Whats wrong with Simmental cattle?

[Ebenezer]

Associations should be lead by members, deal equally with all members and guard the breeding population of the breed. But as a government, they seem to raise costs on members and dictate the rules while not dealing with bad eggs. No doubt, to deal with problem members and cheaters there will be litigation. But that is a better use of the members' dollars that some of the fluff wastes and junk to entertain.

 

[Silver]

I think the Simmental associations should have done like the AQHA and closed their books once there was enough of a base to work with. Might have been a good time to set a colour standard (ie: no black) like the AQHA
Just my opinion.

 

[puzzled in oregon]

The American Simmental Association openly acknowledges that just like America is the melting pot of nationalities,
the American Simmental is the melting pot of cattle breeds.

 

[Lucky_P]

ABS lists Yearling Frame Score and Mature Frame Score for some, but not all bulls in their catalog.

I remember back in the 2000s, when we were on the 'need to make them smaller' bandwagon for a few years, we used a couple of Angus sires with 4.0 and 4.5 frame scores. In retrospect, my old linebred SimAngus cows weren't really all that big... found out that I didn't like 2-yr old cows that weighed less than 900 lbs at calving - though I suspect that marbling scores on the steers were probably pretty decent.

 

[Warren Allison]

I think the Simmental associations should have done like the AQHA and closed their books once there was enough of a base to work with. Might have been a good time to set a colour standard (ie: no black) like the AQHA
Just my opinion.

YOu are right. We had the AQHA White Rule for 60 + years. It was in place because no horse breeds contain tobiano "paint": or "pintos' This is found only in pony breeds. So, that was a good indication that some where in a horse's parentage, there was a "pony in the woodpile" Horse breeds like APHA, however, included Frame overo, splash wg hite, and sabino as approved patterns for paints. AQHA:"s color standard included not allowing these patterns eitherr. No white above the knees, none on the body,. a certain amount of the face, etc. You might breed two QHs and get a foal that " cropped out" due to excessive white, and APHA would register these as paints. But, about 10-15 years ago some wealthy breeder that had a stallion that threw excessive white, and sued the AQHA.. AQHA had started requiring DNA to register in the 80's. The plaintive made a good point: WIth DNA, the An AQHA x an AQHA = an AQHA. So, AQHA had to go back and issue these crop-outs AQHA papers, , creating a lot of horses registered as 2 breeds. It was stupid. LIke saying this cow is a registered Holstein AND a registered Brahma. Thankfully APHA responded by changing their rules that one parent had to be single registered APHA. So, that foal can only be registered APHA. Buit there are still some of the double registered overos around. and of course there is dbl; registered semen still frozen.

What breeders should have done,, which was the intention of the CAB program, in the first place. was NOT try to change the other breeds to black. They should have selected for, and marketed as, their red- white Simms, and orange Limms and Gels, etc, as the best cows to breed to an Angus bull to get superior black calves that qualified for CAB, And markets their bull as the best bull to put on your Angus cows, to get a superior calf that could qualify CAB. The only beef breed that would not have benefitted from this would be Charolais, but they don't benefit from the CAB program now anyway. I remember 55-60 years ago, when the SImms came to this area, and people bred those bulls to their Hereford and Angus 800 lb cows, and it killed half of them. BUT, I also remember people breeding their Angus bulls to those big ole red & white Simm cows. They'd pop out those polled black calves...never remember even a Simm heifer having calving problems, and my God, they had as much milk near about as a Jeresey. They grew off big calves... as big as a pure Simm, and so fast you could almost see them growing day by day. I fail to see what was wrong with that. But hind sight is 20/20 they say. That genie is so far out of the bottle, there'd be no way to get it back in again, now.

 

[Rmc]

Never understood how the color of a horse changed its quality.or the color of a hide made twoin the quality of meat. The more we know about the genetics of coat color the more ridiculous coat color limits on registration is to me .
In my opinion the angus breeders lost good genetics by not allowing the reds to be registered.never understood why a horse with white above its knees couldn't be registered either .

 

[Travlr]

What breeders should have done,, which was the intention of the CAB program, in the first place. was NOT try to change the other breeds to black. They should have selected for, and marketed as, their red- white Simms, and orange Limms and Gels, etc, as the best cows to breed to an Angus bull to get superior black calves that qualified for CAB,

And therein lies the entire problem in a nut shell...

There are no good enough reasons to expect a black Angus bull to throw "superior" calves. Cab is claiming something they can't deliver. Angus carcasses are no more superior than any other superior animals from other breeds.

If a carcass grades Prime... they should be Prime and the animal should be getting paid for as Prime regardless of color.

Producers should be breeding for great carcasses... and not for color.

CAB is ruining the beef industry. The benefits to the Angus breeders are at the expense of all other breeders and the industry as a whole.

