bulls.