Recognizing reproductive excellence

The Dairy Cattle Reproduction Council awarded 24 dairy farms based on their reproductive achievements. Six dairy farms were awarded honors in each category — platinum, gold, silver and bronze. Recipients were recognized during the DCRC annual meeting Nov. 11-13, 2025, in Middleton, Wisconsin.

Jason and Marie Felling

Felling Dairy LLC

Sauk Centre, Minnesota

Stearns County

Describe your facilities and list your breeding management team. Our dairy has a 28-stall rotary parlor with 6-row freestall housing. Our breeding management team consists of our team from Stgenetics, Jason and our herdsman team. Our herdsman team does all the breeding.

What is your reproduction program? We use a synchronized program. We use double ovsynch for the first service, then resync if open after pregnancy checks. We will breed standing heats for the first service. Our heat detection program includes tail chalking and visual heat detection. The same herdsman team that breeds the cows does the heat detection. It is crucial that the herdsman team pays close attention to the details. For example, if a heifer is too small at 415 days, she will not automatically be bred; the team will use their own judgment. All employees are trained to let the herdsman team know if they see a cow or heifer in heat. We breed a cow within 24 hours of noticing a heat. This is why it is crucial for the herdsman team to pay close attention to all details. We are in the process of implementing the Farmfit monitoring boluses, which will assist the team with monitoring heat detection.

What protocols do you follow to reach the goals for your breeding program? Breeding success is achieved with all the small details. Protocols must be closely followed. Shots must be given on time and animals in heat must be bred on time — all the little things are how to achieve success. Recordkeeping has become a crucial part of our dairy business to help us closely monitor fine details. Weekly, we review individual reproduction results, the number of times bred and semen type on cows and heifers. We use a variety of systems to ensure all data is properly entered. We currently use QuickBooks, EZfeed, DairyComp, DairyPlan and Farmfit.

What percentage of your herd is bred to sexed, conventional and beef semen? Our semen protocol is currently 100% combined beef semen and sexed Holstein.

What are you using to confirm pregnancies? We check pregnancy status with a veterinarian from Freeport Vet Service weekly. We check 32-, 60- and 200-day pregnancy statuses. If a member of our team notices a cow in heat that should be pregnant, we will add her to the upcoming vet check. Cows are generally checked on Mondays and heifers on Thursdays.

What changes have you recently made to your breeding program? What has been the residual effect of those changes? Numerous changes in the past few years have helped us monumentally in our reproduction program. We take the process seriously and give attention to details. We are disciplined in protocols and keep them simple. In-house breeders have helped us be able to breed when the cow is ready more often. The in-house breeding team knows our herd best, so we provide ample time for the team to do its job. We also align closely with our nutritionist, Nelson Dairy Consultants, to focus on high-quality forages. Stgenetics has also been influential in advising based on our herd needs. The implementation of Farmfit will allow us to closely monitor the herd. Our goal is to read what the animal's body is telling us, allowing us to make more efficient decisions.

What is the best advice about reproduction you would give to someone building up their program?  To obtain excellence in reproduction, all things must align. Work closely with your team, creating a culture where employees want to and are able to follow protocols. Find a nutritionist you closely align with and focus on high-quality forages.  Be mindful of the little things and enjoy what you do.

Tell us about your farm. Felling Dairy LLC is a third-generation dairy farm south of Sauk Centre, Minnesota. We raise our own youngstock as well as our haylage and corn silage.

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Wim Hammink

Hammink Dairy LLC

Bruce, South Dakota

Brookings County

4,300 cows

Describe your facilities and list your breeding management team. We have two locations, 1 mile apart. The first location has the close-up cows, maternity area, fresh cows pen and a hospital pen, and also houses the calves up to 5 months of age. The second location has a barn for all milking cows and a separate barn for dry cows. Our team has two people who do most of the breedings and one person who does most of the ultrasound. The management team, together with help from Select Sires, decides what we are going to use for bulls.

