Sharp shooter Toystory laid to rest

The well-known Genex Cooperative sire - which had produced a record 2.415 million units of semen at the time of his death late last year - has had an impact on dairy herds across the world.

"The death of Toystory means the passing of the industry's most prolific sire," Genex chief operating officer Keith Heikes said.

"This bull was one of a kind for many reasons."

Toystory was born at Mystic Valley Dairy near Sauk City, Wisconsin, US, in May 2001.

At his November 2005 debut in the AI industry, Toystory was noted as "the new must-have sire, whether your breeding goals are profitability or show type."

Genex said his daughters provided a level of productivity, profitability and improved conformation that impressed producers and show judges across the globe.

In addition to his genetic qualities, Toystory possessed an unmatched semen production ability.

In April 2009, he joined an elite group of bulls throughout the industry that had produced one million units of semen.

Then, in May 2011, he became the industry's all-time semen production leader surpassing the previous world record of 1.767m units held by the Dutch bull Sunny Boy.

By May 2012, Toystory had furthered his impact on the AI industry reaching a remarkable two million units.

At the time of his death, Toystory had produced 2.415m units.

"In his lifetime, Toystory reached a level of semen production that might never occur again in history," Mr Heikes said.

"With the genetic progress possible in the dairy cattle industry today, through technologies such as bull evaluations based on genomics, it is very possible that no other bull will ever surpass his record."

Toystory remains a sellout bull with semen sold in more than 50 countries.