Exterieur Meetingn in Slowenia

This year’s meeting of the chief evaluators from the European countries took place in Slovenia from 8 to 9 June 2022. Thirty-three participants from ten different countries came to this meeting and discussed the latest developments on the conformation complex. After more than 10 years, the traits were reviewed in terms of their significance for the service life. There is a relatively good agreement with the previous calculation formula. Only the trait hock development should be adjusted for the next meeting, as soon as further investigations on other foundation traits are available.

Too narrow and inwardly placed rear strokes will also be put to the test. Especially for AMS farms, an unfavourable constellation of both characteristics is problematic. Jože Smolinger presented the development of Simmental cattle breeding in Slovenia. Performance and quality of the cows have clearly increased. Slovenia aims to participate in the German/Austrian/Czech breeding value estimation system in the future. The practical exercises took place on the farm of Andrej Podkubovsek. His newly built free stall barn with about 50 cows offered the best conditions for this. Further topics were: Experimental trait line position in the front, results from the country comparison and the presentation of the programme for the upcoming World Simmental Congress with National Show in Austria.

Finally, the group thanked for the organisation of the meeting and for the hospitality.