The Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB) will roll out several updates with its December 2025 genetic evaluations. These changes focus on improving accuracy, speeding up evaluations, and strengthening data security. The goal is to ensure that dairy producers continue to receive reliable, up-to-date information to guide breeding decisions.
Health Data Refined for Better Accuracy
CDCB has changed how it collects and processes health data. Records from cows that move between herds during the same lactation will now be excluded. This step prevents duplicate entries and gives a more accurate picture of each cow’s health record.
Testing during the August 2025 evaluations showed strong results. Correlations across health traits such as milk fever, displaced abomasum, and metritis resistance stayed above 0.97. These numbers mean the updates won’t cause major shifts at the herd level. A few individual cows or sires may see small differences if animals changed herds mid-lactation.
Modernizing Holstein Type Data
CDCB and Holstein Association USA have reviewed the type data used in evaluations. More than one million old records—mostly from animals born before 1998—will be removed.
In the past, these records helped fill data gaps. But today’s genomic tools can predict type traits more accurately without them. Removing outdated data improves consistency and ensures that evaluations reflect current Holstein genetics.
This change will not affect A.I. bulls or genetic indexes. Some individual animals may show slightly more variation, but the overall accuracy of herd data will improve.
Faster and More Efficient Evaluations
CDCB has also streamlined its genomic evaluation software. The new system removes extra steps and uses updated international data earlier in the process.
The result is faster evaluations with the same high level of accuracy. Test runs from August 2025 showed correlations above 99.9% across breeds and traits. Any small changes came from rounding or coding differences, not from data loss or performance issues.
Stronger Data Security
To strengthen data protection, CDCB will shift from anonymous FTP to secure HTTPS access for public file downloads on February 2, 2026. The HTTPS platform offers stronger encryption, better access control, and easier use with modern browsers and tools.
Producers and partners can already access files through the new system at
https://webconnect.uscdcb.com/base/ftp/pub/. Private SFTP access for authorized users will stay the same.
What These Changes Mean for Producers
These updates reflect CDCB’s continued effort to make dairy genetic evaluations more accurate, efficient, and secure.
By refining data collection and improving technology, CDCB helps ensure that producers, A.I. organizations, and genetic advisors base their decisions on the most precise and trusted information available.
Better data means better breeding—and continued progress for the dairy industry.
Source: Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB), November 2025.