 

[Mossy Dell]

Very interesting thread since I just did a fairly deep dive into Angus epds trying to see how many breeders have been trying to balance their cattle. I was surprised how many big, famous Angus breeders have awful estimates for such qualities as heifer pregnancy, calving ease, and feet (claw and angle), even as increasing numbers seem to be measuring feed intake and selecting for efficiency.

But again, horrible estimates overall on another biggie for me: docility. I wonder if the Holstein influence is felt there, because it sure wouldn't have helped, at least regarding the bulls. And didn't Hosteins have to add feet epds long ago?

The big on-paper Angus winner for me, by the way, is Yon Family Farm Angus in SC. Their bulls, at least the ones I like, are stunningly balanced for economic, maternal, management, and carcass qualities. Take a look at Top Cut.

"The only reason for purebreds is to make crossbreds," a mentor used to growl.

Now it'd be, "To make composites."

When I was on the board of Katahdin Hair Sheep International, we had a member who got on the board who was all about showing and wanted to close the flockbook. The Katahdin is a composite, so grading up and allowing for new genes that might be needed made sense all around.

An irony was that this guy was infamous for winning shows, when he raised Dorsets, with huge sheep that looked like big western Columbias. That's become the show Dorset. There are working Dorsets you can find but the breed is split due to the show jockeys and their Columbia-Dorsets.

The real reason everyone said our guy wanted to close our breed's book was so he could secretly cross and win shows. Wonder if someone who showed Angus saw what a Holstein infusion could bring in purple ribbons? My little experience is one of the reasons I got to detest anything about showing.

I slowly came to appreciate, admire, and even envy that kids learn to handle livestock in showing. Otherwise it so clearly leads downward for the people and animals involved.

 

[simme]

This color thing sure is a trigger to people. Maybe the FSA, NRCS, USDA, or cattleman's association needs to offer therapy on cow color anxiety. All paid for by tax money of course.

For me, the simmental (or any other) association deciding on a no-black policy or a closed herd book would make no more sense than the AAA having their policy of nothing but black (except for a little white in a few places. How did that happen?) and their apparent belief that they have everything that is useful already in the herdbook. The AAA has decided that red is a genetic defect even though the red genetics were clearly in the breed for a very long time. It probably came from the red cattle used to develop the breed originally (before there was an AAA). The simmental association has decided that genetic defects are those lethal conditions like NH, AM, and CA. Interesting that the risk of those conditions in the simmental registry is mostly from the angus influence in the breed.

The case can be made for multiple closed breeds of very uniform cattle as seed stock for crossbreeding in commercial herds (outside of breed associations). That raises the question - Who is best able to maximize progress from that crossbreeding and cow making using the seed stock from closed registries? Is it the commercial guy or an association with a database? One of those will probably collect more records and perform more data analysis and offer more services than the other. There is certainly something for everyone in the cattle business.

My thinking is that the important thing for a producer is to breed for making money. That can vary by location, environment, management and marketing. And can include multiple colors and characteristics and (sadly) even mini long haired bovines that have no economic value - except that a few people seem to sell them for big money.

About everything that can be said about color has been said multiple times. Maybe it is time to have the discussion about the value/harm of the show ring as mentioned above. There has not been much recent discussion on that topic. But there is plenty of ammunition in that topic.

 

[Mossy Dell]

My own beef with showing actually started in childhood. I exhibited poultry, all I could raise in town. Two things amazed me at shows. First, there were fowl that looked exactly like the beautiful breed paintings in The American Standard of Perfection. Second, their unthrifty shaky faced aspect.

Even as a kid I'd read enough about environmental fitness and raw health and vigor that that's what I saw missing. I didn't know and couldn't imagine how inbred those birds were. Or how highly inheritable, and therefore comparatively easy to achieve, are appearance/conformation.

I am not saying show lines of livestock are weak or inbred, I wouldn't know. But I do know show animals tend to develop in unfit ways except for their own game. I also suspect showing, which I envy for teaching farm kids livestock handling, leaves a very bad legacy in those who do not realize that handling was its value—not breeding selection, not sustainable farming.

And maybe unfairly, I suspect showring experience is in part behind the mystifying apparent lack of EPD knowledge/use/balancing by so many cattle breeders. In some cases, they are people successful in other areas who bought their way in. In others, they are multi-generation legacy ranchers. And they produce, as my genetics advisor used to say, duds in studs clothes.

When I look at their sometimes horrible EPDs, it appears they don't understand EPDs or make much, if any, effort to use them. I must be missing something, I think. Maybe it is all about growth? Forget maternal qualities and convenience traits, just stack what you're directly paid for?

Then I run across a breeder like Isa Beefmasters or Yon Angus or Hooks Simmental and see the results of long-term breeding for balance. Huge value there to those who have dealt with crazy cows, with high growth cows that have little milk for their high growth calves, or high milk bulls for desert range cows, etc.

