NATIONAL Milk Records celebrates 60 years of milk recording this year - and a County Durham farming family has been a member since it began.

The Crozier family from Elwick has records dating back to the 1943 start.

Charles Cecil Crozier, who died only last year, started the pedigree Biggen herd in 1930 and made full use of the NMR service as soon as it was available.

His library of annual NMR reports makes interesting reading. The herd ranked second in the Friesian listings in the 1943 report for Durham, with an average yield for the 17 cows and heifers of 10,608 lbs - 4,816kg. Their cow Brunton Season was the highest yielding animal in the county, giving 14,473lbs (6,571kg) in 355 days.

Although Friesians gave the most milk, the predominant breed in Durham was still the Shorthorn and, out of all the herds in the county, only three were producing more than 10,000lbs (4,540 kg).

In that 1943 report Cecil Pawson, then senior lecturer at King's College, Newcastle, urged those dairy farmers not recording to reconsider, describing it as the first step in dairy farming.

Milk records were an essential means of increasing output and reducing costs of production in a way that would not impair efficiency, but he stressed that milk records must be properly interpreted so they could be used as an efficient management tool, and the same arguments holds true today.

The Biggen herd is now managed by Mr Crozier's grandson, Alan, in partnership with his father, Dennis, and brothers Colin and John. The herd has developed into 190 pedigree Holstein Friesians with an average yield of 7,863kg and 615kg of fat plus protein.

The Croziers remain firm advocates of accurate records and have recently introduced impelPRO software which manages and analyses their records for management purposes and automatically transfers required information to third parties.

The family still wins regularly in herd competitions. Their latest success is the best cow in the county award with Biggen Mab 139. She scored top points for a combination of production, inspection and calving interval over the last three years. In her fourth and most recent lactation she gave 10,644kg of milk and 843kg of fat plus protein. In line with her herd mates, Mab had an average cell count of 59,000 per ml.

NMR plans to celebrate its 60th anniversary with a gathering of dairy farmer customers and friends at the Dairy Event at Stoneleigh on September 17.

The Milk Marketing Board took over NMR in England and Wales from the Ministry of Agriculture in 1943. The Ministry had earlier taken control of national milk recording from the federation of county and branch clubs. By the mid-Fifties, NMR was recording 50pc of dairy herds in England and Wales and 60pc of cows.

The service was supported financially by the MMB and Ministry but, after the withdrawal of Ministry support, the MMB still supported it as it was deemed that all producers derived some benefit from the information provided.

Since 1997 NMR has been a totally independent company whose success depends on providing the modern, cost-effective services its customers require.

Despite these changes, it is still by far the major milk recording organisation in Britain and, through its on-farm services and dairy management programs, still records and manages data for more than half the country's herds.

Andy Warne, managing director for NMR, said: "Although the total number of dairy farms is declining, cow numbers are relatively stable. There is increasing demand for good on-farm records and information from our customers, consultants, retailers, the Government and consumer organisations generally.

"In 60 years the service has moved on from recorders travelling by motorbike, or even horse, around farms and relying on postal services to a highly technical electronic system. But the demands remain the same - regular, reliable and accurate records.