No Certs for Registration

[El_Putzo]

Here is a blurb from a weekly e-mail I get from AHA. Someone mentioned this the other day. I hope some of the bull owners will find this appealing.

Hereford Highlights
Introducing the Non-Certificate AI Bull Program
The American Hereford Association (AHA) has developed the Non-Certificate AI Bull Program to increase the use of artificial insemination (AI) within the Hereford breed. Owners can enter any AI sire in the program, and the sire's calves can then be registered without an AI certificate.

The cost to enter a sire in the program is $250. Sires can be entered beginning April 1, 2006, and calves born from these sires after Dec. 1, 2006, are eligible for registry without a certificate. Once a bull is in the program, he cannot return to the original system, which requires an AI certificate for registration. An agreement must be signed by all bull owners and be filed at the AHA. If a bull is syndicated, the representative of the syndicate signs the agreement.

The Non-Certificate AI Bull Program, endorsed by the AHA Board of Directors, was created to strongly encourage the use of AI in the Hereford breed. The AHA Board and staff are hopeful that by not having to pay for a certificate, more breeders will consider AI using proven bulls and genetic improvement will ensue.

More program information will be included in the April issue of Hereford World. Contact Jack Ward with questions at (816) 842-3757 or [email protected].

 

[shutskytj]

But will this mean more money for each straw I don't reg. my bulls so I bet it will even out for me if they up the cost of the semen

 

[cowsense]

We've had this program for years in Canada and it works excellent; no scrambling for certs. at registration time and once you purchase the semen it's yours! Lot's of decent cattle never get registered because of the added expense of certs on top of reg. fees. The top Heref. bulls are getting very expensive to use at present w/ high semen and cert costs!

 

[MikeC]

Lots of Char breeders opt for no "signing" fees when pricing their semen. Doesn't seem to matter much.

They still use the bulls they think will do the best job. It's just marketing a target.

 

[Frankie]

Good idea. I hope it will encourage more Hereford breeders to use AI. I wonder, though, if owers of popular bulls will shift their bulls over to the "free" system? At the least, maybe it will encourage breeders to lower the cost of their certificates.

 

[Kent]

All it will take is a few really good horned and polled bulls getting switched over and used more heavily. The certificate bulls will begin not to be used as much, and cert. prices will have to come down. This IS the reason many don't use AI in the Hereford breed.

When you breed 20 cows, you pay $30 per straw, use 25 straws, that's $750. Then you want to register 3/4 of them, that's 15 certs at $75-100 each, or another $1275 (using $85 per cert). Total cost of $2025. Now suppose there is no cert cost, but semen goes up to $50 per straw. So 25 straws now costs $1250, but you're done. I like the idea. Of course, if bull owners start charging $75-100 per straw, AI will never increase in the breed.

Of course, you can now find bulls with semen at $20 and certs at $40-50, but heck, I can raise bulls as good as most of those at home and nobody's after those kind of pedigrees anyway.

 

[Brandonm2]

"Of course, you can now find bulls with semen at $20 and certs at $40-50, but heck, I can raise bulls as good as most of those at home and nobody's after those kind of pedigrees anyway."

I think that is why this will not make much difference. IF I want cheap semen, Reed already has straws as cheap as $5 and certificates as cheap as $30. That is probably cheaper than buying and keeping a bull. When you look at the price lists, we have no shortage of cheap semen. You can dig through all the $5, $7, 10, and 15 a straw bulls and find a couple of DECENT bulls to choose from. The problem is that the semen that most breeders REALLY want is priced through the roof. Mohican Nasdaq (not the most expensive bull by far) is $50 a straw and $100 a certificate so breeding 30 cows to him would cost...
$3000 for semen alone AND $2000 for the 20 certificates you need for the calves. That is $5000 and you still have to cleanup the 6-10 head that didn't settle, probably pay for estrus synchronization drugs, and extra labor. For most producers it is more cost effective to buy one of his sons. But I am not certain that the bull owner would make as much if he did away with the certificates and dropped the semen price. He would have to move several times the volume of semen.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

I know nothing about certificates. Are Hereford & Angus the only breeds that require them? Who gets the certificate $$ - owners - owners & semen distributor?