It must have taken me a couple years of study and seminars to understand EPDs. I am not saying they are perfect, just a hugely powerful breeding tool. Using EPDs for balance helped me transform one decent but unbalanced and one very messed up sheep flock. Later I helped Katahdin Hair Sheep International develop an EPD for parasite resistance with a lot of hot, sweaty, dirty work and mailings of cold feces to vet labs.

 

[Warren Allison]

In my opinion the angus breeders lost good genetics by not allowing the reds to be registered.never understood why a horse with white above its knees couldn't be registered either .

Just told you. Tobiano doesn't exist in horses, Only in ponies. Other patterns found in equines had always been considered to be paint/pinto. A QH ( or Morgan or whatever) born tobiano was proof there was a pony somewhere in the pedigree. That was the only way to tell in 1940. And they considered the other paint patterns., frame overo, sabino, splash white etc, to also be indicative of a "pony in the woodpile". Never was a tobiano born to 2 QHS< but a lot of times a horse with 4 white stockings and big blaze, bred to one just like iot, good have a foal with the stockings high enough or enough white on the face, to be overo or sabino, and outside the limits of white to be Registered AQHA. But in the last 20 years, a suit was filed against AQHA saying that with DNA , saying 100% QH, a foal ....resulting from 2 parents DNA tested to be a QH,....no matter how much excessive white.....is therefore a QH.

 

[Rmc]

Your claims don't match up with science.
Don't know if you have noticed but it isn't 1940 anymore.

Just told you. Tobiano doesn't exist in horses, Only in ponies.

And white above the knee is not only due to the tobiano genetics.
Always amazed me that breed associations are among the last to accept advances in science and genetics!

 

[alacowman1]

The American Simmental Association openly acknowledges that just like America is the melting pot of nationalities,
the American Simmental is the melting pot of cattle breeds.

If that's the case,then get ready for them to turn up the heat..our pot is melting like lava

 

[puzzled in oregon]

I think those involved with the American Simmental will display better management
practices than those managing our borders.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Interesting points of view.
I'm a long time breeder and I also show. I use EPD's as a TOOL as they are meant to be used. They are not the Almighty's gift to the beef industry. You cannot use EPD's without LOOKING at your cattle.

The Simmental breed promotes the use of BALANCED EPD's by requiring all the Regional and National junior show judges to use the current EPDs on all the show cattle.
Color....I love the excitement at the birth of a calf....what color? any white markings? What sex?
I tell everyone, I don't care if cattle are red, black, purple or polka dotted.....just as long as they are good. Good cattle are good no matter what color, what breed, in the pasture, in the showing, or hanging on the hook.
There are a lot of people that cheat. Whether it's breeding cattle, selling cattle, showing cattle, ....you name it. There are people who cheat. I get beat in the show ring by cattle that are better than mine. I also get beat by cheaters with fake cattle. "Most" people in the industry know where my cattle SHOULD stand.

 

[Warren Allison]

Interesting points of view.
I'm a long time breeder and I also show. I use EPD's as a TOOL as they are meant to be used. They are not the Almighty's gift to the beef industry. You cannot use EPD's without LOOKING at your cattle.

The Simmental breed promotes the use of BALANCED EPD's by requiring all the Regional and National junior show judges to use the current EPDs on all the show cattle.
Color....I love the excitement at the birth of a calf....what color? any white markings? What sex?
I tell everyone, I don't care if cattle are red, black, purple or polka dotted.....just as long as they are good. Good cattle are good no matter what color, what breed, in the pasture, in the showing, or hanging on the hook.
There are a lot of people that cheat. Whether it's breeding cattle, selling cattle, showing cattle, ....you name it. There are people who cheat. I get beat in the show ring by cattle that are better than mine. I also get beat by cheaters with fake cattle. "Most" people in the industry know where my cattle SHOULD stand.

I despise the judged classes at horse shows...the halter and pleasure classes, etc. That clock don't know or care who you are, or how much you are worth. The clock don't cheat. Even though cattle classes like cutting etc, are judged, at least they are objective. It is obvious which horse perforned the best, where as halter and pleasure are purely subjectove.. just one man;s( or woman's) opinion. You can buy yourself a blue ribbon in a halter or western pleasure class, but you can't buy seconds shaved off a clock in the barrel race.

 

[Hpacres440p]

After taking a unique-colored steer to be processed yesterday, I can see why uniform cattle patterns/colors would be preferred by the processors. They all look alike. They become generic "things" to the guys on the kill floor who have to kill cattle all day. Get patterns on them, they start becoming individual-you start noticing how many are killed in a day. Just a psychology observation…

 

[ClinchValley86]

After taking a unique-colored steer to be processed yesterday, I can see why uniform cattle patterns/colors would be preferred by the processors. They all look alike. They become generic "things" to the guys on the kill floor who have to kill cattle all day. Get patterns on them, they start becoming individual-you start noticing how many are killed in a day. Just a psychology observation…

Interesting observation.

 

[gitnby]

just lost my simangus bull....best bull ive ever had.