Black Angus crossed with White Shorthorn

[ANAZAZI]

In the United Kigdoms they cross white shorthorns with galloways, Every calf turns out blue roan. Heifers from this cross are kept as terminal cows as long as they can stand on their legs, see lightning and hear thunder! Anyway such f1 produce for many years.

I suppose the black in angus and black in galloway works the same way.

 

[turning grass into beef]

For starters, if you look closely at some shorthorns that look white and are registered as white you will see a few red hairs around their ears or around their muzzles. Thus their genotype is roan. That is why, in practice, it is possible to get a red calf if you cross a phenotypic white (genotypic roan) with a red shorthorn. In theory it is impossible to get a red calf if you cross a genotypic white shorthorn with a genotypic red shorthorn. You should always get a roan calf from this mating.
If you have purebred black angus cows and you cross them with a genotypic white shorthorn bull, IN THEORY you should get a blue roan calf. If you have crossbred black angus cows and a white shorthorn bull with red hairs around its ears or muzzle, then all bets are off. You could get blue roans, blacks, black with white markings, reds, etc. Remember in all of this that the term blue roan itself can mean a wide range of color. Blue roan can be anywhere from almost black with a few white hairs intermingled, or it can be an extremely light blue roan, or anywhere in between.
2 years ago we had about 50 black angus cross yearling heifers out with our shorthorn cross yearling heifers. About 5 were BWF or BBF, the rest were straight black. If I remember right we had 2 white bulls, 2 roan bulls and 1 red with white marks bull out with them. The calves from these heifers were about 40% blue roan. We also had a few red roans and a few RBF, so some of the heifers had to have the recessive red gene.

 

[3waycross]

Here is the cow I have been talking about. This is the first time for me using this upload technique the labels came out wrong. But it's not that hard to figure out. The White cow and her different colored dtrs. BTW she doesn't have a red hair on her. Anywhere!

 

[ANAZAZI]

I have no further comments on colour; but that is one deep cow!

 

[randiliana]

That is one darn nice cow, her heifers are pretty darn good too.

Don't know what to say for sure, but she pretty much cannot be Homo for the roan gene if she is throwing calves without any roaning on them.

 

[3waycross]

That is one darn nice cow, her heifers are pretty darn good too.

Don't know what to say for sure, but she pretty much cannot be Homo for the roan gene if she is throwing calves without any roaning on them.

I am looking forward to seeing what her calves look like with the new RA bull. So far out of 3 on the ground only one has any white and it's a small star on the forehead. However one heifer has roan on her nose and tail not much but it's there and she is out of a solid red and white cow.

These darned Shorties are like Forrest Gumps box of chocolates. You just never know what your gonna get.

One other thing I like about the RA crosses so far, they have smaller ears. It moght help the early calvers with frostbite?

 

[randiliana]

That is one darn nice cow, her heifers are pretty darn good too.

Don't know what to say for sure, but she pretty much cannot be Homo for the roan gene if she is throwing calves without any roaning on them.

I am looking forward to seeing what her calves look like with the new RA bull. So far out of 3 on the ground only one has any white and it's a small star on the forehead. However one heifer has roan on her nose and tail not much but it's there and she is out of a solid red and white cow.

These darned Shorties are like Forrest Gumps box of chocolates. You just never know what your gonna get.

One other thing I like about the RA crosses so far, they have smaller ears. It moght help the early calvers with frostbite?[/quote]

I wish that would help, they still freeze. Got 16 on the ground now (well 15, one was stillborn) and it doesn't seem to matter what size their ears are, the little ears freeze just as bad. Some don't have frozen ears at all, some just lost the edges, and one, I think mama stood over it all night and slobbered on it, he lost over 1/2 the ear. His other ear is just fine.

 

[cowman30]

Is that based on experience or just guessing? I know that Murray Grey are a cross between Black Angus and a White Shorthorn, but I wasn't sure if that would be the colour a person gets every time. When you cross a roan with a black you usually get a blue roan; not sure how the incomplete dominance of the white will cross with the black when the shorthorn is homozygous for the white gene.

Actually you are incorrect. Murray Greys were made crossing black Angus on a blue roan shorthorn cow.

 

[Keren]

I know that Murray Grey are a cross between Black Angus and a White Shorthorn,

Nope.

Randi, to answer your question, it is generally accepted that the sh cow in question possessed some sort of mutation since she was the only one in the herd to produce the mulberry calves; but there are also some in the breed that think she had something else in the woodpile, perhaps charolais, to get the diluter gene.

 

[3waycross]

I know that Murray Grey are a cross between Black Angus and a White Shorthorn,

Nope.

Randi, to answer your question, it is generally accepted that the sh cow in question possessed some sort of mutation since she was the only one in the herd to produce the mulberry calves; but there are also some in the breed that think she had something else in the woodpile, perhaps charolais, to get the diluter gene.

