Irish farmers can now use ‘Tinder for Cows’ app to find bulls

Irish farmers can now swipe right on a tinder type dating app for cows!

In a bid to find the most suitable breeding partner and to ensure they have a moo-ving experience when mating their animals, farmers can go to an app called Sire Advice to select a suitable partner for the pride of their herd.

Sire Advice is allowing up to 4,000 farmers to swipe left or right to match their cows with the best bull and sire for them. The dating service for cows contains a database of information including fertility, weight, ancestry, milk production and quality.

The app is a great tool for maximizing genetic gain in the herd by enabling the user to make more informed breeding decisions. Inbreeding is automatically avoided when using Sire Advice.

And stats show that farmers are buying into the idea.

A report from the Irish Cattle Breeders Federation, (ICBF) in 2021 revealed that 3,260 dairy farmers availed of the sire advice facility.

This accounts for the mating of over 473,000 dairy cows and heifers, of this figure 442,971 were assigned a Holstein Friesian AI sire – an increase of five pc from 2020 figures.

The popular Jersey breed saw a rise in popularity as well as 25,382 cows were matched for mating to a Jersey AI sire.