International and Irish researchers and Irish farmers took part in the conference and a series of regional dairy cow fertility farm walks.
It was concluded tackling fertility is a year-round effort, not just for the start of the breeding season.
The advice is, improving fertility is like baking a cake, you need all the ingredients to get a nice result.
On 21-day submission rate; cows cannot get in calf early if they are not submitted in the first three weeks.
On cow body condition; expect less than 50% six-week in-calf rate if the body condition score is less than 2.75.
Because heifers take seven to 10 days longer to come back in heat, calve them before the cows start calving. Experts said genetics accounts for 50% of the variability in fertility in herds.
The advice from New Zealander Scott McDougall on problem cows is that these cows are examined 10 days before the start of breeding in New Zealand.
This increases their chances of being submitted in the first three weeks.
Also from New Zealand, improvement of 2% per annum in the six-week in-calf rate is reported in their InCalf programme, a package of tools, resources and training which involves dairy farmers, vets, consultants and advisers in continuous improvement of herd fertility.
Data is the key to better fertility, said Torstein Steine from Norway, where fertility has been included since 1971 in the Norwegian breeding index.
Three farmers who have high levels of herd fertility outlined the five factors affecting fertility in their herds.
Three areas were common to each farmer:
* Genetics: importance of having a high fertility sub-index (SI) and selecting bulls with a high fertility SI;
* Heifer rearing: heifers must calve at the start of calving to achieve high six-week calving rates. Each farmer outlined two crucial points: reaching target weight at the start of breeding and synchronising the heifers.
* Cow body condition: each farmer outlined how to achieve correct body condition. It is a combination of dry off-times, dry cow feeding and grass quality throughout the breeding season.