Speaking of the diluter gene. Here's one for your consideration.

I have 2 cows, a 3yr old and her 4yr old full sister. They are both white. They are out of a blk baldie cowX a Char/? bull. Last year the older one was bred to a blk crossbred bull and produced a white heifer. The younger one was bred to a reg Angus bull and produced a white heifer. Today the younger one gave birth to a BLACK bull calf and she was supposedly bred to our RA bull. Any ideas what's up?

 

[randiliana]

I know that Murray Grey are a cross between Black Angus and a White Shorthorn,

Nope.

Randi, to answer your question, it is generally accepted that the sh cow in question possessed some sort of mutation since she was the only one in the herd to produce the mulberry calves; but there are also some in the breed that think she had something else in the woodpile, perhaps charolais, to get the diluter gene.

Thank you Karen.

 

[randiliana]

Speaking of the diluter gene. Here's one for your consideration.

I have 2 cows, a 3yr old and her 4yr old full sister. They are both white. They are out of a blk baldie cowX a Char/? bull. Last year the older one was bred to a blk crossbred bull and produced a white heifer. The younger one was bred to a reg Angus bull and produced a white heifer. Today the younger one gave birth to a BLACK bull calf and she was supposedly bred to our RA bull. Any ideas what's up?

She WAS probably bred to your RA bull. We have a very light grey cow in the herd, that has had red and a black calves too, so far no grey or white, but, I'm sure that will come.

You have to understand the genetics of both the black baldy cow and the Char bull the cows were out of.

First off, the Char is Homo for the diluter gene, that means you will get a grey/tan calf. The exact shade of grey/tan will vary a LOT. Char's also have a RED base coat (well most of them do)

Now the black baldy cow, is most likely Ee - hetero black (carrying red gene)But could also be EE (homo black)

So here is what happened with your younger cow
She is Hetero for the dilute gene, and is carrying both the black and the red gene (hetero black)

So she is DdEe

Last year you bred her to a Reg Angus bull (presumably homo black)

He was ddEE

Your calf would have been
Dd - hetero dilute
EE/Ee - homo or hetero black (doesn't really matter in this case the end result is the same)
So it was grey (very light) with a black base coat.

This year you took her again

DdEe

And bred her to a RA bull

ddee

She passed on the BLACK gene, but not the DILUTER gene. The bull passed on a red gene which was overridden by the black, and he had no dilute gene to pass on. Thus you got a black calf.

Essentially your younger cow could throw grey, tan, black OR red calves depending on what she is bred to. Most likely the older cow could as well.

 

[3waycross]

Or it could be the Corriente bull from the neighbor. Who I am thinking about shooting.

funny thing is ,the neighbor who I actually like, tells me that most of the calves out of him even with blk cows come out RED.

Randi I like your explanation it makes sense and the calf LOOKS very Angus not corriente.

 

[randiliana]

Or it could be the Corriente bull from the neighbor. Who I am thinking about shooting.

funny thing is ,the neighbor who I actually like, tells me that most of the calves out of him even with blk cows come out RED.

Randi I like your explanation it makes sense and the calf LOOKS very Angus not corriente.

Could be, but unless you saw the neighbours bull in with your cows at about the right time, I would go on the assumption that the calf is out of your own bull. It is all in the math, and understanding of the genetics in question.

Good luck with the rest of your calving.

 

[blackcowz]

There's some discussion on this over here. Pretty good info.

http://www.steerplanet.com/bb/index.php?topic=8979.0

http://www.steerplanet.com/bb/index.php?topic=9113.0

 

[Nelson Ferris]

White Shorthorns are HOMOZYGOUS for the roan gene. The roan gene is an incompletely dominant gene which means that it displays itself differently when Homo and when Hetero.

Essentially breeding a white shorthorn to a black angus will give you some shade of blue roan. Could be almost black, could be almost white, but there should be some roan somewhere.

RR = White
Rr = roan
rr = solid colored

I'm not real sure how the Murray Grey breed got started from a white Shorthorn cow, unless, there was some sort of mutation, because from everything I have ever found about the roan gene says that a white animal (in the Shorthorn breed) is homo for the roan gene, and I have never seen anything that suggests the Shorthorn breed carrying the dilution gene which is what causes the grey in the Murray Grey breed.

I don't think the gray colour came from the first cross, but rather by mating the crossbreds to each other. So two blue roans left 25% gray calves. Those gray calves bred true and founded the breed.

 

[coachg]

I'm saying blue roan . Beautiful color but don't expect a good price at the sale barn.

 

[SBMF 2015]

I'm saying blue roan . Beautiful color but don't expect a good price at the sale barn.

They sure are fun to feed out though. I won't touch a white short horn, but a red or especially a roan / blue roan. Seems like you can always get bought right and they get big when they're done.