| The British Charolais Cattle Society |
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High genetic merit
bulls: measuring and monitoring reveal
the real benefits
Dewi Hughes
Some cattle will perform better than others quite simply because of their
genetic potential, writes
Hybu Cig Cymru/Meat
Promotion Wales’ Dewi Hughes.
The advantage of using high genetic merit bulls has been clearly
demonstrated by HCC which collected the weights of
8,400 cattle as part of its
Welsh Beef Quality Improvement Project.
Suckled calves by bulls that were in the top 10% of their respective breed’s
performance figures gained an extra 0.25kg per day over their lifetime
compared to calves from all other bulls. Add together that improved
performance and it equates to 137kg over an 18 month period, the difference
between profit and loss.
Regardless of whether you are
selling suckled calves, stores or finished cattle, weight undisputedly pays,
so it makes sense to manage your cattle to grow well and achieve heavy
weights at sale. Taking time out to put them over the scales to measure and
monitor their performance to determine if they are achieving their genetic
potential is time well spent and will pay dividends later on, as will
investing in a
high genetic merit bull
in the first instance.
The weights collected by HCC
from 8,400 cattle showed a massive variation between the lowest 20%
performing animals who achieved an average 0.65kg
daily liveweight gain (DLG) from birth to finishing while the top 20% gained
an average 1.25kg DLG. This huge variation highlights the importance of
knowing the performance of your cattle so that you can manage them
appropriately to achieve your targets.
Setting a target selling or
finishing weight is a good way of managing your growing or finishing cattle,
but it is only useful if accompanied by targets for liveweight gain. For
example, to achieve a finished weight of 650kg, assuming 35kg birth weight,
at 18 months an animal should be gaining an average 1.12kg per day from
birth.
Alun Jacob
Alun and Wendy Jacob are among those suckled calf producers who are
realising the benefits of using high genetic merit performance recorded
bulls and making sure their progeny are on track. Their team of three
Charolais bulls which qualified for WBQIP funding being within the breed’s
top 10% for performance EBVs, are currently leaving steer calves averaging
1.5kg DLG at weaning at just over six months of age, while the heifers are
averaging 1.4kg DLG. In comparison, steers by one of their previous bulls
which scored around the breed’s average for performance EBVs averaged 1.1kg
DLG, and heifers achieved a figure just slightly less.
“The performance difference between the two sets of calves reared in exactly
the same management system is quite striking,” comments Alun. “The calves by
the high EBV bulls are averaging a target 350kg at weaning, compared with
300kg for those by the average bull. That extra 50kg per calf, when
multiplied up over 180 calves sold off the farm annually, amounts to
approximately nine tonnes of additional beef, which to us represents a
substantial sum.”
The Jacobs manage a
relatively extensive operation at Twlly y Gwyddil, a 700 acre SDA unit with
accompanying hill rights based at Craig Cefn Parc, Careful choice of terminal sire has been one
straight forward route to achieving the Jacob’s goal. “He’s half the herd
and can be easily manipulated. We have used Charolais for the last 20 years
because of its ability to leave calves with weight for age, they grow
uniformally, they are easy to batch up for market in groups of 20 like peas
in a pod, and buyers seems to like them,” he says.
“As far as dam line is
concerned, we’ve developed a closed herd of Angus cross and slightly bigger
Simmental Angus cross which are suited to this farm. For example, our 120
spring calving
cows have to have the ability to out winter on the hill, they’re never
housed.” Calves are sold straight off their dams at six months and averaging
a target 350kgs, through Sennybridge Auction and at
Brecon and Radnor Suckled Calf
Rearers’ annual sales, and they usually find their way into
the day’s top 10% of prices. “They sell to repeat buyers and we always make
a point of talking to
these finishers to find out how well our calves performed and eventually
killed out.” The Jacobs became familiar with using EBVs in
their terminal sire selection process when they began to use AI in an
attempt to choose more accurately bulls with high scores for growth rate,
muscle depth and ease of calving. They also carefully selected for milkiness
and growth in maternal sires destined for using over 10% of the herd which
is used for breeding heifer replacements. “We found these high EBV bulls were
consistently leaving high performance calves, a trend that made us realise
the data was accurate and worked,” Wendy explains. “In the last five years,
we’ve gone on to prove using EBV performance data and it has become second
nature to our decision making. Compared with average bulls, those within the
Charolais breed’s top 10% are consistently delivering an extra 50kg growth
by weaning and the calves have better conformation.” The couple record each calf, its sire and
dam, ease of calving and new born vigour, after which its performance is
carefully monitored. “We weigh every calf at 100 days to give an indication
of performance and to make sure it is on a suitable trend to reach target
weaning weight. We weigh again at weaning to help us appraise the calf’s
sire, to see if it is delivering the performance we targeted,” she says.
Alun adds: “We’ve started to
talk to finishers
about the potential of our calves by high EBV performance recorded bulls and
how they can be differentiated from others. We want them to be able to
explore the whole picture, make more informed decisions on our purchases to
select the cattle with the highest potential performance and in turn, the
highest margins.”
Charolais Bulls with a terminal index in the Top 10% of the breed can produce calves worth and extra £50 more than an average TI bull
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