What is your reproduction program? We have a 70-day voluntary wait period. We give a Lutalyse shot at 60 days in milk and breed about 50% of the cows around 70 DIM. The cows that did not show heat will get a second Lutalyse shot at 82 DIM. We breed our cows only after they show heat on our CowManager system. Only about 3% of the cows that do not show heat after two Lutalyse shots go on offsync.

What protocols do you follow to reach the goals for your breeding program? Our breeding protocol is set up in DairyComp and cows are coded for Jersey or beef semen. If cows are not pregnant at 200 DIM they get do not breed status. We use about 1.9 straws per pregnancy and our 21-day pregnancy rate runs 39%-40%.

What percentage of your herd is bred to sexed, conventional and beef semen? We breed about 40% of the cows to sexed Jersey semen and 60% to Charolais.

What are you using to confirm pregnancies? We use in house ultrasound.

What changes have you recently made to your breeding program? What has been the residual effect of those changes? We have not made changes for the last few years. About four years ago, we increased the voluntary wait period from 60 to 70 days since we were getting too many cows pregnant too early.

What is the best advice about reproduction you would give to someone building up their program? A good and well-balanced ration with minimal changes through the year and following a strict protocol is working well for our reproduction. We also have an excellent team doing the work.

Tell us about your farm. We moved here from the Netherlands in 1995 and started milking in 1996 with 300 cows. Over the years, we gradually expanded to 4,300 cows today. We milk three times per day in a double-15 parallel parlor in our transition facility. Most of our cows are in a cross-ventilated barn and are being milked on a 60-stall rotary. We produce about 60% of our forages ourselves and work with the neighbors for more alfalfa and corn for silage. Hammink Dairy LLC is a family-owned dairy with three partners, Wim, Nicolien and Tom.

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Corey Hoffman

North Creek Dairy

Chatfield, Minnesota

Olmsted County

500 cows

Describe your facilities and list your breeding management team. We have a freestall barn with sand bedding. We use Select Sires for all our reproductive work. The team from Select Sires includes Jenna Reps, Kim DeFrang, Riley Augustine, Mary Ramirez and Jordan Pahl.

What is your reproduction program? We use double ovsynch. We also have an activity system for which I am currently disgusted with the warranty department and will be replacing it next summer when the contract runs out.

What protocols do you follow to reach the goals for your breeding program? We are using a good vaccination program and working with the best people we can find.

What percentage of your herd is bred to sexed, conventional and beef semen? We shoot for 14 heifers a month and everything else is bred to beef bulls. No conventional Holstein semen is used.

What are you using to confirm pregnancies? Dr. Portia Seckerson from Northern Valley Vet ultrasounds every Tuesday morning. It is my favorite job on the farm.

What changes have you recently made to your breeding program? What has been the residual effect of those changes? We have not made any changes in quite a while as far as breeding goes. We are constantly trying to improve everything else, which affects breeding. Feed and cow comfort are the two most important issues that affect reproduction; we are always looking to tweak these to improve. I feel cow comfort and longevity are something that can and should be improved in our industry. We owe it to the cows. Never be satisfied with where you are; you can always be better.

What is the best advice about reproduction you would give to someone building up their program? Surround yourself with not only the top people in the industry (veterinarians, hoof trimmers, nutritionists) but also the top producers. Listen to what they have to say, find something that interests you and try it out. Dairy farming is an art. There is nothing wrong with thinking outside of the box; that's how advancements are made. You can always improve. I remember in 2008 our pregnancy rate was 22%. It was good for the time, and an industry rep said we did not want to get it over 25% because their studies had shown it isn't profitable over that number. Now, look at where our industry is. I always wonder, what are we doing now for practices that we will look back at in 10 years and shake our heads?

Tell us about your farm. North Creek Dairy was started in 1903. Garrett, Tira and August Hoffman are now the fifth generation.