CULL RATE CONSIDERATIONS

Part 1 of this series, Cull Rate Calculations, explained how culling metrics are calculated, with the theme, if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it. The counterpoint to “If you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it,” is called McNamara’s Fallacy – named for former defense secretary Robert McNamara who reputedly made errors because he disregarded things that could not be measured or counted. The point is, we need to apply some judgement to the numbers we calculated in part 1. I recall doing cull rate calculations when I nominated a herd for a DCRC award several years ago. I was shocked to discover that this high performing herd had a cull rate of about 50%. I dug deeper and cull rate considerations showed that at least half of the cows that were coded as culls were sold for replacements.

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