I'm sure this has been discussed here before... w a lot of purebred breeders starting to say there is no need to buy anything but a calve ease bull bc even the calves ease bulls have the growth as the low calve easers. Question is, are you still giving something up in hip shape or size? Maybe some think the continued destruction of cattle by continuing to drive down bw, size, and shape. I say this as a commercial angus guy. Not as familiar w what the other breeds are doing. Comments?!
CED and BW
- Thread starter Rniemann
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True Grit Farms
Well-known member
I feel like Angus bulls are low birth weight and don't really pay attention to the CED, BW numbers. Hopefully it doesn't come back and bite me. I do pay attention to the CED, and BW on the Simmental, SimAngus bulls I plan on using though. But the majority of AI bulls available today have been bred to be easy calving.
Through the years I've always been worried about every bull we've used. You don't know what your getting until after his first calf crop on your cows under your management style. Don't believe nothing you hear, and only half of what you see, applies to bulls. IMO
Through the years I've always been worried about every bull we've used. You don't know what your getting until after his first calf crop on your cows under your management style. Don't believe nothing you hear, and only half of what you see, applies to bulls. IMO
We stick right around breed average for CED, seems to work for us MOST of the time. If we are using an AI bull we use him first on proven cows so we know what to expect. The next year we'll use him on younger cows/heifers depending on the results
cow pollinater
Well-known member
I have no doubt that we can continue to breed for smaller calves and more growth at the same time, especially with a gene pool as large as angus. I'm just not convinced that we should. An 80lb calf can handle quite a bit more cold than a 50lb calf can and most of the nation calves in fairly cold temperatures. If my cows can crank out a hundred pounder, I'm not at all worried about handing them an 80.
Seems like extreme anything can be bad, but, that seems to be what the seedstock goes for. Nothing against seedstock guys producing what sells, but it's getting harder and harder to find something not on the extremes.
Ebenezer
Well-known member
If going outside your herd, look for +BW and then select CED in a comfortable range. You get the decent sized calf but shaped like something other than a basketball. Curvebenders, if they still call them that, are real but also you need to know what "real" is. I have the opinion that there is something not quite as stable in curvebender types versus a decent birth weight making a decent mature weight but I could be wrong. But don't believe that all Angus are easy calving unless you keep some chains and a puller handy.
jscunn
Well-known member
Multiple generations of calving ease bulls tend to make frail cattle with width of hooks and pins too narrow to have a normal size calf. Feel free to use high CED (proven) on heifers but a cow needs to be able to have a calf out of a high BW bull, one that is above average for BW. I look for high CED bulls with birthweights above breed avg for heifers. Not afraid at all to use a +4 or +5 BW bull on cows, I do it every year. (Angus bulls)
talltimber
Well-known member
That's a +4 or 5 on a high percentage AI bull only, jsc? Not those numbers on a yearling bull I assume?
jscunn
Well-known member
Yes proven. Shape of the calves means as much as actual BW.
Son of Butch
Well-known member
:nod:cow pollinater":3fyi8ogp said:
Best heifer I got and some of the best cows I've seen are out of Rito 9969 16417285 gonna flush some to him. Wouldn't use him on heifers but cows yes, these type bulls scare most folks to death, around here it's mostly because that's what the university preaches high CED low BW.
skeeter swatter
Well-known member
What do you folks consider acceptable CED on an Angus or RA?
CED number is arrived at by number of heifers the bull has been used on and if they calve unassisted or not, scews the number, higher being better. From my understanding needs only be applied to breeding heifers that's where I think big confusion comes in.
So for me average Angus is 6 so 6 doesn't bother me on heifers, don't care on cows. But I will look at pedigree and make sure something may not be lurking there if acc isn't pretty high.
My opinion if you keep stacking low BW you better treat all cows as heifers.
So for me average Angus is 6 so 6 doesn't bother me on heifers, don't care on cows. But I will look at pedigree and make sure something may not be lurking there if acc isn't pretty high.
My opinion if you keep stacking low BW you better treat all cows as heifers.
