Superiorr calves from superior cows

CURTIS -- After moving to Curtis to practice at the Medicine Valley Veterinary Clinic in Curtis, Dr. Lee Jones discovered that area producers wanting to improve or enhance their herds through embryo transfer had to go outside Nebraska -- a state known for animal agriculture and high-quality cattle. "I was surprised there was no local company providing bovine embryo transfer services," Dr. Jones said.

Dr. Jones and his wife, Katy, opened Frontier Genetics International in a small travel trailer two years ago, and a year ago, moved into a new clinic on a hill south of Curtis overlooking the Medicine Creek Valley.

"Breeders kept encouraging me to build a facility specifically to expand the bovine embryo transfer service, Jones said.

Frontier Genetics specializes in embryo transfer, the goal of which is to increase the number of superior offspring from superior cows.

Left to nature, a heifer or cow will normally produce one calf a year. By using fertility hormoes in the embryo transfer process, a donor cow can be stimulated to produce 15-20 eggs or more, with an average around 8-10, Jones said. Between 55 and 65 percent of those embryos should become pregnant, Jones said, after being transferred to recipient or surrogate cows. "We have gotten as high as 100 percent, and as low as 20-30 percent," Dr. Jones said.

Cattle producers select only their very best cows -- those they define as genetically superior -- as embryo donors, Dr. Jones said. Producers hope to pass on to the offspring whatever trait or traits they find desirable in the donor cow.

"The only way to reproduce a select cow or cow bloodline on a large scale is through E.T.," Dr. Jones said. "With embryo transfer, a producer can make some major moves in the right direction in one generation."

"We can make a lot of genetic progress through E.T. in a short amount of time," Dr. Jones said. "We can get several calves from different sires in one year, whereas that may take a lifetime under traditional means."

From hormone shots to breeding to collection, a cow can expect to stay at Frontier Genetics for a minimum of two weeks.

Breeding is done at the clinic through artificial insemination. The cow's owner determines the source and the availablity of the semen. "We mimic the natural process as closely as possible," Dr. Jones said.

Seven days after breeding-- plus-or-minus half a day -- "all the little seven-day-old babies are up on the tip of the horns of the uterus," Dr. Jones said. These embryos are then "flushed" out -- a non-surgical embryo recovery -- using a sterile, antibiotic fluid injected into the cow's uterus. The embryos get caught up in the fluid, the fluid is filtered as it washes back out and the embryos are collected for lab work.

In the lab, technicians can do several things with each egg, Dr. Jones said.

- The egg can be transferred fresh to a recipient cow whose cycle is synchronized with the donor cow.

- It can be frozen in straw pipettes in liquid nitrogen, and held indefinitely.

- It can be biopsied to determine sex. (The technology exists to determine the sex of resulting calves, Dr. Jones said, but the process is more complex than he is currently able to do in his lab.)

- It can be "split" -- a process called "twinning" -- producing twins from two cows.

- It can be sold. Producers sometimes sell embryos, and Frontier Genetics is approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to export embryos to Mexico, Canada, Australia, Argentina and Brazil.

Embryos shipped overseas from Frontier Genetics meet very strict standards to ensure that diseases were not transferred with the genetic material, Dr. Jones said.

Embryo transfer not only capitalizes on and carries on the genetic superiority of remarkable cows, Dr, Jones said it can extend the usefulness of a proven cow getting on in years, yet still healthy, or one who has had difficulty carrying a pregnancy to term.

E.T. can also address a cow's infertility, to get that animal back into production.

Frontier Genetics works with 20-or-so breeds of cattle for about 50 producers, who select the cows they feel are worthy of embryo transfer. "Cost limits this procedure to only excellent females," Dr. Jones said.

The embryo transfer procedure adds about $150 to $200 to the cost of a calf, he said.

All of the E.T. work can be done in-clinic, or by using a combination of in-clinic and on-farm procedures. "We're here," Dr. Jones said, "so we can manage all this for busy farmers/ranchers."

There are many factors involved in the whole process, Dr. Jones said, many over which there is minimal control. "We control what we can," he said, "by managing the donors in-clinic."

Dr. Jones said embryo transfer is a niche, a speciality within beef cattle veterinary science. The concept is taught in schools, he said, but not the techniques it takes to develop proficiency.

Embryo transfer is not glamorous work. It's hard work, with very demanding time restraints and piles of paperwork.

But the rewards are worth it, when a new wobbly-leg calf carries the dreams of a purebreed beef producer and the future of the beef industry in its genes.