Coum Masda (Dude daughter out of a Bradnick) is one of the important ambassadors of the La Coumière herd. She is pregnant to Haniko, one of the appreciated bulls on this French dairy farm.
One of the well-known prefixes in the national French show world is Coum: the prefix of the La Coumière dairy enterprise owned by the Varnier family in the northeastern part of France. For many years already, this herd with 380 milking and dry cows has been able to regularly provide cows that end up high at French shows – and sometimes even beyond the French borders. Cow families and solid conformation – these are key words on this beautiful French farm. In addition, from time to time, they also sample their own promising sires, as you will discover in this report.
JAN BIERMA HAN HOPMAN
‘The sires that we select certainly need to originate from a very solid family. Not with just one or two nice generations, no, with as many generations of outstanding cows as possible, preferably EX ones. In addition, we also look at actual production realized by the cows – they need to be solid.’ Does the Varnier family also look at indexes? ‘Barely,’ responds Alban Varnier. ‘They are not that important to us. In the first place, we look at conformation, and like to see that combined with outstanding production. But: if the conformation is very attractive, and the production is average, then we will still consider a sire like that. But, the other way around – lots of production, with average conformation – has no chance at our place. And as mentioned: the composition of the genetics (“montage genetique”) really needs to be in order.’
Together with his father Jean-François, uncle Daniel and cousin Quentin, Alban manages a beautiful dairy farm with 380 milking and dry cows in northeastern France, about 90 km west of the city of Nancy. Their 330 cows are milked in a rotary parlour, which at one point was described as one of the “best parlours in France” by the French magazine PLM. Cows that enjoyed being seen recently in the parlour are especially daughters of Stantons Chief and Siemers Lambda Haniko. ‘We have about 45-50 Chief daughters, of which thirty have calved. They are doing very well here, with tremendously good udders. Very solid cows,’ reports Alban.
CALTONED FAMILY
One of the notable Chief daughters at La Coumière is Coum Pasta, who is now in her 3rd lactation and scored EX-91. At the same time, Pasta represents the strongest family in the herd; the family with Pasta’s dam Coum Masda EX-91 as the key cow. (Masda is pictured with this report.) ‘Masda is one of our very best cows, thanks to her own splendid achievements, as well as her outstanding daughters and granddaughters,’ explains Alban. Masda (a daughter of the Canadian Atwood son Gibbs-I Claynook Dude) traces via Bradnick-Zenith-Calypso-Goldwyn-Terrason-Lantz-Dombinator-Blackstar back to a Ned Boy daughter who at the time enjoyed great popularity in France: Caltoned, owned by Gaec Dairy Genes. It was Caltoned’s granddaughter by Dombinator, who was purchased at the time by the Varnier family; the family has then already been on the farm for eight generations. Masda EX-91 represents that 8th generation and is already the dam of four daughters: the already mentioned Pasta, Osda VG-89 (<Ammo-P), Tasda VG-85 (<Amaretto) and… a pregnant daughter of Coum Extrem, a homebred sire who was used intensively in their own herd and also on the farm of French breeder Philippe Deru. ‘We have about thirty daughters by Extrem, the last of which will calve this year,’ says Alban.
HOMEBRED SIRES
Who is Extrem and why was he used so intensively? ‘Together with Deru, we purchased the then young Arcade, a full sister of the well-known Shottle daughter Amarante, owned by the Cabon family. As a two-year-old, Arcade became Reserve Junior Champion at Eurogénétique, after which we sold her again. But: out of Arcade (who would later score EX-90) we had the young Goldwyn bull Extrem, in whom we both had a lot of confidence. For that reason, we arranged for the Belgian AI company AWE to freeze 3,000 doses, and he was used widely,’ explains Alban. Extrem (born in 2009) developed into one of the better conformation sires of France; today the Goldwyn son still scores +1.8 conformation based on 245 classified daughters. ‘Cows with lots of milk, very solid udders, and lots of strength,’ is how Alban describes his daughters.
Do they do this more often: using homebred bulls? ‘If they appeal to us, sure,’ responds Alban. ‘We currently have a young Bullseye son that is three months old that we also plan to use ourselves. If we have confidence in the family, when a large percentage of the descendants from the family perform splendidly at our place, then we are always willing to try homebred bulls.’
As is the case with this Bullseye son, who has the appreciated cow Wilt Envy VG-88 as dam. Crushtime daughter Envy was purchased as a calf at a Wilt sale and is now working on her third lactation. She descends from the successful Elegance family, is a half-sister of the popular conformation sire Wilt Emilio (+10 conformation on the Canadian base;
SHOWS
You heard it already: cow families are an essential factor at La Coumière. In that regard, Moh Olivia also deserves mention. This EX-91 Skychief daughter (good for >103,000 kg/226,600 lb milk) is the foundation cow of the family with the most descendants at La Coumière. Just like Olivia, many of her descendants are performing very well in the home herd, but also at prominent shows. For example, Merchant daughter Coum Vahinée became the Junior and Udder Champion in Paris in 2006, and Vahinée’s full sister Velia became the French National Champion 2009. Homebred sires from this family also received opportunities; for example, a Goldwyn son of Vahinée, Bowyn Coum, was used.
What is the breeding goal of the Varnier family? ‘We want cows with outstanding conformation that also produce well. Nice conformation is important to us as it enables us to fully enjoy working with our entire herd each day, and allows us to participate at shows. We visit about five to six shows annually,’ explains Alban. When we speak to him just before writing this article, they had recently returned from the regional show in Coulommiers, east of Paris. Six cows participated there and they captured three Reserve Champion titles: for the Juniors, Intermediates, and Seniors. In addition, they were the proud owners of the champion for the Seniors; here Wilt Envy and Coum Jisa ended up as Champion and Reserve Champion respectively. Jisa also participated in the Swiss Expo earlier this year, and is an EX-91 Chief daughter out of a Mogul – she also descends from a family with a very solid background. Hence the unchanging strategy at La Coumière: lots of attention to powerfully transmitting families: A proven formula for continuing success, for decades already.
La Coumière in France
Alban & Quentin Varnier.
Located near Effincourt in the department Haute-Marne Owned by the Varnier family 510 ha: 110 alfalfa, 90 corn, 100 grass, 210 grain Ration: TMR of 23 kg alfalfa silage, 20 kg corn silage, 3.2 kg soya, 1.5 kg grain, 3.5 kg ground corn, 8 kg beet pulp, minerals Production 2x 10,923kg/24,030lb 4.15% 3.31% Current sires: Weeksdale Rockstar, Blondin Detective, Robella Major, Siemers Wolf Hulu-RC, Blondin Direct