Son of Butch
Well-known member
cow or heifer?skeeter swatter":3ce8e5xj said:
Angus breed average is ced 6 top 1/3 is ced 8 and bottom 20% is ced 2
A well grown heifer should be able to handle a same breed bull that is breed average (6) but I prefer to stay above 8
on heifers for safety sake, on questionable or younger heifers and unproven low accuracy bulls definitely double digits
to allow for a margin of error.
On cows I don't like going below ced 3
CED 3 is 75 percentile and there are plenty at or above that I don't feel the need to dip into the bottom 25%
Nesikep
Well-known member
I'd like to have lower birthweights than I have, but after all, calving ease is the end goal of low birthweight... why not select for it directly?
On my herd, a "sleep all night" birthweight for heifers would be about 70 lbs... they like to make them about 80 to 90 though... Cows I never have to assist.. the birthweights for the calf seems to closely match what the cow can handle.. a bunch of the bigger cows will make 140 lb'ers with no trouble, the smaller cows make 100 lb calves.
On my herd, a "sleep all night" birthweight for heifers would be about 70 lbs... they like to make them about 80 to 90 though... Cows I never have to assist.. the birthweights for the calf seems to closely match what the cow can handle.. a bunch of the bigger cows will make 140 lb'ers with no trouble, the smaller cows make 100 lb calves.
Ebenezer
Well-known member
The genetics of your cows are your issue more than the genetics of any bull you use. The past becomes the present from dams and granddams.Nesikep":3reli66h said:
talltimber
Well-known member
If a guy uses high ced on heifers and low birth weight ( assuming a low bw is a below breed average number) and he wants cows to be able to have a low ced, high bw calf, I assume then that you are not keeping any heifers out of first calf heifers? And also assuming you are AI'ing the heifers and have the high ced/bw bull on cow herd (or AI'ing them too) ?
Is a low bw/ced considered anything under breed average? If not, what is considered low, a negative bw?
When I was looking at bulls I was looking for a 6+ ced and a positive bw number, negative numbers got disregarded right off the bat, didn't even look at them. His primary purpose was to put on heifers, and two yo first calvers that I thought my old bull would ride down, and depending on his calves would move on to the old cows to replace my old bull eventually.
Is a low bw/ced considered anything under breed average? If not, what is considered low, a negative bw?
When I was looking at bulls I was looking for a 6+ ced and a positive bw number, negative numbers got disregarded right off the bat, didn't even look at them. His primary purpose was to put on heifers, and two yo first calvers that I thought my old bull would ride down, and depending on his calves would move on to the old cows to replace my old bull eventually.
Nesikep
Well-known member
for 15 years we had "normal" birthweights... then one year they jumped up by 20 lbs.. same cows, same bull, same food.. be darned if I know what it wasEbenezer":19rk2e40 said:
Son of Butch
Well-known member
talltimber":3pentij8 said:If a guy uses high ced on heifers and low birth weight (assuming a low bw is a below breed average number) and he wants cows to be able to have a low ced, high bw calf, I assume then that you are not keeping any heifers out of first calf heifers?
IF you are making genetic progress then your heifer genetics should be superior to your cows.
IF you calve heifers a month earlier than your cows you certainly could keep the superior replacement
genetics from them.
Such as daughters of Connealy Capitalist CED 11 bw -0.1 CEM 12
When breeding use CED (11 = top 20%) and when selecting replacement females use CEM (12 = top 15%)
ced = calving ease direct
cem = daughters calving ease (calving ease maternal)
I would not keep any daughters of JMB Traction CED 1 bw 2.5 CEM 6 and consider him as Terminal only
top 25% CEM 11
Angus Breed Average CEM 9
bottom 25% CEM 6
Is a low bw/ced considered anything under breed average?
breed ave birth weight 1.1 lbs so anything under would be a lower bw than breed average
breed average ced 6 and so anything lower would be considered more difficult than breed average
If not, what is considered low, a negative bw?
sigh... no child left behind... any number with a - sign in front of it means it's negative... jk
25% = bw -0.1 or lower
30% = bw .2
Angus breed average bw 1.1
75% = bottom 25% bw 2.2 lbs or higher
