Noob to Angus cattle and EPDs

[Jafruech]

I feel like I need to address this post. I need to make it clear that the majority of our cows are not tipping over dead at 4 years old after becoming walking skeletons. I lost the three this year that I explained one thing each had in common, severely chilled at birth. Reviewing records I kept from cows inherited there interestingly were some kept by my FIL that had frostbite ears that seemed to have suffered this same Fate in 2012 and 2013. I lost a 2015 born last year for an unknown reason. Everything else that is moved into my "gone to greener pastures" file has been culled due to open, calf death, or bad attitude or bag defect. I have a few that have died from accidents (lightening, one got stuck in the mud, and a few roll overs) and I'm willing to bet I'm not the only person who's suffered streaks of bad luck?

I know I stated that "I have had this happen more than I care to count", of course if it happens once that's more than I care to have happen. Bigger numbers of opens have followed poor weather years (bad droughts). I have records of this.

I have 207 cows now after taking those three out of the book. 16% of my herd is 9 years and older, 34% are 7-8yo, 16% 5-6yo, 16% 3-4yo and I have 35 1150# first calf heifers to calve out. In 2013 and last year we kept more than normal the amount of heifers to grow and will be doing a heavy cull again in the fall. Typically we only keep 20-25 replacements.

Average weight in my herd is ~1350-1400, about 35 of them are 1500-1600lbs and they were exposed to bulls with BW in mid 90's. Equally saying I probably have 35-40 that are around 1200lbs.

Part 2...it was too long to let me post in the previous one...

6. A bull has to fit your environment. If a bull has to be fed grain, ever...he has no place on my ranch. A bull on my ranch has to maintain or gain condition during breeding season. If he looses an ounce...he is gone. But I buy bulls that fit my environment so I don't have that issue. Every bull I buy has been developed on grass/forage only. No grain. If they are developed on grain, chances are they are going to fall apart during calving season in my environment. They should be developed in an environment similar to mine. Obviously, he should be able to breed every cow I put him on.

A bull should enhance the traits of my cows, make better cows every generation, and produce both good replacements and good steers to sell. I don't select for milk. My angus bull out of Beral of Wye has a +18 milk EPD. His daughters wean very nice calves. Why? They meet and exceed their nutritional requirements easily and have a lot more to pass on in their milk. I have multiple generations from bulls with similar EPDs...and have zero issues with having enough milk and weaning good calves.

Traits I select for:

-Disposition
-Calving Ease (My angus bull out of Beral of Wye is +16 CED, top 1% of breed). He got in and bred 4, 9 mo old heifers. All 4 calved with no assistance, had great vigor in calves, weaned really nice calves, and bred back first cycle.
-Fleshing ability/Efficiency
-Dam Udder Quality and Age
-Muscling
-Thickness
-Marbling
-Hair/Coat
-Disease/fly resistance
-Longevity
-Dam Weight

Those traits complement and enhance my herd...and because of that I could care less about the WW and YW EPDs....which is blasphemy for some people...but somehow both my feedlot and grassfed buyers are very happy with my calves, and they are healthy, and weigh a good amount.

7. I use angus and old world type Hereford bulls. I select both for what I need from my cows and to enhance my herd.

If select cows/bulls that fit your environment, your inputs will be significantly lower. I've never had an issue being profitable even in drought years like last year where I only got 5.5 in of rain.

I think you need to take a hard look at what you're selecting for, and how you justify the extra expenses, loss rates, your time, and the stress to your herd calving when you do and why you aren't pushing back your calving season and working with nature instead of fighting against it.

I think you need to set up very specific criteria for your bulls and cows and cull like crazy. It sounds like you've grown a lot and haven't been culling like you should. You have to stick by those criteria and cull no matter how much you like the cows.

Anyway...just some thoughts. Not trying to be harsh. Just trying to give you some things to think about.

 

[Allenw]

Great posts jafruech.

 

[TJSideBiz]

Excellent thread! Very informative. Thank you BayerFooted for asking everything I wanted and needed to know but was afraid to ask. Been AIing since 2017 and have used the same bull on all 10 cows without regard to their individual (very different) qualities. Of course, this shotgun approach resulted in some hits and some that were delicious . Now that I have a better understanding of EPDs (and frame score) I can zero in on what's most important. Coupling those with the phenotype we want will (hopefully) result in 100% hits. Thank you all for being so generous with your knowledge.

 

[Rancher]

Amen TCRanch

 

[W.B.]

Some of the advise that has been touted on this thread is very sketchy at best. As the song goes "people are crazy".

