Value of Genomics

[dbirdsong]

Two years ago I went bull shopping. I wanted a cleanup bull that would improve my herd by giving me some good replacement females and improve the epds of my herd. I located a yearling bull that had the phenotype that I was looking for and a really nice epd profile so I took him home. He was an embryo calf so shortly after I bought him I pulled blood on him to verify his parentage and did the angus gs. I'm sure you've guessed by now what happened to his epds after the genomics came back on him. The good news is his parents were verified but the bad news was his growth epds went from the top 25% of the breed to the bottom 15% which leads to my question. How accurate are genomics test and if you have a calf with good epds from an established herd are they worth doing? Below is the pedigree of the bull in question. I still believe he will leave some good females in my herd. I have only had a few calves from him but have been pleased by them so far. I can certainly understand why a well established ranch with mountains of data behind their cattle would be hesitant to roll the dice and test all their bull calves.

 

[bse]

The test can change it big, if your looking for maternal, then growth wouldn't bother me. Hard to tell with just his pedigree, but I'll say he is loaded with SAV. Maybe that's why they dont do genomics???

 

[Ebenezer]

From what I have been told, there is more benefit to the data if your cattle are closely related to the base animals used to build the comparative data. So for the outer fringes of the breed, the testing is of less value.

 

[dbirdsong]

I can see why SAV wouldn't test their standout calves. It could cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars. Based on the handful of calves I have from this bull I would say he's not a mega growth sire but they do hold their own.

 

[dbirdsong]

 

[Davemk]

Two years ago I went bull shopping. I wanted a cleanup bull that would improve my herd by giving me some good replacement females and improve the epds of my herd. I located a yearling bull that had the phenotype that I was looking for and a really nice epd profile so I took him home. He was an embryo calf so shortly after I bought him I pulled blood on him to verify his parentage and did the angus gs. I'm sure you've guessed by now what happened to his epds after the genomics came back on him. The good news is his parents were verified but the bad news was his growth epds went from the top 25% of the breed to the bottom 15% which leads to my question. How accurate are genomics test and if you have a calf with good epds from an established herd are they worth doing? Below is the pedigree of the bull in question. I still believe he will leave some good females in my herd. I have only had a few calves from him but have been pleased by them so far. I can certainly understand why a well established ranch with mountains of data behind their cattle would be hesitant to roll the dice and test all their bull calves.

Stop buying bulls with S.A.V in front of their name.

 

[dbirdsong]

I have been raising a small herd of registered angus for the last 25 years but only recently started submitting data through AHIR. None of my cattle had epds established so the easiest way to get started was dna. I have been pulling dna on my calves and my plan was to keep the heifers and cleanup bull with the best profiles as I culled older cows. My problem is I just got several test back and the dna results aren't matching their Dams performance. Actually if I had not pulled dna I would have culled some of the better dna profiled cattle and kept the worst based on previous performance. I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around these results.

 

[Stocker Steve]

There is variation in any test, some traits are not highly hereditary, and prepotent cows are a small minority of the herd.

If the DNA results matched the dams performance - - then is there any value in the test?

 

[Stocker Steve]

From what I have been told, there is more benefit to the data if your cattle are closely related to the base animals used to build the comparative data. So for the outer fringes of the breed, the testing is of less value.

Could buy a Hereford bull and skip the DNA testing ? ;-)

 

[dbirdsong]

The testing is definitely too expensive to do if the results don't match the real performance collected data. This is the second year I have done the test. The cow that has had the calves with the best genomics test raised one of the lightest calves last year and looks like this years will be also. Now I know there are many factors at play but something seems off. Possibly I'm just not providing the extra nutrition that these type cattle need to express all their genetics potential.

 

[dbirdsong]

Don't get me wrong some of the cows with good genomics did preform well but there wasn't much consistency which would seem to make it hard to base many decisions on them.

 

[Stocker Steve]

A common concern in the real world - - "I keep using high WW bulls but my actual WW does not increase much".

I have creep fed some sim angus x calves and about half of them get huge. Must be the simi side of the distribution.

What does high performance genomics mean to you?

 

[dbirdsong]

High performance = high inputs

 

[dbird33]

I'm in the same boat as dbirdsong(dad). I see some correlation between genomic rankings and real world performance, but honestly, it doesn't seem like the correlation is much better than 50/50. It just seems like half the time the test fits with real world data, the other half its completely off. One of my cows had really solid performance with a 110 WR on her first two calves. I thought i would experiment a little with AGS and she came back with a terrible genomic ranking of 98, which knocked her EPD's way down. Seems like more of a marketing program than anything else right now.

 

[Redgully]

I am not real clued up with genomics but is there a measurement for feed efficiency? If i produce a 600 pound calf at twice the feed of a 500 pound calf what's the point.

 

[dbirdsong]

There is dmi and en but even those don't always match what you see in reality.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

numbers are a TOOL. You people still have to use your EYES (and scales) to make cull/keep decisions.
I am NOT sold on using DNA/EPD's on making ANY of my decisions. DNA does not tell you if the cow is structurally unsound, or has deer feet, or is bad disposition, or is or is not a fertile myrtle.
I think DNA testing is helping breed associations with an overall view for EPD's.

 

[True Grit Farms]

Good numbers are worth more than good structure. Same can be said for a blaze face. Folks will over look obvious flaws to get what they think they want.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

I, personally, don't care if they are black, red, blazed face, or purple & polka dotted - just so they are GOOD. And when i say good, I definitely am not talking about their numbers. If you are looking for cow families - structure, good feet, great volume, sound udders - easy keepers that raise a great calf.
Numbers don't mean anything if the numbers don't match the cow. Pretty soon, people will be letting computers pick their replacements. Get yourself a good scale and keep track - adjust weights so you know what you are comparing. Numbers DO NOT pay your bills. A good functional, sound cow pays the bills. And a cow that stays around for a good long time.

 

[Bovine breeder]

I think genomics has been an invaluable tool for all segments of the industry. For many traits it is worth the equivalent of data on 25-30 calves. Yes the raw scores can sometimes make you scratch your head, but I really believe most of the time it's right. They've come a long way since they came out, and I think they will continue to do so with more data and more gene mapping.

Of course The Holstein breed is a lot tighter gene pool and the management is more similar and there is more data to work with, but it has been huge for the dairies. ABS has 179 Holstein bulls today, and only 19 are daughter proven. The genetic progress is so fast that By the time the bull has milking daughters, he's already been passed up