Dexter semen

[thecatzpajamas]

I've been talking to my local AI guy about some semen I want to order & have him store for me. He mentioned that it would be better to get it from a distributor vs. 'straight from the farm' like they have on the ADCA website, for example. here's what he told me:

"I know they have good semen (cattlevisions). when you don't deal with a distributor you could end up having non vital semen. Its one of those risks of dealing straight from the farm."

Now, I know he is a professional & knows a lot about his business, but the distributors he showed me have really lame choices for Dexter bulls, not at all what I want. It's such a small market (Dexters), they don't carry more than a few choices.

Has anyone here had experiences with getting semen advertised online vs. using a distributor? If I order from a farm, even a farm I know, am I throwing my money away and buying non-vital semen?

[otf]

I think this will vary...some may keep the straws in their own tank at home and ship to you (or your AI person), but I have a feeling most are kept at a facility specializing in this (Select Sires, for instance). You would probably order it through the owner and they would probably arrange for shipment to your vet or AI person. It's usually shipped overnight in a special container. Call the owner of the straws and talk to them.

[otf]

Thanks Genebo, I knew you'd chime in with the facts!

[wdd]

All the semen I have bought from Dexter Breeders is stored at a Semen storage/shipping facility. I don't think any of the Breeders keep any on the farm except for personal use. Its too big a hassle to deal with shipping, the expense of the special containers ect to not have the pros do it. As Gene mentioned I purchase the semen from the breeder then am referred to the storage facility/shipper for delivery, or the breeder handle the shipping for me. The semen is then delivered to my AI tech.

[cddexter]

some extra things to think about?

Some of the listed ADCA semen specifically mentions what tests the bull has had, like Bangs, IBR, etc. Some doesn't. Privately collected semen in the US is not regulated, so anyone can collect anything with very little testing. You wouldn't want to bring into your herd some of the venereal diseases, or Johnes, or bluetongue or anaplasmosis, or any of the leptos.

Let's take bluetongue for example: it's a sheep disease, is very very common in the warmer parts of the country, and is spread by mosquitoes and biting flies. If the semen you choose hasn't been tested for bt, and was collected from a bull in the warmer areas of the US, it could be a carrier. Any calf will automatically become a carrier, too, if the semen is infected. The calf won't get bluetongue, but any mosquito biting the calf to suck blood from it, that then flies on (or is drifted on by a strong wind) and bites a sheep down the road, will pass on the bluetongue to the sheep. Especially if this is not a common diesease in your area and the sheep have little or no immunity built up, the sheep will die.

As well, every 'jump' collection will be slightly different from another 'jump' from the same bull, and variations can matter. Make sure that the quality of semen from any specific date is a known factor. This is called morphology and motility. Morphology is the expected percentage of live sperm in the straw after the semen's been thawed for use. Low morphology lessens your chances of getting a 'catch'. Motility is the quality of the sperm: what percentage is normal and healthy vs. deformed, missing tails, kinked, etc. If the motility is low, then it doesn't matter how plentiful the live sperm is, there's going to be fewer viable sperm to get a 'catch'.

I privately collected a bull in Oregon a long time ago. The semen quality was good, and the percentage live sperm was good. Twenty years later, that semen hadn't stood up to the long storage, and it was very low in live sperm when thawed. It was always stored at a professional center until sold to the individual purchasers. I don't know what happened, but somewhere along the line, the quality deteriorated.

If the bull has not been very active for a while, collection centers use the first one or two jumps to clean out the pipes, so to speak, before actually keeping, testing and freezing that bull's semen. Privately collected semen isn't usually so picky. Try to buy semen from a second or third jump, rather than from a first, if more than one jump was done.

Semen costs less that $2.00/straw to collect. What adds to the cost is the testing, and any quarantine required (if collected at a big center). Keep this in mind when buying. If two bulls are equal in your eyes, and the prices are similar, which one has the cleaner bill of health.

