Hypnose (Schneider) sold in Ireland cow-calf operator : Yves Nicolas (22)	Jonction (Downson)au at Gaec "Les Chênes" (65) cow-calf operator : Gaec Pouilly (80)

A dairy breed with high degree of adaptability

Prim’Holstein is a breed whose animals are tall, a breed easy to identify because of its black and white or sometimes red and white colour. The average weight of calves is greater than 40 kg whereas adult females weigh between 600 and 700 kg with a height of 145 cm at the sacrum. A very precocious breed, it benefits from a rapid growth rate and heifers easily calve at two years of age. 

A specialised dairy breed, it has the highest yield of milk as well as milk protein since the improvement of protein content has become one of the industry's breeding aims. 
It is also endowed with an excellent functional morphology, that is, an udder adapted to mechanical milking, a body capacity that provides optimal valorisation of fodder, a slightly sloped rump for easy calving and feet and legs which provide good locomotion. 

It is a breed with an impressive capacity to adapt : it can acclimate itself to all types of environments, even extreme ones, and to all types of feed.

The number one domestic breed

Holstein is the number one dairy breed in the world and the number one cattle breed in France. 
Prim’Holstein can be found throughout France but has a particularly important place in the major milk-producing areas of the west, north, northeast and southwest. It represents 73% of milk recorded cattle numbers and provides approximately 80% of the milk collected nationwide. 

A breed that came from the North

The Germanic people, traditionally hunters and fishermen, brought their cattle to the rich plains of the Rhine River about two to three thousand years ago. The common origin of all of the "Black-and-Whites" appears to be a population of dairy-type cows found along the North Sea coast (from Friesland to Jutland, passing by the Holstein region) which had been more or less crossed with Shorthorns. 

The breed was first improved at the beginning of the 18th century by a group of Batavian and Friesian breeders whose primary aim was to increase milk production. After 1945, the butterfat content and conformation were improved. Bulls chosen to improve these three traits guaranteed the considerable genetic progress and the success of the breed through their progeny (only black males were chosen but good red cows were kept), gradually spreading throughout Holland and the northwest of France and eventually being known as "Dutch" cows. 

Dutch settlers and navigators came to America (to the Great Lakes region) during the 18th century as well. Cattle imports began in 1852 and developed between 1860 and 1885 at the same time as the settling of farmland in the Midwest and the demographic development of the New World. In 1886, 10,000 animals crossed the Atlantic, including 750 bulls. The breed became known as Holstein Friesian in Canada and the USA. It rapidly replaced domestic breeds of Spanish and British origin. Thus, production and morphological characteristics were the same on both continents.

1880 : the king-size Dutch cow

From these two different points, the race set out to conquer all of the countries of Europe and Central and South America.  Beginning in 1945, as a result of the different context in North America, the selection of animals imported from Friesland and Holstein in the 19th century was based mainly on milk production and was extremely specialised (particularly by the Carnation Company in Washington state). Particular emphasis was placed on the udder (quality and hardiness). This difference in orientation explains the Holstein Friesian characteristics : high-level milk production, large size and flatter musculature than European animals.

In France, the breed was imported at the beginning of the 20th century in the north and gradually spread to the Paris area and Lorraine and finally to the milk-producing regions of major cities, in some of the valleys of the southwest, before reaching Brittany and the centre.  The Herd Book of the Dutch breed (Hollandaise Pie Noire) was created in 1922 : the Dutch cow was therefore close to the Holstein but endowed with a voluminous udder.  The period after World War II was characterised by a redefinition of the breed standard, turning it into a carbon copy of the standard Friesian mixed type. In 1952, the Dutch breed became know in France as the "Française Frisonne Pie Noir". As a result of directions taken in Europe by the Dutch and their partners, the animals were of the mixed type, which explains why most European countries imported Holstein breeding animals in the 1960's and 1970's to improve the milk production of the French Frisonnes. These imports had a considerable impact on breeders in Europe and throughout the world: the mixed Frisonne breed was specialised in milk production but was larger and had a higher quality udder.

A page from the Herd-Book 1937

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