Horned/Polled Hereford

[Ashton V]

I was going to get some hereford cows and have the option of getting horned or polled. I was wondering what the benefits of having horned/or polled cattle are? And also,I was wondering how the polled gene works. For example, if you breed a horned hereford bull to polled cows, would the offspring be horned or polled? And vice versa with horned cows and a polled bull?

 

[wtrapp]

For me personally I can't see a difference between Horned or Polled; some can. I have some registered Angus cows and put a horned Hereford bull on them for some F1 Baldies. Guess what? Horns did come through on some of the Baldies. Registered Polled Hereford cows also had some calves with Horns. I had been told as long as the Horned Bull was put on Angus cows there wouldn't be any horns but you know sometimes mother nature will just take over. I sold the bull because I just don't want horns. There will probably be other replys with more educated answers than mine.

 

[Lucky_P]

It comes down to personal preference.
Biggest benefit of polled is...not having to dehorn.

Good discussion of inheritance of horns/polled trait here:
http://www.simmental.org/userimages/sim ... es_mod.pdf

 

[wtrapp]

Lucky-P. Lot of P's but a really good article. Thanks for sharing.

 

[dun]

If you saw how the polled gene works you might want to ask yourself how those registered angus cows got registered

 

[bigbull338]

For me personally I can't see a difference between Horned or Polled; some can. I have some registered Angus cows and put a horned Hereford bull on them for some F1 Baldies. Guess what? Horns did come through on some of the Baldies. Registered Polled Hereford cows also had some calves with Horns. I had been told as long as the Horned Bull was put on Angus cows there wouldn't be any horns but you know sometimes mother nature will just take over. I sold the bull because I just don't want horns. There will probably be other replys with more educated answers than mine.

well now if you got a heck of horned bull,then yes he will put horns on calves out of angus cows.

 

[Baldie Maker]

For me personally I can't see a difference between Horned or Polled; some can. I have some registered Angus cows and put a horned Hereford bull on them for some F1 Baldies. Guess what? Horns did come through on some of the Baldies. Registered Polled Hereford cows also had some calves with Horns. I had been told as long as the Horned Bull was put on Angus cows there wouldn't be any horns but you know sometimes mother nature will just take over. I sold the bull because I just don't want horns. There will probably be other replys with more educated answers than mine.

well now if you got a heck of horned bull,then yes he will put horns on calves out of angus cows.

Are you sure they were horns? Were they loosely attached to their head? Could they have been scurs?

It shouldn't matter if he is one heck of a horned bull or not, horns are a simple recessive and if the cow is truely homo polled then there won't be horns.

I'm under the impression that angus are homo polled after being selected for years for that trait and culling cattle with scurs/horns; Is that not safe to assume?

 

[bigbull338]

a horned bull will not put horns on every polled cows calf.but he will put them on some calves no matter what you think.

 

[dun]

a horned bull will not put horns on every polled cows calf.but he will put them on some calves no matter what you think.

Correct, IF THE COW IS HETEROZYGOUS POLLED. Registered angus are homozygous polled, if they aren;t they aren;t angus

 

[Brandonm22]

Exactly, the only the way that a horned bull should put horns on a herd of "Reg. Angus" is if you kept him around long enough that he was breeding his daughters.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

a horned bull will not put horns on every polled cows calf.but he will put them on some calves no matter what you think.

Correct, IF THE COW IS HETEROZYGOUS POLLED. Registered angus are homozygous polled, if they aren;t they aren;t angus

EXACTLY - doesn't make any difference "how strong the bull is horned" :shock:
A horned bull/cow has two horned genes. Period - none are STRONGER than the other. If a horned animal breeds with a HOMOZYGOUS POLLED animal, the offspring is POLLED (heterozygous Polled - meaning 1 horn gene inherited from the Horned parent & 1 polled gene inherited from the Polled parent)
As mentioned, they COULD have SCURRS - were the calves mostly bull calves that had the "horns"?