 

[El_Putzo]

Good question Jeanne. I've got one to go along with it too. What was the original purpose of the certificates??

 

[Brandonm2]

The original reason for the certificate is so semen could be priced cheaply to sell to commercial cattlemen, without selling it on the cheap to your competitors in the show ring. The certificate is also an insurance policy against a dead or undesirable calf. IF the AI calf is a dink all you have in him are two $20 straws and some bad memories. IF the AI calf is your next Denver show bull on the other hand, you pay the $100 certificate price to get him registered. On the negative side, you AI 30 cows and a year later you are stuck having to come up with $3000 worth of certificates plus the normal registration costs in order to get your calf crop registered. Angus is not having any problems with the certificate system. 50% of the ANgus calves registered last year were sired by AI bulls. By contrast only 15% of the registered Herefords last year were sired by AI bulls (Hereford World/March pg 8 ). This is one reason why a Herf has to be 10 years old to have highly accurate EPDs. Remitall Boomer 46B supposedly has more daughters in CURRENT production in North America than any other Hereford sire; but when you look him up there is ONLY 600 daughters with records.

 

[Kent]

"Of course, you can now find bulls with semen at $20 and certs at $40-50, but heck, I can raise bulls as good as most of those at home and nobody's after those kind of pedigrees anyway."

I think that is why this will not make much difference. IF I want cheap semen, Reed already has straws as cheap as $5 and certificates as cheap as $30. That is probably cheaper than buying and keeping a bull. When you look at the price lists, we have no shortage of cheap semen. You can dig through all the $5, $7, 10, and 15 a straw bulls and find a couple of DECENT bulls to choose from. The problem is that the semen that most breeders REALLY want is priced through the roof. Mohican Nasdaq (not the most expensive bull by far) is $50 a straw and $100 a certificate so breeding 30 cows to him would cost...
$3000 for semen alone AND $2000 for the 20 certificates you need for the calves. That is $5000 and you still have to cleanup the 6-10 head that didn't settle, probably pay for estrus synchronization drugs, and extra labor. For most producers it is more cost effective to buy one of his sons. But I am not certain that the bull owner would make as much if he did away with the certificates and dropped the semen price. He would have to move several times the volume of semen.

You may be right and it may not help at all, but semen and cert cost is hurting AI use in the Hereford breed. I think you and I agree on that.

Just from a quick search, Bovine Elite sells Bon View New Design 878 for $20/straw and $35 per cert. Whether or not you or I like him is irrelevant. He is quite popular. On the other hand, Boyd Heavy Hitter, who is not even popular anymore since his BW is so high and his daughters so inconsistent in milking ability, is $25/straw and $60/cert. Most of the popular Hereford bulls are twice as high on combined semen/cert cost (not from Bovine Elite but in general). It is really ridiculous.

Sure, if you are selling bulls for $2500 apiece, you can't afford not to AI. But if you're trying to build a cowherd with daughters of elite bulls, where only half the calves are heifers and only half of those are good enough to keep, it is very expensive.

I don't know what else can be done to increase the use of AI. I just hope this new policy helps.

 

[Frankie]

I know nothing about certificates. Are Hereford & Angus the only breeds that require them? Who gets the certificate $$ - owners - owners & semen distributor?

They're the only breeds that I know of. The owner of an Angus bull buys a certificate from the Assn for $10. If you bought semen and want to register a calf from his bull, you must buy one of those certificates from him at whatever price he has put on them. If you don't want to register the calf, you don't have to buy a certificate.

 

[Brandonm2]

You may be right and it may not help at all, but semen and cert cost is hurting AI use in the Hereford breed. I think you and I agree on that.

