Aint ever seen nothin like this before!!!

[jersey lilly]

This is a bull we seen at the Houston Livestock show, I guess I was impressed enuff to take a couple pictures, but no way would this ever be in my pasture. I dont know if he hadda over dose of growth hormones, or what, YUCK!!!!!!!

 

[polledbull]

That looks to be a Belgium Blue . They are muscled like that . It is normal .

 

[jaydill]

That looks to be a Belgium Blue . They are muscled like that . It is normal .

Belgian* blue. A very muscular breed...often times double muscled, in fact. They come in a blue roan coloration as well.

 

[Beef11]

often times double muscled

i would go as far as to say that they are almost always double muscled. I think he looks like a pig.

 

[warpaint]

often times double muscled

i would go as far as to say that they are almost always double muscled. I think he looks like a pig.

Yeah, but look at the size of them hams.

 

[Ryan]

Belgian Blue indeed. I talked with a breeder last year at houston for a good while about them. Pretty interesting breed. They are double-muscled because of sometime of chromosomal or genetic defect that extremely minimizes the production of fat. Whereas, breeds like Peidmontese are double muscled b/c of heavy selection for muscle. The best example he gave me was this: If you go grab a brood cow out of the pasture of most any breed and put her on feed she will put on fat, however if you grab a Belgian Blue out of the pasture and put her on feed she will put on muscle. Pretty cool stuff. They had a BB X Angus steer that was about 5 months old. Man that dude was awesome. A solid black little power house.

 

[MikeC]

I put a double muscled Limo X Angus calf in the freezer a few years back. It was by far the best meat we had ever eaten. He dressed out a 73% carcass.

We need a touch of this in our herds today, but without over doing it. We are chasing the "Marbling" attributes and overlooking the main ones..............."Tenderness" and "Lean Meat Yield".
Lot's of feed is wasted by not doing so. Our biggest cost.

 

[rgv]

What's his name - Mr. Atlas?
Looks like one of those overdone body builders.

RGV

 

[Aero]

They are double-muscled because of sometime of chromosomal or genetic defect that extremely minimizes the production of fat.

i wouldnt call it a defect when it is part of the breed characteristic. it is considered a genetic defect in some breeds but not in the Belgian Blue or Piedmontese breeds.

here is a pretty neat article that tells why this happens and what the same thing does to mice and humans.

http://5barx.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t ... highlight=

 

[Ryan]

They are double-muscled because of sometime of chromosomal or genetic defect that extremely minimizes the production of fat.

i wouldnt call it a defect when it is part of the breed characteristic. it is considered a genetic defect in some breeds but not in the Belgian Blue or Piedmontese breeds.

here is a pretty neat article that tells why this happens and what the same thing does to mice and humans.

http://5barx.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t ... highlight=

Thanks for the link to the article. THat definantly cleared up my fuzzy memory from what the breeder had told me. I didn't know the same "mutation" was the cause of double-muscled pieds. I thought pieds were double-muscled by selection.

Thanks again.

Ryan

 

[dun]

There used to be a poster from somewhere in Europe that raised them. Claimed that they did there own C-sections and didn;t bother the vet. I figured that if you had to get proficient at surgery you either needed to go into the surgeon business or get rid of whatever it was that needed it that much

dun

 

[MikeC]

There is a fairly large Belgian Blue breeder in Selma, Alabama. About 30 miles from me. He claims he has never done a C-section and has only lost a couple of calves. He breeds his first calf heifers to more conventional breeds.

I have a very close neighbor who has Romagnola that are purported to need C-sections regularly. He has never seen a calf born and hasn't lost any either.

But I have a Brangus neighbor who has to pull about 50% of his calves.

Shows that you can get hard calvers in any breed.

 

[S.R.R.]

They are double-muscled because of sometime of chromosomal or genetic defect that extremely minimizes the production of fat.

i wouldnt call it a defect when it is part of the breed characteristic. it is considered a genetic defect in some breeds but not in the Belgian Blue or Piedmontese breeds.

here is a pretty neat article that tells why this happens and what the same thing does to mice and humans.

http://5barx.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t ... highlight=

Thanks for the link to the article. THat definantly cleared up my fuzzy memory from what the breeder had told me. I didn't know the same "mutation" was the cause of double-muscled pieds. I thought pieds were double-muscled by selection.

