From breeding objectives to balanced bull teams and new breed societies. It’s more important than ever so show up to bull sales this year – fully prepared. Know your objective, choose your breeder, navigate the bull… and the bulls.
1. Are you clear on your own breeding objective?
- Are you in the market for a terminal bull or a maternal bull? It is very hard to get a bull with both.
- Do you breed and sell store?
- Maternal traits will be key: Calving ease, days to calving, 200 and 400 day weights, milk, mature cow size.
- Do you finish all your own progeny?
- Maternal traits for breeding replacements (traits as above)
- Terminal traits – Growth and carcass traits.
- Have you considered two different sire teams so you can be more specific about buying terminal vs maternal bulls?
Being clear about your on breeding objective will help you;
1. Choose your breeder and;
2. Choose bulls from that breeder.
2. The most important decision you will make is what breeder you go to.
If you can’t answer these questions from the catalogue – be sure to give them a call!
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- Are all bulls semen tested? Even the best looking bulls are no good if they don’t have the goods (and enough of them don’t!).
- Have all bulls been DNA tested to verify their pedigree? 60-70% of bulls sold in NZ will tick this box. If they’re not, and their sire and/or dams are wrong – the EBVs have absolutely no relevance to you. There are just no excuses for not DNA testing anymore.
- If you are mating your heifers – so should your breeder. Not just a few – all. And do they cull them if they don’t get in calf? If you are doing it – they should be too.
- Did you know that re-breeding has more genetic influence than heifer pregnancy? So it’s not just about mating heifers, it about getting them back in calf while they are still lactating. How is your breeder managing this?
- There should be no second chances for cows that do not get in calf. For any reason. No excuses.
- Are they genomically testing at least their sale bulls? It adds accuracy to the breeding values and gives you, the buyer, more confidence. If your breeder CAN do it – they should be.
3. Know the strengths of your current bull team so you can maintain the balance.
You may be buying 5 bulls this year, but that is probably only 1/3 of the bulls you will put out.
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- Mark off what bulls are still around and what ones you are replacing.
- What were your objectives over the last 5 years and how did that reflect your bull buying choices?
- Have you got a mix of bulls from a few different studs?
- How do you create a feedback loop for different studs and know who’s performing and who isn’t?
4. Take the time to understand what index your stud breeder is utilising for their breeding and marketing.
Indexes are a great tool for comparing performance of bulls across a number of economically important traits/EBVs, as opposed to using individual EBVs. It is always important to understand the objective of any index as this will determine the economic weighting on each trait included.
More specific to those in the market for Angus bulls – you might be navigating some confusion around breed societies and different indexes. It is REALLY important that you have a chat with your breeder so you know where they are sitting and what index they are or are not using. It’s even MORE important to be clear that yours and your breeders objectives are matching. I’ll follow up with a blog on the different indexes but here are the key points you need to know for now:
- Regardless if your EBVs are coming from Australian or New Zealand breed societies – they are calculated in the same Breedplan evaluation so the EBVs themselves are apples with apples.
- The EBV averages between Australia and New Zealand are DIFFERENT so you’re comparing pear with apples when it comes to the percent ranks. The EBV averages or percent ranks in the catalogues from breeders now aligned with Angus Australia are reflective of all the breeders in NZ that have moved to Angus Australia, but also all breeders recording in Australia. A big population reflecting many different breeding objectives.The EBV averages for breeders aligned to the Angus NZ society are reflective of ONLY those breeders her in New Zealand.
- The New Zealand indexes – Angus Pure Index (API) and Self Replacing index (SRI) will only be reported for breeders still recording with Angus New Zealand. The breeders who have shifted to Angus Australia will either be using the Angus Australia indexes or the AngusPro index.
Preparation for this years bull sales is more important than ever. Take the time to re-evaluate your breeding objectives, know what bulls you still have and what their pros and cons are, have a good conversation with your breeder and study the catalogues before the sale day!! Lastly, don’t hesitate to reach out with any queries you may have!! I am MORE than happy to help.