A Steak in Genomics™

Developing and maintaining a herd with the key profit driver By Rebecca Mettler Reprint from the Joplin Stockyards Cattlemen's News. Cow longevity is a key profit driver in cow-calf operations. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter if a producer has purchased the perfect bull for their operation if the cows remain open because of poor cowherd fertility. Instead, developing and maintaining a herd with enhanced longevity should be a top item on producers’ minds when setting goals for the new year ahead. While proper nutrition and sound vaccination protocols for reproductive diseases are essential pieces of the puzzle, producers should also focus on making genetic improvements to fertility and other longevity related factors. Too often when producers looking at genetic predictions, e.g., expected progeny differences (EPDs) and indexes, they look at growth and carcass traits. But as an industry, we often don’t think about traits to improve our long-term employees—our co...

Head over to the January 2020 issue of the ANGUS BEEF BULLETIN to read a new article written by my graduate student Harly Durbin and me. Harly was an intern at Angus Genetics Inc. the summer of 2019, and through her work AGI will be releasing a Hair Shedding EPD in 2020. Article Available Here .