I am also in agreement that black is not the color I would have in a perfect would, but because of Certified Angus Beef and the premiums associated with black cattle showing little ear at the packer everyone wants black in my area. The sale barn is not my primary market. I am aimed at producing replacement females, both for the public and (hopefully) for my future expansion.
I wanted to run an Angus bull over my cows to do a few things. First, there are producers in my area that want an Angus sired female. They like the idea that their cows can have a black calf when bred to a hereford bull or something not black, so they want calves out of black cows and a black bull.
I am also wanting to put some uniformity in my herd. Hopefully, in a few months I will be employed and be able to help my dad expand our farm. In that case I would like a nice set of uniform black heifers that I can put a Hereford bull over and create black baldies. I would rather use a Braford over those Angus sired heiferes, but as ALACOWMAN said, they are hard to come by in North Alabama, especially with any quality.
Additionally, this coming breeding season I will have 9 of my 20 cows that are sired by an Angus bulls over non-Angus crossbred cows. 5 more will be Hereford sired over Brangus cows, 3 will be Gelbvieh over black crossbred cows, and the other 3 are out of non-Angus bulls over crossbred cows. So, other that one straight bred Angus heifer I purchased, the highest percentage Angus cow I will have will be 5/8 Angus. Even on those higher percentage Angus cows, I am still getting all the benefit of a crossbred cow and losing a small amount of added growth on the calf side. I would love to keep 100% heterosis and really mash down the scales on my steers, but I am willing to lose a little to meet my heifer customers' expectation.
Again, thanks for all the comments. I am really enjoying getting different views of my situation.