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Grassfarmer
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Joined: 21 Aug 2005
Posts: 1002
Location: Central Alberta, Canada
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Dylan Biggs
Rancher
Joined: 21 Apr 2008
Posts: 1444
Location: hanna,alberta
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Grassfarmer
Rancher
Joined: 21 Aug 2005
Posts: 1002
Location: Central Alberta, Canada
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 Posted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 10:39 pm Post subject: Re: Maternal genetics |
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| Dylan Biggs wrote: |
| Grassfarmer wrote: |
| Dylan Biggs wrote: |
| leanin' H wrote: |
A question I'd like input about has to do with the corelation between maternal genetics and carcass genetics. Are they absolute opposites or do they fall somewhere in the middle? I have always followed the thinking that it takes great cows to make great calves. And a bull that throws great replacements would be more attractive to me than a carcass bull. And a secondary question is which Angus lines do ya'll like as maternal bases?
My plan for my cattle is based on balance. I won't chase fads or extremes and I want to build my bunch on "perfect" mother cows who calve unassisted, breed back and raise nice calves. I want a balanced set of cattle that are moderate to below average on frame size with good feet being real important too. So knowing what I'm shooting for, advise me what you'd pick as maternal bulls to breed with. Thanks for the input!  There are no wrong answers!  |
There was a time when Angus were considered a maternal breed that also made good eating meat. Carcass cattle are more akin to limos or pieds or chars. Now because market forces have signaled we are trying to make carcass and maternal and growth and calving ease all in one. We want to have our cake and eat it to. It all gets a bit complex. A good old Angus didn't use to have to satisfy everyone. Soaps advise is as sound as any. Find a herd in your region that manages their cattle in the manner that suits you and study the cattle for soundness and go from there. |
I don't think it's so much market forces guiding the move as it is marketers of seed-stock (breeders) backed by greedy breed associations that want their breed to be the one that does it all.
I like this quote from Larry Leonhardt;
"The purpose of a purebred is to offer more predictability or continuity generation after generation. If the objective is to improve product consistency and do it more efficiently without sacrifice to the production end, the industry must look at what the rest of agriculture is doing and forego the persistant habits of the past trying to cram all the beneficial traits into one super parent. The dairy people traded beefiness for milk. The pork people finally accepted the genetic reality that the mother pig could not do her best job and also be the meatiest. I remain more convinced than ever that the industry will ultimately stabilize, not mongrelize, male and female parent lines designed for hybrid production." |
My comment referring to market forces is an observation of the evolution of carcass trait selection in Angus cattle that coincided with the grid carcass value evaluation system the processors embarked on in Canada about 20 years ago.It was also the same time period when the CAB brand really started to grow. It didn't take any time for purebred Angus breeders to try to capitalize on carcass data as an additional marketing tool or ploy, depending on your point of view. |
Sorry Dylan, I thought you meant that market forces were forcing people to cram carcass, maternal, growth and calving ease all into one package which is tough to do - hence my remark that this was more seed-stock breeder driven. Market forces acting to drive selection for carcass as you outlined makes sense.
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Dylan Biggs
Rancher
Joined: 21 Apr 2008
Posts: 1444
Location: hanna,alberta
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| Posted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 8:31 am Post subject: Re: Maternal genetics |
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| Grassfarmer wrote: |
| Dylan Biggs wrote: |
| Grassfarmer wrote: |
| Dylan Biggs wrote: |
| leanin' H wrote: |
A question I'd like input about has to do with the corelation between maternal genetics and carcass genetics. Are they absolute opposites or do they fall somewhere in the middle? I have always followed the thinking that it takes great cows to make great calves. And a bull that throws great replacements would be more attractive to me than a carcass bull. And a secondary question is which Angus lines do ya'll like as maternal bases?
