Angus breeders, need mating advice

[Till-Hill]

Bought set really good deep, stout good uddered cows. Could use some more butt, and they are a tick shallow in their front foot angle. These cows have been selling bulls at the Iowa Bull Test in Tama. One of them is out of cow family that sold a $13,000 bull at Midland to Leachman of CO.
Page 29 is the bull that was sold to them: http://issuu.com/leachman/docs/2015_semen_catalog/1


106 cow Connection x Directive x Dateline 16972673

109 cow Objective x Lead On (709 cow and Leachman cow family) x Papa Universe 16972680

208 Accountant x Lead On x GT Expo 17294276
208's heifer by Maternal brother to Leachman bull or Hoover dam son, waiting for DNA

307 PA Power Tool x Mytty In Focus x Direction 17602610
307's heifer by Maternal brother to Leachman bull or Hoover dam son, waiting for DNA

709 Lead On x Papa Universe x Papa Forte (Leachman cow family) 15843607

803 Mytty In Focus x Blackhawk x 095 16178956

907 Objective x 208 x 095 16436141
907's heifer by Maternal brother to Leachman bull or Hoover dam son, waiting for DNA

What I had on hand and have used and know how they breed are:
For cows:
Consensus 7229
Prophet
For Heifers:
Bando 9074
sexed Right Answer
sexed Chisum
Confidence
Prophet
BC Lookout
Bismark

What do you think?

 

[Drzr]

Don't have any advice just wish you well!

 

[Jake]

What genetics are you willing to try and what do you want to stay away from? Kind of a hodge podge of types within those genetics so that's why I ask. What are you looking to change, keep consistent or improve?

 

[Till-Hill]

Willing to try anything as long as they make seedstock and are marketable. We sell a few show heifers already and would like to sell some more bulls that appeal to commercial cattle buyers. Like to maintain or add to the epd profile. Add some butt to them. Already easy doing big cows. I'd say all are 6+ frame cows and weigh over 1600#. Sorry had to edit. One thing I'd like to stay away from is any linebreeding. That's where I need the most help. Not real familar with Angus pedigrees. Will also use these cows for some SimAngus production. Didn't take time to AI this year and kicked them out with a baldy Lock N Load son.......

 

[Jake]

Willing to try anything as long as they make seedstock and are marketable. We sell a few show heifers already and would like to sell some more bulls that appeal to commercial cattle buyers. Like to maintain or add to the epd profile. Add some butt to them. Already easy doing big cows. I'd say all are 6+ frame cows and weigh over 1600#. Sorry had to edit. One thing I'd like to stay away from is any linebreeding. That's where I need the most help. Not real familar with Angus pedigrees. Will also use these cows for some SimAngus production. Didn't take time to AI this year and kicked them out with a baldy Lock N Load son.......

I'd look at a couple of the SAV bulls out there (Resource, Harvestor) Would take a look at Connealy Black Granite. Or go a little older and use Bushwacker 41-93.

 

[Till-Hill]

Jake did you look up cows pedigree's? Is there something epd wise I am missing they need? I know $B is really hot right now........

 

[Katpau]

There are a number of bulls in your list that I would be happy to use for my own purposes, but they may be a bit behind the times for selling seed stock bulls. Selling seed stock is often as much about good promotion than it is about good bulls. When you breed you have to guess what everyone will be looking to buy two years from now when your bulls are ready to sell. The bull that is immensely popular today, may not be after a couple of his calf crops hit the ground. Personally I would like to see more seed stock producers figure out exactly what the want to produce, and then stick to a plan using well proven bulls, even when the rest of the crowd changes direction to chase after the popular bull of the month. You can use the proven bull already in your tank that best met your criteria, or try the bull being currently hyped and hope he lives up to expectations.

I will comment on a few of the bulls you mentioned.
Consensus 7229 - I have heard more than few comments about bad feet for this bull. If you are worried about feet, I would probably avoid him.
Prophet - I really dislike the way this bull is put together. His selling point is carcass quality, but I would never use him because of phenotype. I feel pretty sure you would not get more butt. I would bet just the opposite.
Bismarck - Another bull known for poor feet.
Confidence - He will take them down in frame score. If you like a bigger animal, I expect you might not be happy.
Chisum - I really like this bull, and have used him several years. I really liked most of his calves, and most had good feet and plenty of rear end, but most were out of cows with the same. I have one cow who has been an outstanding producer and has earned the status of Pathfinder on her first four calves with a weaning ratio of 116%. She is a good cow for the most part, but she has no A$$, as others like to say. I bred her to Chisum twice hoping to improve that area, but both calves got their mom's rear end, so I don't know if he would help your cows in that area.

