BEEF and dairy farmers are joining forces to raise money for testicular cancer research, while also improving their herd genetics as part of Breedr’s Bulls Out for Cancer campaign.

Running throughout May and June, the campaign aims to raise £5000 for the OddBalls Foundation. Using the free Breedr app, farmers can register all of their breeding information to help identify the best performing bloodlines and management practices. For every bull logged in the app in May and June, Breedr will donate £10 to the OddBalls Foundation, with an extra 10p added for each bulling activity or artificial insemination added.

Farmers who share their photos or video on Twitter with the hashtag #BullsOutForCancer will earn another £1 for the charity.

“Around 2300 men are diagnosed with testicular cancer each year, and the OddBalls Foundation is all about raising awareness and getting men to check themselves regularly,” explained Suzy Wheal, co-founder of Breedr. “Healthy balls are vital to farmers, whether that’s their own or their bulls’ – they’re clearly a vital part of any breeding system!”

Tom Ellis from the OddBalls Foundation responded to the campaign by saying: “Thank you to Breedr for raising money for the OddBalls Foundation. The money raised will go into helping us raise awareness of testicular cancer and get more men and boys talking about and checking their balls.”

Since its launch in 2019, Breedr has helped farmers to monitor and predict growth rates, keep track of medicine usage, and maximise productivity based on real-time data. It recently launched a live trading platform for farmers to buy and sell cattle as well as the world’s first smart, minimum-priced beef contract. Now, it is unveiling a suite of free breeding tools, enabling farmers to collect all their information in one place and benchmark against industry standard Key Performance Indicators.

Charlie Beaty farms 85 Simmental cross suckler cows with her father and uncle at The Dairy Farm, Meriden, Warwickshire, and has just joined the 3000 farmers already using the Breedr app. “At the moment, my uncle has management software on his computer, so we have to use a pen and paper each day to keep records,” she said. “It’s just not accessible or easy to use. Having that information accessible to all of us, on our phones, all the time, is going to be a massive benefit.”

Live information on each animal will make it easier to pick up issues and address them, Ms Beaty added. “We can see what’s bulling, what’s in-calf and who to, birth weights, growth rates and so on. That will help highlight where there are problems. We had an infertile bull a few years ago and it massively affected our calving interval – we’re only getting back to a tight block now. With solid data, we would have picked that up more quickly.”