I'm in Canada, and we can't collect, even just for ourselves for on-farm use, unless it's done through a federally supervised professional center, and the bull and semen both are subjected to tests for all manner of diseases, to ensure the semen we use or sell is of the highest quality and free of disease. Bulls are quarantined for up to three months (at about $16/day). Collecting just a few hundred straws is a valid option in the US, but for us with all these extra costs, the per straw cost skyrockets unless you collect at least 800 straws, and even then we are looking at around $7/straw. Then there's the 65 cents/year storage charge on the semen we hold. Every straw I don't sell right away increases in cost annually until it's sold.

Gary's right about most semen is stored at a pro facility, rather than on farm. Individual shipping tanks cost around $300-400 each min., and a good storage tank for home use will run around $800. Much better and safer to use the big facility, and let them send the semen to a local distributor on one of their regular semen runs.

Call the owner of the semen, and get the answers you need first. Your local inseminator is right to a point, but he shouldn't be deterring you from selecting semen from your bull of choice, if it can meet the other criteria. The seller should know the morphology and motility of the semen he is selling. Expect somewhere around 30-45% viable semen when thawed. Ask how diluted the semen was when it was frozen. All this will give you an idea of what to expect and should prevent you from throwing that money away. c.

[kansasdexters]

When we collect a bull, we collect him in accordance with CSS protocol. What that means is that the bull is quarantined for at least 60 days in an approved facility and that he is tested for a number of sexually transmitted diseases and that the semen is tested for these diseases, and for morphology and motility. The semen is then "CSS-certified" if it meets the criteria.

What does this cost? Well, the bull is quarantined in an approved facility for at least 60 days:

60 days x $8.25/day = $495.00

The bull is "jumped" twice a week during that time to keep his semen in top condition:

8 weeks x 2 jumps/week x $60 per jump = $960.00

The disease testing for CSS-certified semen costs approximately $500 and includes testing (more than once) for BVD, BLV, Lepto (5 strains), Anaplasmosis, Johnes, Blue Tongue Virus (BTV), Brucellosis, TB, Vibrio, and Trichomoniasis.

Then it costs $2.00 per straw to prepare the straws, and then there is a storage fee for the straws. If we store 251 - 500 straws at KABSU (Kansas Artificial Breeding Service Unit), it costs $30.00 per month ($360.00 per year).

Thus, for a bull to be collected for 500 CSS-certified straws and stored for the first year, the "out-of-pocket" cost is $3,315.00 for the owner.

Unfortunately (for the Dexter breed) most orders for semen are for 5 straws at a time for any particular bull. So, in order to recoup the cost of collection, testing, and storage, the owner has to sell at least 111 straws at $30 per straw (20 transactions) in the first year. Then, at least 12 straws per year after that, just to cover the storage fees and break even. That doesn't account for the cost to transport the bull to and from the collection facility, ongoing advertising costs for the semen, A2 Beta Casein testing, Genotyping, PHA and Chondro testing, color testing, and the time spent to process each sale (phone calls and emails, creating and recording the invoice, mailing the invoice, and record keeping on semen inventory, etc.).

So now you know the rest of the story.

Patti

[cddexter]

thanks, patti. your costs are pretty much the same as ours, just the daily board is different: half of what is charged up here. I haven't done it for a while, so your pricing will be much more up to date.

The killer for Dexter owners is that there is such a small market. When you are collecting for a big commercial breed, you'll do in the thousands of straws, making those fixed costs miniscule when spread over a large number. For us, that same fixed cost is only spread over the few. It's a toss-up. Collect 200 and the per straw cost skyrockets; collect 800 and have it cost less, but have the $$ eaten up in storage costs instead. Galaxy was collected 20 years ago and there are still some of his straws around. I only collected 800, so you can see it takes a long time for them to be used, even for a popular bull.

This info doesn't help catz, tho'. If she's really concerned, it might be worth buying just two straws to start, and pay for testing herself, or talk it over with the owner and see if he/she would stand the cost as a promotional expense. c.

[thecatzpajamas]

wow thanks everyone, all this info is great, and I will def be doing some more research.