 

[Peace]

Some of the advise that has been touted on this thread is very sketchy at best. As the song goes "people are crazy".

Ok, what advise and why?

 

[W.B.]

Well not to get personal but why would someone 500 miles away recommend to someone they need 6.7 frame cows to be most profitable. I could go on from that post but environment rules every time. Every mile you move north or south makes a huge difference on cow adaptabilly. The dmi epd is a lowly referenced epd because so little data is being turned into the AAA. I know they use genomics for that number but I think we are a long long way from making that a selection tool as the formula is going to protect older lower growth bulls just as the newer bulls get protected on growth.

 

[Nkline]

Well not to get personal but why would someone 500 miles away recommend to someone they need 6.7 frame cows to be most profitable. I could go on from that post but environment rules every time. Every mile you move north or south makes a huge difference on cow adaptabilly. The dmi epd is a lowly referenced epd because so little data is being turned into the AAA. I know they use genomics for that number but I think we are a long long way from making that a selection tool as the formula is going to protect older lower growth bulls just as the newer bulls get protected on growth.

Good questions, I'm familiar with the area. I have farms in NW Minnesota and spend some time around there. I have watched sales and fed out cattle from there too. While little data is turned in on the dmi epd, most of the data is coming from unbiased sources, and well structured tests. Dmi has not been largely selected for in the past, so improvement should be easy and fast. Genomics is getting better every year, the formula figures in selection pressure per trait which is really a guess. I think this inflates newer growth epds more than it protects older ones.

 

[W.B.]

The differences from north to south and East to west in both Dakotas are big enough that anyone recommending cow size without knowing the input level of the individual operation is quite frankly full of hot air.

 

[W.B.]

1

 

[Nkline]

The differences from north to south and East to west in both Dakotas are big enough that anyone recommending cow size without knowing the input level of the individual operation is quite frankly full of hot air.

The original poster said she lives in central ND and, winter cows on silage, chopped alfalfa/grass or cover crop. With free choice hay available. So I told her the frame size the current cattle industry is built for. I have no problem with smaller cattle elsewhere, but focus should not be making cows small, it should be making efficient small cows. Studies show that cow size isn't the main driver in how much cows eat. Milk production and inherent feed efficiency (differences in metabolism) are.

 

[Nkline]

Good questions, I'm familiar with the area. I have farms in NW Minnesota and spend some time around there. I have watched sales and fed out cattle from there too. While little data is turned in on the dmi epd, most of the data is coming from unbiased sources, and well structured tests. Dmi has not been largely selected for in the past, so improvement should be easy and fast. Genomics is getting better every year. The epd formula figures in selection pressure per trait which is really a guess. I think this inflates newer growth epds more than it protects older ones.

This is what I meant to say. I edited within last few sentences.

 

[W.B.]

The fact of the matter is genomics still have a long way to go to predict feed efficiency and I believe today they are not even in the ballpark of most of the modern pedigrees. Based on the dmi epd I should be hauling more feed to my cows than I was 10 years ago. The fact is I am hauling less feed to them and I am not talking about starving cows either. They mostly get as much as they will eat without wasting much. I have a scale and do measure my feed.

 

[Nkline]

It is the best estimation of feed intake available, when you couple dmi with selection for growth you basically make cattle that gain on less feed. I don't think calves have a switch, and that after they are weaned they eat a proportionately different amount (high intake calves before weaning are likely the high intake calves after weaning). Calves that eat more demand more milk, and this is harder on heifers which are trying to grow while feeding a calf that's why I try to keep the dmi epds low on first calves. Calves that eat more are likely hungrier, it's not all about capacity to eat more.

It is necessary to combine low dmi with fleshing ability, heifer calf fleshing ability has been found to be a good predictor of cow fleshing ease. You need to select for both because you don't just want a bunch of thin cows that don't eat much. Cow fleshing ability is going help with cow intake once your cattle reach there mature size, we know that a cow at bcs 6 (body condition score) have a significantly lower feed requirement than bcs 5. When cows are mature some study's have said that calf dmi correlates to cow dmi at this point. Different cows eat massively different amounts, and if we can select for this then a lot of progress will be made. There is an old formula that is pushed by the small cow crowd, but it is theoretical, and variance within cows rule it obsolete if selection pressure is used.

Like I said here it is necessary to combine heifer calf fleshing ability as it has been shown (in a university study) to correlate with cow fleshing ability. Easy fleshing heifer calves=easy fleshing cows, cows with higher bcs eat less, especially if it's cold outside. All that being said, if you have an option to limit feed cows you should, just balance their diet accordingly.