 

[wtrapp]

No scurs guys. Horns; and yes the cows are truly registered angus. Now, not every calf had horns and in some years a cow has a calf with horns the next year polled. I agree it shouldn't happen, but it did. Go figure

 

[Ashton V]

A while back a guy had a bull for sale advertised as a purebred angus bull. He was solid black but had a rather large set of horns. When i told him purebred angus were naturally polled and asked if it was possible that the bull was a cross, he came unglued and insisted that the dam was purebred and the sire was 7/8 angus.

 

[dun]

No scurs guys. Horns; and yes the cows are truly registered angus. Now, not every calf had horns and in some years a cow has a calf with horns the next year polled. I agree it shouldn't happen, but it did. Go figure

If they were registered angus there was an Etheopian in the fuel supply somewhere

 

[Brandonm22]

Registered they may have been; but the horns prove almost beyond any doubt that the pedigrees on those papers were falsified. Given Angus's recent rise in popularity, I am sure that many a good looking black commercial bull has been sold with a registration paper that did not belong to him.

 

[Idaman]

Doesn't the problem go much deeper than a few recently falsified papers.

Back in the late seventies and eighties it was common knowledge that the Angus were being crossed with all sorts of other breeds to chase the size fad. It seems that Holsteins were the main infusion at that time. I was warned repeated times to be very careful when buying the black cattle of the time. Even from people outside this country.

With all the genetic defects showing up I think I can understand the source. The cattle that have been the most free of these are the ones that most display the original characteristics OCC, PCC, Diamond D, and probably WYE and those using those lines.

Has there ever been a DNA study showing just which cattle are truly Angus?

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Registered they may have been; but the horns prove almost beyond any doubt that the pedigrees on those papers were falsified. Given Angus's recent rise in popularity, I am sure that many a good looking black commercial bull has been sold with a registration paper that did not belong to him.

Exactly - genetics are genetics. You may get ONE genetic freak out of ??Millions??
Just like Polled Fullblood Simmentals :shock: They've been registering Simmental in Europe since 1806, all horned. Now in the last 20 years they miraculously have polled Fullbloods! :shock:

 

[robert]

No scurs guys. Horns; and yes the cows are truly registered angus. Now, not every calf had horns and in some years a cow has a calf with horns the next year polled. I agree it shouldn't happen, but it did. Go figure

be real interested in seeing some reg numbers on those cows, just for curiosity's sake

 

[Bonsman]

When Dr. Jan Bonsma was developing the Bonsmara breed he opted for Horned Hereford and Shorthorn as the British base rather than any of the polled bulls tested.

Dr. Bonsma stated that of the animals tested being polled was a factor affecting prolapse of the prepuce in bulls. He further stated that : "[t]he condition is found in various breeds but its detrimental consequences occur with greater frequency in certain breeds, especially in the Santa Gertrudis breed of cattle and in bulls of some of the polled breeds."

I am not stating my opinion; I am stating Dr. Bonsma's opinon. So rip the good doc in your replies--not me!! :roll:

 

[Brandonm22]

Doesn't the problem go much deeper than a few recently falsified papers.

Back in the late seventies and eighties it was common knowledge that the Angus were being crossed with all sorts of other breeds to chase the size fad........... Has there ever been a DNA study showing just which cattle are truly Angus?

I have never heard of one, though the difficult part would be getting consensus on what IS exactly Angus. Do we assume that cattle breeders in the 1950s were more honest than cattle breeders in the 1970s thus those cattle are more likely to be pure???? If nonAngus genetics found their way into the herd book in the 1970s, how much more likely is it that nonAngus genetics found their way into the herd book in the 1870s and 1890s when the American ANgus herd was growing exponentially? Do we go back to Scotland and find some legacy herd there and set that as the standard? how the heck would you tell the difference between a 3/4 blood Angus and a fullblood Angus and how would you be able to PROVE that the genes that appear to be non-Angus weren't part of Angus's genetic diversity 100 years ago?? Undoubtedly there are as many genes that were in the Angus genotype in the 1850s that were lost over the years as there are nonAngus genes that have been added through unscrupulous behavior, negligent management, or completely accidental (bulls will be bulls afterall). Finally what would you do with that information if you had it??? I certainly would never publish it given the high likelihood that (1) I would lose a lot of friends when I exposed their cattle as being fraudulent and in a lot of cases their daddys and (2) probably spend numerous years in court being sued.