Ohlde vs EPDS

[alacowman1]

I used for maternal purposes anyway..ive went a different route now ,that I've got them heading in the direction I intended.....you can chase you tail in this business ..as I've done in the past..and its can be easy to forget we're in the beef business ..not pasture ornaments...just momma cows that will fatten on grass ..raise a calf,breed back and maintain condition through the whole process ..

 

[Rmc]

Larry Leonhardt was a genius. He knew more about Angus genetics than anyone. He always said, "I'm just a dirty little beet farmer." He was much more. When we looked at his 2 year old bulls, (he wouldn't sell yearling bulls because he didn't push them on feed), they were like clones. They were identical. The only difference were the color of ear tags. There were 3 colors.
One color designated the closely bred bulls; one color I don't remember, and the other color was for bulls with sires outside of his herd. The cowherd was so strong that the bulls were identical. Some of our very best cows came from those bulls.

That is what line breeding can do is produce repeatability and predictability.
Yet that is what epds are biased against. And are biased towards bulls that are the results of outcrossing.
How much more money do calves bring when they are matched and similar in type ,compared to a calves that are dramatically different in size and type.
Yet epds actually discourage the production of same size and type of calves. So if it epds aren't a marketing gimmick I don't know what is.

 

[faster horses]

I used for maternal purposes anyway..ive went a different route now ,that I've got them heading in the direction I intended.....you can chase you tail in this business ..as I've done in the past..and its can be easy to forget we're in the beef business ..not pasture ornaments...just momma cows that will fatten on grass ..raise a calf,breed back and maintain condition through the whole process ..

It has been said, the best Black Angus cattle were those from the 70's. I think that is why you are seeing more of those older angus genetics used today. FWIW.

 

[jdg]

Echo has a fascinating pedigree. I believe the story goes that he hid the bull because he looked like such a dud because of inbreeding depression, but yet served his purpose well. Larry knew what he was doing. I believe the colored tags were based on his three groups: strictly maternal, terminal (not by today's standards) and in between. I've been told he eventually abandoned two of the lines and focused on the maternal. Please correct me anyone if I've got the story wrong. It's important enough to tell with accuracy.

 

[Ebenezer]

Larry's tag colors at one point were yellow (caution) for maternal, green (go) for balanced and red (stop) for terminal. He dropped the red and morphed the yellow and green into tru-line and later X strain. He also had some other color thinking.

When he began to go more beyond the Beaufort of Wye effort he had some cattle that had Beaufort as sire, grandsire and great-grandsire. He realized that he needed an outcross.

There was another heavily used bull that was low performance as a calf and was not picturesque. I do not remember if that was Bob or not. He never wanted to go backwards in his pedigrees.

Larry's cattle carried the "brown saddle" trait in later years.

You need to know Larry's story on S. Shoshone (the Haystack cow) to understand the bull.

What has worked here the best in limited trials is the green line type.

 

[simme]

Yet the associations won't even mandate dna match of both parents to register. Let alone dna for traits .
It also doesn't address the built in bias against genetic potential of heterosis in the offspring of line bred animals.
In fact epds have a terrible bias towards a total out cross bull. Which in many cases is a poor choice to use as a herd sire as far as predictability of offspring and the potential improvement of the offspring of a outcrossed sire.
IMHO epds have done far more harm then good in the total of all breeds of cattle

There is a lot of diversity in a breed association. Members of all sizes, goals, cattle types, opinions, knowledge, experience, financial resources, etc. High volume and high dollar guys along with the mom and pop folks with a few cows that their kids show at the county fair. Then board members who determine the rules. Diversity there as well. Decisions made for the good of the breed, good of the industry, or good for themselves probably come into play. Then paid staff doing a job for a living with personal and professional goals. Sort of like any organization, group of people or a country. How to please the majority and think you are making the right decisions and trying to keep your job come into play. Doing the "right thing" is probably subjective with different opinions.

As far as a mandate for dna testing, there is the cost involved that the member would have to pay. How many would support that? I just spent $856 on dna testing for 12 head. Some people would find that expensive. Probably would be controversial and result in an uprising from some of the members. Many a discussion here about "mandates" of a different type for the past couple of years.

No doubt that dna testing would improve the accuracy of the pedigree both in terms of parent verification and genetic value. But the board members might have to go into hiding if they mandate that.