Just from a quick search, Bovine Elite sells Bon View New Design 878 for $20/straw and $35 per cert. Whether or not you or I like him is irrelevant. He is quite popular. On the other hand, Boyd Heavy Hitter, who is not even popular anymore since his BW is so high and his daughters so inconsistent in milking ability, is $25/straw and $60/cert. Most of the popular Hereford bulls are twice as high on combined semen/cert cost (not from Bovine Elite but in general). It is really ridiculous.

Sure, if you are selling bulls for $2500 apiece, you can't afford not to AI. But if you're trying to build a cowherd with daughters of elite bulls, where only half the calves are heifers and only half of those are good enough to keep, it is very expensive.

I don't know what else can be done to increase the use of AI. I just hope this new policy helps.

We have the chicken and the egg argument with Hereford semen. The bull owners will tell you that semen is high because Hereford breeders don't buy a large quantity of semen so they have to charge a high price to recover their promotional costs. Hereford breeders will tell you that they don't buy a lot of semen because the semen they want is priced too high and the semen that IS cheap is not going to improve their cow herd. IF you are an Angus guy, there is a huge selection of semen. I think ABS alone has ~90 Angus sires in the stable versus FIVE horned Herefords and SIX polled Herefords
http://abs-bs.absglobal.com/beef/hereford_ss_main.asp?
Worse than the quantity, the performance is a little suspect. For example 39% of the 2004 Hereford calves beat the best Horned Hereford bull ABS has for weaning weight (+38 ). We would have a better selection of bulls with every semen company IF more Hereford breeders bought semen; but IF your herd is already superior to the bulls being offered OR you are linebreeding a line the bull stud doesn't carry then there is no reason to buy the semen.

Everybody is going to have to give in a little. Some of the popular bull owners are going to have to lower the AI costs and HOPE they sell more quantity to make for the loss in income and more Hereford owners are going to have to go out of their way to buy more semen to encourage more bull owners to sell more semen at more affordable prices.

 

[Kent]

Good post, Brandon. Agree completely.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

I know nothing about certificates. Are Hereford & Angus the only breeds that require them? Who gets the certificate $$ - owners - owners & semen distributor?

They're the only breeds that I know of. The owner of an Angus bull buys a certificate from the Assn for $10. If you bought semen and want to register a calf from his bull, you must buy one of those certificates from him at whatever price he has put on them. If you don't want to register the calf, you don't have to buy a certificate.

OK, so the breed association is also making money on this type of requirement. In that case, it's kind of surprising that the Hereford assn. was willing to change.

 

[Bez!]

I buy a fair amount of semen from a gentleman in Alberta. If I want to buy a certificate from him for the semen, I send him the cheque - not the association.

He can forego the income from the certificate should I wish to register the animal. It is his choice. I still pay the herf association to register.

I do not register any of my animals - commercial makes our lives far less complicated. He and I go back a long ways. Because I bought some semen from him when I did not need it and he needed the income, he has offered me the right to several free certs should I ever want one down the road.

I honestly do not see us ever bothering, but at the same time it shows there are some breeders in this part of the world that are prepared to promote their breed and forego the cash of the certs.

Certificates are to some a significant portion of their income. It also tends at times to hinder the process of the newbie who would like to raise a registered herd but finds the costs prohibitive.

Bez!

 

[Campground Cattle]

I haven't made up my mind on this one yet I need to do more research.

 

[txag]

i guess it remains to be seen who takes advantage of this option, but i see it being a possible avenue for "small" breeders to promote new bulls that might otherwise be overlooked.

 

[Running Arrow Bill]

We register all of ours. Even some that are not good enough to be breeders: Reason? Establishes a paper trail for our sires & dams for anyone wanting to research our stock.

Cost? Negligible: $15. per animal Time to Register? Less than 30 min. of paperwork. Benefit? Priceless.

 

[mtnman]

BS, Brandon, they started issuing certificates so it they could sell bulls more more money. For good looks.

You can pump up the doolar value of a bull at the sale, then charge more for certs.

It just robbing Peter to pay Paul, with the net benefit of money trading hands to the bigger players who can advertise the most.

That's all it's ever been.

Several breeds like Simmental just passed that phony BS over for their breeders.

mtnman