determine he probably did not inherit the best half of his sire’s DNA or the best half of his dam’s DNA. That’s where the genomics have come in. They’ve allowed us to add some accuracy to those numbers much earlier than we’d have been able to before, so it’s helping to take some of the surprise factor out.” Amen suggests producers who are selecting replace-
ment heifers might gain the most insight from Angus Genetics’ 2 calving ease EPDs — Direct, which predicts how often fi rst-calf heifers bearing the bull’s own calves will need assistance, and Maternal, which gauges how easily the bull’s daughters would be expected to calve as fi rst calf heifers. She says producers who sell calves at weaning may
want to look at weaning weight EPDs, and those who sell on a grid may be interested in carcass EPDs like yearling weights and feed effi ciency. Along with other breed associations, AAA offers in-
dexes that simplify things for the producer by combin- ing several sought-after EPDs into a single number. The Angus Association calls theirs “Dollar Value” indexes. The $W index is designed for the commercial producer who’s selling calves at weaning and keeping replace- ment heifers, while the $B incorporates post-weaning traits. Amen cautions, “Be sure you know what’s in it and what’s contributing to that index. $W takes into account birth weight and weaning weight, mature cow weight and milk production. Those may be the 4 traits that you’re most interested in. If you look at the $B you have to remember it doesn’t have calving ease or things like that in it, so you may have to look at the calving ease index in addition.”
What’s next for EPDs? Amen says AAA is moving beyond moderate-to-highly
heritable traits like the growth and carcass traits and is working at collecting more reproductive trait data for its “MaternalPlus” program. “It’s a voluntary whole-herd reporting system,” she
says, “and to this point the fruits of that have been very good. We’ve been able to genomically enhance our heifer pregnancy EPDs for the fi rst time in December, and in the future we’d like to expand that and launch some new EPDs related to the productive life of the cow herd and things like that.”
EPDs in practical application For Montague rancher Doug Satree, collecting data
on his registered Angus herd comes naturally. “What we mainly focus on is quality from the phenotypic stand-
tscra.org April 2014 The Cattleman 81
point, but also mainly from a reproductive effi ciency, and also from a performance standpoint,” he says. Sa- tree, who’s been in the cattle business since 1973, has owned a registered Angus herd since 1994 and also raises Simmental-Angus and Chianina-Angus cattle, and has collected many awards at national, regional and state cattle shows. Exhibiting, he says, is a huge part of their operation
from an economics standpoint. “Our show cattle are a side effect of our breeding program,” Satree says. “We concentrate a lot on phenotypic design, structural cor- rectness — a lot of the practical traits that we don’t have, that can’t be measured, from an EPD standpoint — and we try to combine the 2 into a well-balanced group of cattle that read good on paper, but also perform well on their own from the phenotypic standpoint.” And Satree says when it comes to placing a lot of
weight on EPDs in his business, you have to walk a fi ne line. “Our target market is mainly selling show cattle to junior exhibitors,” he says. “You pay attention to your general phenotypic traits — your birth weights and how they’re built. You want them built a certain way so when they go to reproduce, they’re able to lay down and have a calf, or those bulls are able to sire calves that calve easy, but yet they get up and they perform.” His
Expected progeny differences
compare an animal’s
inherited and performance traits with others in the breed.
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