EPD's or EBV's started I think in the 70's. I know that cattle have improved a lot since then in terms of growth, efficiency, and carcass - at least it seems that way to me. How much of that improvement was related to the EPD thing - I don't know. But, I don't think we have lost ground on cattle quality since then. There was a very long time period prior to that where changes were based on all the other important evaluation tools - phenotype, experience, history, visual observation and evaluation, cow family, intuition, keen eye, etc. Did improvement rate go up or down since then? I enjoy the discussion.

 

[Rmc]

As far as a mandate for dna testing, there is the cost involved that the member would have to pay. How many would support that? I just spent $856 on dna testing for 12 head. Some people would find that expensive. Probably would be controversial and result in an uprising from some of the members. Many a discussion here about "mandates" of a different type for the past couple of years.

Parent dna verification is $13-20
Most are already testing for genetic defects any way so are sending samples in anyway.
But then they would actually have to admit in my estimate that up to 5% of registrations are inaccurate.
How much is a accurate registration worth ?

 

[Rmc]

I just spent $856 on dna testing for 12 head. Some people would find that expensive. Probably would be controversial and result in an uprising from some of the members. Many a discussion here about "mandates" of a different type for the past couple of years.

No doubt that dna testing would improve the accuracy of the pedigree both in terms of parent verification and genetic value. But the board members might have to go into hiding if they mandate that.

Latest Cattle DNA Tests Are Better, More Affordable

Jimmy Taylor has been using DNA tests to select replacement heifers for three years. He is already seeing higher-scoring heifers come through his replacement pipeline.

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$35 dollar test results in at least an additional $200 at sale sounds like an justifiable cost to me.
How much would it cost to develop a heifer ? To find out she doesn't produce the desired offspring? More then $35 ?
What would it cost in lost revenue to use a bull that lowers the quality or feed efficiency of your calves? More then $35?
How much extra lbs per calf or price per calf on sale date would you need to pay for the $35 dna test on the bull?

 

[Rmc]

EPD's or EBV's started I think in the 70's. I know that cattle have improved a lot since then in terms of growth, efficiency, and carcass - at least it seems that way to me. How much of that improvement was related to the EPD thing - I don't know.

Epd is supposed to mean "expected progeny differences"
Yet what you or anyone else who is pro epds I have talked to are willing to acknowledge or even discuss. The bias against linebred bulls. And the bias towards bulls that are the result of outcross parents. Very basic scientific laws of breeding are ignored by epds in these situations and have a bias against line breeding?
How many genetics and linebred cow families are no longer available that where available when epd where introduced?

 

[simme]

Epd is supposed to mean "expected progeny differences"
Yet what you or anyone else who is pro epds I have talked to are willing to acknowledge or even discuss. The bias against linebred bulls. And the bias towards bulls that are the result of outcross parents. Very basic scientific laws of breeding are ignored by epds in these situations and have a bias against line breeding?
How many genetics and linebred cow families are no longer available that where available when epd where introduced?

I would not say that I am "pro" epd's, but I am not "anti" epds. There are limitations for sure in EPD's, mainly low accuracy and unrealistic expectations. By the time the accuracy is high (may never be high depending on number of progeny), the bull is old unless he has seen a lot of AI use. Even genomic enhanced EPD's are pretty low accuracy on pasture sires and other low use bulls.
The theory of EPD's is sound. Measure traits (like ww) on the animal and the progeny, compare to other animals and develop a number to "Predict" the trait in his progeny. Before EPD's, there would be a pen of bulls at a breeder's place. Similar age bulls. People would tend to select the bigger one in the pen - since it appears he had more growth and his dam probably had more milk than the others since he was bigger. Feet, legs and soundness would be evaluated, but hard to ignore the bigger ones. That's sort of the principle of ww epd's - using the weigh scale on many animals from the same pen.

I don't know anything about an epd bias against linebred and toward outcross. I (and others perhaps) want to know more about that. Could you explain what that is, how the bias occurs, what is the solution, etc. Is it a defect in the epd calcuation methods, an intentional bias put in place, or what? I have never heard of it. I am old but still want to learn new stuff.

 

[faster horses]

Echo has a fascinating pedigree. I believe the story goes that he hid the bull because he looked like such a dud because of inbreeding depression, but yet served his purpose well. Larry knew what he was doing. I believe the colored tags were based on his three groups: strictly maternal, terminal (not by today's standards) and in between. I've been told he eventually abandoned two of the lines and focused on the maternal. Please correct me anyone if I've got the story wrong. It's important enough to tell with accuracy.