Thanks again.

Ryan

One nice thing about the Pied vs the BB is that their double muscling does not seem to start until they have been out of the cow for a while. Resulting in alot less calving problems.

 

[Aero]

One nice thing about the Pied vs the BB is that their double muscling does not seem to start until they have been out of the cow for a while. Resulting in alot less calving problems.

my understanding of the calving problems in Belgian Blue's is that their pelvic area is proportionally small compared to most breeds.

i also dont like them because of their late maturity. i read somewhere that a 13 month calving interval was about the best average you would get wth them.

i really would like to see somebody do a BB-Wagyu cross to see how well they grade though.

 

[MikeC]

i really would like to see somebody do a BB-Wagyu cross to see how well they grade though.

I'm with you. It would prolly make all us sell what we've got now. :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[dun]

i really would like to see somebody do a BB-Wagyu cross to see how well they grade though.

I'm with you. It would prolly make all us sell what we've got now. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Under the curretn grading system I don;t think they would grade. Double muscle if I remember correctly is a non-grading point.

dun

 

[MikeC]

i really would like to see somebody do a BB-Wagyu cross to see how well they grade though.

I'm with you. It would prolly make all us sell what we've got now. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Under the curretn grading system I don;t think they would grade. Double muscle if I remember correctly is a non-grading point.

dun

For "Feeder" cattle grading,they would grade "Inferior", but only because they don't fit in a normal pen of feeder calves.

Meat grades well and is more tender also. USDA has done several tests on it.

Look at the last part on "Implications":

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/Pl ... 123069.pdf

 

[Gale Seddon]

Looks like he was body-clipped, no hair????

Does anyone recall those very "artsy" well done photos posted a long while back, mostly European cattle, sheep, etc., most taken indoors as I recall. I think there was a Belgian Blue on there too. Thought I'd bookmarked it but can't find it on my computer anywhere.

 

[dun]

i really would like to see somebody do a BB-Wagyu cross to see how well they grade though.

I'm with you. It would prolly make all us sell what we've got now. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Under the curretn grading system I don;t think they would grade. Double muscle if I remember correctly is a non-grading point.

dun

For "Feeder" cattle grading,they would grade "Inferior", but only because they don't fit in a normal pen of feeder calves.

Meat grades well and is more tender also. USDA has done several tests on it.

Look at the last part on "Implications":

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/Pl ... 123069.pdf

From the USDA website on cattle grading! ** Double-muscled cattle are also graded U.S. Inferior because they do not deposit marbling normally.

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/Pl ... 123069.pdf

 

[MikeC]

The classification you stated was for feeder cattle. They don't have a classification for "Inferior" on the meat grading floor because of low marbling. The low would be "Standard", I think.

The DM (Double Muscled) cattle were not significantly heavier than the NM (Normal Muscled)cattle at slaughter, but they produced heavier carcasses and higher dressing percentages (Table 1). The increased yield of carcass weight was in part due to the increased amount of muscling in the carcasses. This was evident in measures of both ribeye area and ribeye area per hundredweight of carcass (REACWT). Measures of fatness were significantly lower in the DM carcasses, including external and internal fat depots. As a result of increased muscling and decreased fatness, the DM carcasses had two full lower yield grades than the NM carcasses. As the meat packing industry moves to a value-based system for purchasing cattle, muscling will impact price. Several packers are already utilizing REACWT in their pricing formulas, and thus carcasses from these animals may offer the advantages of more red meat yield and less waste fat.

The NM and DM carcasses were not different in maturity (Table 1). However, the NM carcasses had significantly higher marbling scores and quality grades than did DM carcasses. Quality grades for the NM cattle averaged low choice, while the DM carcasses averaged high standard. This again emphasizes the overall reduction in fat content of carcasses from DM cattle.