Longevity, length of productive life and lifetime performance of German Brown Part 2: Systematic effects on lifetime performance and lifetime efficiency

Summary In the present study, lifetime milk-, fat-, protein yield and efficiency of lifetime milk-, fat- and protein were analysed. Analysis of variance for systematic effects was employed using a mixed linear model for an uncensored dataset including 524,190 German Brown cows born between 1990 and 2001. Date of birth, date of culling and age at first calving were registered for all cows under analysis. On average, lifetime milk, fat and protein yield were 22,127 kg, 924 kg and 789 kg and average efficiency of lifetime milk, fat and protein were 8.34 kg, 0.35 kg and 0.30 kg. Relative herd production level of the cow contributed the largest variance on lifetime milk production and its efficiency. Cows with lifetime milk yield and...