My plan for my cattle is based on balance. I won't chase fads or extremes and I want to build my bunch on "perfect" mother cows who calve unassisted, breed back and raise nice calves. I want a balanced set of cattle that are moderate to below average on frame size with good feet being real important too. So knowing what I'm shooting for, advise me what you'd pick as maternal bulls to breed with. Thanks for the input! There are no wrong answers! |
There was a time when Angus were considered a maternal breed that also made good eating meat. Carcass cattle are more akin to limos or pieds or chars. Now because market forces have signaled we are trying to make carcass and maternal and growth and calving ease all in one. We want to have our cake and eat it to. It all gets a bit complex. A good old Angus didn't use to have to satisfy everyone. Soaps advise is as sound as any. Find a herd in your region that manages their cattle in the manner that suits you and study the cattle for soundness and go from there. |
I don't think it's so much market forces guiding the move as it is marketers of seed-stock (breeders) backed by greedy breed associations that want their breed to be the one that does it all.
I like this quote from Larry Leonhardt;
"The purpose of a purebred is to offer more predictability or continuity generation after generation. If the objective is to improve product consistency and do it more efficiently without sacrifice to the production end, the industry must look at what the rest of agriculture is doing and forego the persistant habits of the past trying to cram all the beneficial traits into one super parent. The dairy people traded beefiness for milk. The pork people finally accepted the genetic reality that the mother pig could not do her best job and also be the meatiest. I remain more convinced than ever that the industry will ultimately stabilize, not mongrelize, male and female parent lines designed for hybrid production." |
My comment referring to market forces is an observation of the evolution of carcass trait selection in Angus cattle that coincided with the grid carcass value evaluation system the processors embarked on in Canada about 20 years ago.It was also the same time period when the CAB brand really started to grow. It didn't take any time for purebred Angus breeders to try to capitalize on carcass data as an additional marketing tool or ploy, depending on your point of view. |
Sorry Dylan, I thought you meant that market forces were forcing people to cram carcass, maternal, growth and calving ease all into one package which is tough to do - hence my remark that this was more seed-stock breeder driven. Market forces acting to drive selection for carcass as you outlined makes sense. |
Grass Farmer no need to say sorry, i didn't explain myself well, I was in a hurry. You are right about breeds trying to be all things to all people. I think part of this is just human nature especially with the amount of data one can use to compare sires now when making breeding decisions. Its just human nature when looking at data and frankly more simple to characterize one bull as better than another because of the higher numbers. I see it all the time. The more is better psychosis is all around us, it saturates our culture and when you combine it with, the grass is greener psychosis it becomes the engine that drives our economy and our notion of progress. The majority of marketing preys on these two elements of the human psyche for a reason, it works. For the most part its no different in the genetic marketing either.
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RobertMac
Rancher
Joined: 10 Feb 2005
Posts: 3725
Location: Mississippi, USA
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flyingS
Member
Joined: 12 Oct 2009
Posts: 446
Location: Northern Sandhills Just East of Soapweed
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 8:39 am Post subject: |
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| Northern Rancher wrote: |
| The problem with best is we tend to correelate best with whatever pleases our eye not necessarily what is the most productive or profitable. Probably the best test is expose all your heifers and keedp the ones that breed first cycle-I got alot of ugly monjey making cowss doing that. i've always worked on breeding for mother cows-we ring the bell on the grid with those genetics and our replacements usually bring more than fat steers. |
NR has a point. I would ask why do you have to raise your own replacements. Unless you are a seedstock producer or are targeting a replacement female market, I can't see the advantage to raising your own heifer. If you figure her fair market value at weaning then add the expense of running her, breeding her, calving her and lower avg. weaning weight of her calf for 2 yrs, don't forget the cost of fall out, it looks like it would be cheaper to buy cows that fit your system and breed to terminal bulls. I have a friend that keeps replacements just because he likes them, he can't make them pencil. That's OK too.
