Hill Valley Mascot Alice ET was awarded the coveted 2006 Holstein Australia Cow of the Year title at International Dairy Week, taking home $1000 for owner/breeders Roger and Helen Perrett and further securing her place as one of the breed’s truly exceptional animals.

Although she is a cow with no history in the showring, Hill Valley Mascot Alice ET – VG88 has had a significant impact on the breed with 30 female and 20 male progeny. Among her daughters, 29 of them ET cows, are 1 EX, 17 VG and 6 GP, and she has a total of 84 VG animals in her daughters and granddaughters, with her total progeny listed at an amazing 5157 animals.

Included in her offspring is the Genetics Australia bull ranked Number 3 in Australia, DONANTE - Hill Valley Dom Andante.

“When you look at her contribution to the breed, you can probably see why the judges picked Alice out of the 4 finalists” said owner Roger Perrett.

“Her contribution has been phenomenal and while we were over the moon to get her into the Global Cow of the Year final, winning this is something else again.”

He says that Alice was clearly destined for greatness when she began her first lactation 13 years ago and she hasn’t let the family down since.

“She is a dream cow to work with; she has a superb temperament and her manners around the dairy are excellent. That combination of temperament and milking ability were like nothing we’d ever experienced before.”

And for a cow who completed her best lactation, 10,340 litres 356 kg protein and 447 kg fat in the mid 1990’s when such figures were truly at the extreme end of production, Alice has shown great longevity. In fact that is a trait noticeable in the herd – her Dam is still on the property aged 18.

Roger and Helen Perrett milk 300 cows on their 130 Hectare farm near Korumburra in South Gippsland running both their Holstein Stud and a pedigree Jersey herd in one group. Milked through a 32 stand rotary dairy, the Perrett’s have a clear focus on high production, “feeding cows to hit their genetic potential” as Roger puts it. To that end the farm grows crops of maize for silage, millet and sorghum and the two herds are individually fed in the dairy to account for the different requirements of Holstein and Jersey cows.

The herd was the Number 1 ASI herd in Australia, and Alice is also a former Number 1 ASI cow, a remarkable combination of breeding and production that the family is keen to develop.

Their daughter Melissa – a vet nurse at a nearby practice – has also started her own stud, Mytee Holsteins and Jerseys and works on the farm alongside a full time staff member.

“We are planning to try to develop the Alices further in the future” says Roger. “I aim to strive for a fertile, low maintenance, high production cow, something which is a growing issue for all the industry.”

Alice is currently empty and will be flushed in February to an as-yet unchosen proven bull.