 

[Katpau]

Till Hill,
Be really careful about breeding just to make good numbers. Especially carcass numbers. Sometimes that is the quickest way to ruin a good set of cows. In my part of the country cattleman are buying 10, 20 or more bulls every year to put out with 100's or 1,000's of cows. Most never ask about $B, and most pick their bulls by appearance, with maybe a look at EPD's for weaning weight and calving ease. In Iowa I imagine most herds are 40 or less and most buyers know less about cattle, so they trust what the bull seller tells them is important. $B is mostly important as bragging rights between seed stock producers. It rises and falls with beef prices and it will go down if prices come down. I would not make $B a high priority when breeding your cows. If you know what you are doing you should be able to sell them based on their quality and not some low accuracy numbers on a piece of paper.

 

[Jake]

Jake did you look up cows pedigree's? Is there something epd wise I am missing they need? I know $B is really hot right now........

Take the $B and throw it out the window. EPDs are not the end all be all. Know your customers and their wants and try to breed for a TYPE and KIND that suits their desires and your own. Epds are a tool and should be treated as such. If you have reg# on the cows I would be happy to look at them but I have a fairly good idea based upon the bulls you posted what they are. Power, muscle, fertility, and ease of fleshing will never go out of style. Fancy EPD chasers will.

 

[cow pollinater]

There's lots of little tidbits of information running around in my brain but I'd want to see them before I acted on any of them. I will say that I would try to tone down the milk on whatever you use on the power tool daughter. I've seen a few train wrecks with him from too much milk.

 

[Till-Hill]

Katpau,

Yes I'm looking for the best #'d but best phenotype there is I guess.

CP on the milk side yes all these cows have way more milk # wise and you can tell looking at them. Tho they do keep condition real good. Even on the older end of the herd.

 

[Till-Hill]

Jake first post after each cow is the reg #

 

[Till-Hill]

Terrible pics the day we got them home so they weren't really in mood for pictures.

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php? ... 8296208910

 

[Jake]

Jake first post after each cow is the reg #

I appologize I missed that.

 

[jscunn]

Nice cows when I saw the pictures I knew the 106 cow was a Connection daughter. I had one that looked just like both in the face and body type.

I have some comments about the bulls as well ..

Consensus 7229- I dont know about the foot problems one way or another but he sure wont make them any bigger.. seriously downsize them.
Prophet - heard good things about him, watch out for alot of white..
Bismark - feet issues.
Confidence - He will downsize them as well.. decent type otherwise.
Chism - another downsizer, he will drag out the growth curve if you are putting steers in the feedlot. They get to a good end weight but take longer than most.

 

[Jake]

Do you have a picture of the 709 cow? Her and the 106 are my favorite on paper and I the picture of 106 is pretty good as well.

 

[Till-Hill]

I will get one asap.

 

[Son of Butch]

What I had on hand and have used and know how they breed are:
For cows:
Consensus 7229
Prophet
For Heifers:
Bando 9074
sexed Right Answer
sexed Chisum
Confidence
Prophet
BC Lookout
Bismark
What do you think?

You know how they breed and if you want to do selective matings I'll leave that up to you.
I like uniformity, so I would try to use one bull on all of them and tempted by taking a home run swing at the fences with a young sire. Quakerhill Manning 17831034 at Select Sires could be a good one and is one I would certainly consider.
He's only 15 months old, so your calves from him could be considered on the cutting edge of genetics.

http://www.selectsiresbeef.com/index.ph ... ge?bid=354

He's a great grandson of Upward and I wouldn't mind putting a distant shot of Upward into any of one of your cow pedigrees.

 

[talltimber]

SOB, what do you make of the $EN with this bull? How would you classify this bull, as a carcass bull I assume? I'm thinking this is indicating he would increase your cow size with kept heifers.

This may be painfully obvious to some, I'm just checking myself I suppose. Trying to learn to decipher the total picture with the epd's.

 

[Jake]

You know how they breed and if you want to do selective matings I'll leave that up to you.
I like uniformity, so I would try to use one bull on all of them and tempted by taking a home run swing at the fences with a young sire. Quakerhill Manning 17831034 at Select Sires could be a good one and is one I would certainly consider.
He's only 15 months old, so your calves from him could be considered on the cutting edge of genetics.

http://www.selectsiresbeef.com/index.ph ... ge?bid=354

He's a great grandson of Upward and I wouldn't mind putting a distant shot of Upward into any of one of your cow pedigrees.

Different folks looking for different things but if I was to use any young bull and wanted to retain females I would look at these two. Two of the top cows in Schaff's herd right at the front of the pedigrees.
http://www.herbsterangus.com/seedstock.html or http://genex.crinet.com/beef/index.php? ... 53&lang=EN


Upward to me isn't something you're going to see as a feet improver if that is something that you're looking for but that's just in the Upward's I've seen. And you get to chasing the $Beef a little too hard for my taste.