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Silver
Rancher
Joined: 23 Mar 2005
Posts: 3531
Location: BC
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 8:56 am Post subject: |
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| flyingS wrote: |
| Northern Rancher wrote: |
| The problem with best is we tend to correelate best with whatever pleases our eye not necessarily what is the most productive or profitable. Probably the best test is expose all your heifers and keedp the ones that breed first cycle-I got alot of ugly monjey making cowss doing that. i've always worked on breeding for mother cows-we ring the bell on the grid with those genetics and our replacements usually bring more than fat steers. |
NR has a point. I would ask why do you have to raise your own replacements. Unless you are a seedstock producer or are targeting a replacement female market, I can't see the advantage to raising your own heifer. If you figure her fair market value at weaning then add the expense of running her, breeding her, calving her and lower avg. weaning weight of her calf for 2 yrs, don't forget the cost of fall out, it looks like it would be cheaper to buy cows that fit your system and breed to terminal bulls. I have a friend that keeps replacements just because he likes them, he can't make them pencil. That's OK too. |
There are several reasons to keep heifers, and some of them pencil out ;). I wonder why some folks worry about the chance of smaller weaning weights from heifers but not from 20 year old cows? If you keep the lighter end of your calves over for grass the next year, heifer's calves may be just what you want.
If you keep all your heifer calves, expose them to bulls, keep the breds you like you will also have a fine pen of yrlg. heifers that will do well at market by the pound.
I find most years that there is better money selling yrlg. steers I have raised, so why wouldn't heifers be similar? There are several more good reasons to keep your own heifers, but I'll quit here for now
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RSL
Rancher
Joined: 19 Dec 2008
Posts: 1202
Location: 48 5W4
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 9:17 am Post subject: |
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This is a pretty interesting thread. First, I would say what makes money. Depending on how/when you sell and what you sell the emphasis on carcasses, and what type of carcasses is probably different.
I think GF is on to something...
If you really push lean yield, you will lose some fat which is pretty critical and important to managing cows through inclement range conditions. If you push lean yield you will lose some fertility and marbling.
why not use a maternal line with all the fleshing ability/marbling and cross it with a terminal sire and have the best of both worlds? If you are selling CAB and the premium is larger than the benefits of xbreeding that is one thing.
I think you can find maternal cattle with decent carcasses, I think you can find terminal cattle with decent maternal abilities, but each combination leaves something on the table to a straight maternal or straight terminal line.
FWIW...
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cowsense
Rancher
Joined: 10 Feb 2005
Posts: 1365
Location: Central Saskatchewan
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 10:53 am Post subject: |
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| Sean......You nailed it! At least that's my opinion too & I'll stick to it!
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Northern Rancher
Rancher
Joined: 10 Feb 2005
Posts: 12235
Location: saskatchewan
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:28 pm Post subject: |
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| something our Dads had figured out 40 years agho we just had to reinvent the wheel every generation lol
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andybob
Rancher
Joined: 24 May 2006
Posts: 1023
Location: Laverstoke England.
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 2:13 pm Post subject: |
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When I made my breed choice in 1970, I went for what had been proven to make a profit in my very challenging environment. A medium framed easy keeper with exeptional fertility and mothering as proven in government research over several years, filled all my requirements, especially as I later had an exhausting military deployment schedule.
Despite being selected on maternal merit, the carcases were graded in our higher range, straight off native grass. I provided some F1 heifers for another larger ranch who then produced a terminal generation for their feedlo/butchery business. Neighbours added heterosis and muscle by crossing with British genetics, Sussex being the best in our environment, black cattle of any breed didn't cope, and most exotics struggled with the parasites and diseases, requiring dipping for tick controll, wide spectrum vaccination, and winter feeding, all adding to cost of production per weaned calf. Maternal breeds and F1 cattle adapted to the local environment are the most profitable, with the option of using a terminal on the poorer producers to achieve the required carcase weight or colour for CAB premium.
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Grassfarmer
Rancher
Joined: 21 Aug 2005
Posts: 1002
Location: Central Alberta, Canada
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| Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 8:08 pm Post subject: |
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| RSL wrote: |
I think GF is on to something...
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Don't think I've really discovered anything RSL - well other than maybe discovering that there are some smarter people out there I can learn from because they have it figured out already. As NR says it's nothing our fathers and grandfathers didn't know.
I think we are living in a genetic dark age with the dumbing down that goes on so that anyone that can read EPD numbers and multiply them to come up with a bigger total is a cattle breeding genius. Take away the props, the better nutrition management and medicines and I doubt most of today's cattle are any better than those of 100 years ago. I have a real admiration for the guys that created and refined types of cattle into the breeds we know today - now they had a genius.
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