I believe you to be right. Also, GD Viking GE60 was called "Mr. Clean Genes".
Larry showed us a picture of Echo...YIKES. But he knew what he was doing.

 

[Rmc]

I don't know anything about an epd bias against linebred and toward outcross. I (and others perhaps) want to know more about that. Could you explain what that is, how the bias occurs, what is the solution, etc. Is it a defect in the epd calcuation methods, an intentional bias put in place, or what? I have never heard of it. I am old but still want to learn new stuff.

Best way to eliminate epd bias against linebeeding?
Stop using them. Registries will not
promote the use of box of crayon hided cattle.
Yet that is exactly what epds promote in more important genetic traits in cattle. Epds promote variation (box of crayon genetics) genetics.
Consistency and predictability in breeding is based on homozygousity
And prepotency of traits in the breeding animals both of which are discouraged with epds.
Very basic breeding science says that if you take two totally different linebred strains of animals the resulting offspring will be far superior than either parent. This is known as hybrid vigor or heterozygosity. In each successive generation you will loose some of the benifits of this mating so all matings after your offspring will revert towards lower quality than their parents.
Imho epds promote this continued mating that will result in lower quality animals than their parents.
When in fact the mating that would produce the best offspring is the original matting of two different line bred strains.
Another example you have a herd of line bred cows . You ai the best 100 cows to five different totally unrelated bulls .
All offspring regardless of which bull used are very similar in type and weight.
These calves would bring a significant premium because of similar type and size. Yet the epds from the bulls would suffer because their would be little variation between the offspring of each of these five bulls among their offspring. Epds would be better if you used a box of crayons genetic herd that would produce a few supioror animals at the expense of having the majority of the herd lower quality

 

[faster horses]

Larry's tag colors at one point were yellow (caution) for maternal, green (go) for balanced and red (stop) for terminal. He dropped the red and morphed the yellow and green into tru-line and later X strain. He also had some other color thinking.

When he began to go more beyond the Beaufort of Wye effort he had some cattle that had Beaufort as sire, grandsire and great-grandsire. He realized that he needed an outcross.

There was another heavily used bull that was low performance as a calf and was not picturesque. I do not remember if that was Bob or not. He never wanted to go backwards in his pedigrees.

Larry's cattle carried the "brown saddle" trait in later years.

You need to know Larry's story on S. Shoshone (the Haystack cow) to understand the bull.

What has worked here the best in limited trials is the green line type.

What is "brown saddle trait"? I never heard of it before.

I recall Horse Butte Angus, Two Dot, Mt. paid Larry a lot of money for one of his bulls, to get those genetics, but I don't remember which one. Do you know? I wish my memory was better.

 

[Ebenezer]

What is "brown saddle trait"? I never heard of it before.

I recall Horse Butte Angus, Two Dot, Mt. paid Larry a lot of money for one of his bulls, to get those genetics, but I don't remember which one. Do you know? I wish my memory was better.

The cattle get a brown patch just behind the shoulders. I've seen it in other lines too. He also like cows with more of a brown or fawn on the back of the rear legs. Horse Butte had Beetseed and some others. I do not know about amount paid, etc.

 

[Stocker Steve]

They are slower growing unless crossed on something with a lot of growth. I am trying to work some of their influence in my herd but at least two generations back. For the commercial breeder selling at the sale barn I don't seeing straight bred OCC cattle working for us as commercial breeders.

What if you outcrossed commercial cows to OCC, and then sorted the resulting retained heifers for growth?

 

[faster horses]

What is "brown saddle trait"? I never heard of it before.

I recall Horse Butte Angus, Two Dot, Mt. paid Larry a lot of money for one of his bulls, to get those genetics, but I don't remember which one. Do you know? I wish my memory was

The cattle get a brown patch just behind the shoulders. I've seen it in other lines too. He also like cows with more of a brown or fawn on the back of the rear legs. Horse Butte had Beetseed and some others. I do not know about amount paid, etc.

That is a classic sign of copper deficiency.
Beetseed is not the name of the bull that we knew he sold to Horse Butte.
He only sold part so he could keep using him. Darn! Wish I could remember who that bull was.
Fitting name, though.

 

[Ebenezer]

That is a classic sign of copper deficiency.
Beetseed is not the name of the bull that we knew he sold to Horse Butte.
He only sold part so he could keep using him. Darn! Wish I could remember who that bull was.
Fitting name, though.

Totally different from copper deficiency. A patch only: genetic issue. Encore was a bull that got a good bit of use. I've used a son a little.