inbreeding?

[monkeywerkz]

With cattle, can you breed a bull to his daughter? When it comes time to replace my heiffer I just want to know if I can keep one of her daughters to breed with the bull, or if I need to get another one.

 

[la4angus]

With cattle, can you breed a bull to his daughter? When it comes time to replace my heiffer I just want to know if I can keep one of her daughters to breed with the bull, or if I need to get another one.

I would get another one.
The old rule is "If you Have to Ask Don't do it."

 

[sidney411]

You 'can' breed a bull to his daughter but if there are any genetic defaults with the bull there is a great chance that they will be magnified in the resulting calf. If you did this then I would not keep any of the offspring for replacement animals.

 

[TexasCountryWoman]

If you breed the bull back to his daughter, things may go just fine. I've done sucessful inbreeding projects with show rabbits, dairy goats and cattle. Things can go right or wrong. As stated above, if there is a hidden defect (recessive gene) in both bull and daughter, it may well be amplified or brought to the surface, so to speak. On the other hand, good traits are reinforced in many cases depending on the stock. You just have to be aware of what you are doing and be sure to have a strong hand at culling when you inbreed. An example might be: The bulls mother may have had a terrible udder with poor attachment, volume and milk production. You wouldn't know this by looking at the bull. Or maybe his grandmother had the poor udder. So he carries this gene. His daughter does too even though her mother is a good uddered, heavy milking mom. Breeding bull to daughter may bring out the poor udder gene from hiding producing a heifer calf that can't raise her own calf well later when she is bred. On the other hand, it works in reverse too and for all traits.

 

[ollie]

Inbreeding along with predictability also provides genetic regression. This is why line bred cattle will out breed themselves when mated to a different set of genetics. Genetic regression is never a good thing in a terminal operation.

 

[Anonymous]

been doing it for about 10 years. You can breed a bull back to its daughter with out any problems, but can't breed back a bull to its grand daughter.

 

[sidney411]

TX Cattle

What is the difference in breeding to daughter but not grandaughter? Do you mean the "grandaughter" resulting from breeding the bull to his daughter and getting a heifer than breeding that heifer to the grandfather bull also? Would it be the same if you bred his daughter to another bull and breed the resulting granddaughter back to the mothers sire (grandfather bull)?