Ky Hills- Your 2 replies to my posts, as usual, are very informative, and contain information that is derived from your own real-life experience. That is why I respect what you say, and nearly always agree with you. I see your point that other breeds have taken advantage of the CAB program, but I don't know if that has been detrimental to the goals of the AAA. In order to get Brangus, Black Hereford, Chi-Angus, the black Simmentals and Black Gelbievs, Limosines, etc, they had to use homozygous Black Angus cattle to do so. This further increased the demand for homozygous Black Angus breeding stock. People don't raise herds of registered Angus cattle to slaughter,, they raise them for seed stock. When the CAB was created, it was to increase the value of black angus market steers, which created the need for registered, homozygous Black angus cattle. And ,. it really didn't matter if these seed stock cattle were used on commercial angus, or commercial cattle of other breeds.. you needed homozygous black angus to insure your whole calf crop was black and had the carcass scores, like the correct marbling, to earn the CAB certification. So, to me, other breeds taking advantage of the CAB, was not hurting the AAA, but rather increasing the demand for homozygous black AAA registered cattle. I think red Angus are awesome animals, and maybe a higher percentage of registered red angus cattle , do produce the carcass characteristics that the CAB strives for. If you have a herd of commercial red angus cattle, and use a homozygous black bull.. Angus, Brangus, black Simmental...whatever.. you will most likely have a higher percentage of the calf crop that will have the carcass characteristics, as well as the black hide, for CAB. There for, it seems to me, that these are even MORE reasons for the AAA to strive for homozygous black, and to exclude red angus from THIS registry. And, it seems like a very good idea for the Red Angus registry to exist, as well, to preserve the foundation qualities of the original Angus. I see your point in that breeding for color, may have resulted in the loss of some foundation Angus traits in AAA registered cattle. I have seen this to be true in some of the colored horse registries.. APHC appaloosas are the best examples. You mentioned DNA testing for Angus genetics. I think time constraints would prevent this for CAB certification of carcasses, and would be contrary to the goals of the AAA when they created the CAB program, so don't know why AAA would want to do this as part of the CAB.. However, if enough people felt like they wanted an Angus registry that included both red and black, like some have said angus registries in other countries do, then perhaps they could create a Foundation Angus, or Heritage Angus, association, that required DNA testing for 100% Angus blood, regardless of hide color. Dunno what the value would be in today's beef market, but it could be a way to preserve the original angus characteristics for the purists. And of course, any of these cattle, or their offspring from crosses, that were black, would still be CAB eligible.