Livestock Farming, Breeding and Reproduction
What an animal is owed, how a farmer tells at a glance that one is well, and how the next generation is produced. Then inside an egg, along the lactation curve, and into the choices behind every commercial breed.
Justify the choices, the way you are assessed
Free interactive practice on the decisions the assessment actually asks you to justify.
Start revising freeWhat you'll cover
What an animal is owed
Before any of the production side, this course starts from what a farmed animal is entitled to. The **five freedoms** apply to cows, sheep, pigs and poultry alike: freedom from **hunger and thirst**; freedom from **discomfort**; freedom from **pain, injury and disease**; freedom **to express normal behaviour**; and freedom from **fear and distress**. The fourth one is the one people forget, and it is the reason housing and stocking density are welfare questions and not just management ones.
Which are the five freedoms?
Select the TWO that are among the five freedoms.
- Freedom to express normal behaviour
- Freedom from fear and distress
- Freedom from being sold at market
- Freedom to live outdoors all year
Five things to look at
A farmer walking through a shed judges general health in seconds, on five things.
Match each animal to how long it carries
- Cow
- Ewe
- Sow
- Hen's egg (incubation)
- About 283 days, roughly nine months
- About 147 days, roughly five months
- About 114 days, remembered as three months, three weeks and three days
- 21 days from setting to hatching
Set the incubator
A commercial laying hen produces typically around 300 eggs a year. One of them is set in an incubator. How many days until it hatches? Give the number only.
Two ways to get a calf
Most dairy herds use artificial insemination, and it is worth being able to say why rather than just that they do.
When is embryo transfer worth it?
A pedigree herd has one outstanding cow. Why might the farmer use embryo transfer rather than simply breeding from her normally?
- Because her embryos can be carried by other cows, so she can produce far more calves in a year than she could herself
- Because it is the cheapest of the three methods
- Because it guarantees the calves will be female
- Because the gestation period is shorter
The first milk is not milk
What the mother produces in the first hours after birth is **colostrum**, and it is a different substance from ordinary milk. It is thicker, richer in protein, fat and vitamins, and above all it carries **antibodies**. The newborn is born with almost no immunity of its own, and colostrum is how it gets a working defence. **Timing is the exam point.** The gut can absorb those antibodies only for a short window after birth, and that ability falls away within hours. A calf or lamb that misses colostrum early cannot make it up later, however well it is fed afterwards.
Reproduction in a paragraph
A cow carries a calf for about _____ days. Most dairy herds breed by _____, which gives access to proven bulls without keeping one on the farm, though it depends on accurate _____ detection. To get many calves from one outstanding cow a farmer would use _____ transfer instead. Whatever the method, the newborn must receive _____ within hours of birth, because that is how it gets its antibodies.
Inside an egg
Five parts of this egg are marked. Drag the right name onto each one. Two of the labels are parts of an egg that are not marked here, so you will not use them.
Read the lactation curve
A dairy cow typically gives around 8,000 litres across a lactation of roughly 305 days before being dried off. This graph shows her DAILY yield over that time. Tap the part of the curve where she is at peak yield.
Three reasons and one honest catch
**"Explain why most dairy farmers use artificial insemination rather than keeping a bull. (6 marks)"** "AI gives access to semen from proven bulls anywhere, so a farmer can improve milk yield or conformation far faster than one bull of their own would allow. It also removes the cost and the real danger of keeping a bull on the farm, and reduces the risk of disease passing between animals. The trade-off is that it depends on spotting heat accurately, since the timing has to be right, and it requires a trained technician or training for the farmer." Three reasons for, one honest limitation. On a six-mark "explain", the limitation is what turns a list into an answer.
State what breeders select for
Build a sentence describing selective breeding accurately.
Match each breeding trait to what it means
- Growth rate
- Conformation
- Hardiness
- Longevity
- How quickly the animal reaches market weight
- The animal's physical shape and structure, and how well it suits its job
- How well it copes with poor weather and rough ground
- How many productive years it gives before being replaced
Why keep the old breeds?
Commercial breeds out-produce traditional ones. Why is it still worth keeping rare breeds going?
- Because they hold genes the commercial breeds have lost, such as hardiness or disease resistance, which may be needed later
- Because they actually produce more than commercial breeds
- Because they cost nothing to keep
- Because they look more attractive on a farm
Your turn: advise the herd owner
A dairy farmer wants to improve the herd over the next ten years while keeping welfare high. Advise them.
- Name two of the five freedoms and say how they affect how the herd is housed
- Recommend a breeding method and justify it against the alternatives
- Explain what must happen in the first hours after a calf is born, and why
- Explain one risk of selecting hard for production, and what guards against it