At the risk of starting a big brawl.....

[ASRG]

I think smcgrath has the right approach with the "balance" thing. The industry as a whole usually follows trends to extremes....we chase one trait too far until it starts to raise problems.
For example the pursuit of long framey cattle that gained a lot and had high lean meat yield led to a lot of problems: high feed costs, longevity,fertility issues, and quite often a lack of eating satisfaction from the consumer?
By crossing back to angus(and others) some of these issues were addressed and corrected, but at a cost as the angus genetics became more prevalent?
At the end of the day the gene mix of your cattle is something you have to be able to live with? You might have to realize you won't get the top price if you don't choose the genetics that optomize production for the feeding industry? At the same time the feeder must realize if he wants those super productive feeder cattle he will have to pay more?
There are always options.
I do agree with Kato that generally speaking angus type calves will not produce like the Char or Sim calves in feedlot performance. I think her "on farm" conclusions are fairly accurate and probably reflect the concerns of cattle feeders?
The cow/calf producer needs to be aware that his customer needs cattle that will make money? He needs to understand how he can fill that need without undermining his own needs?
Like Sean said it is all about balance.

[kato]

I agree. Well said.

As for the crackpot issue... Our own cattle are not like this. A lot of the calves we buy are not like this.

However.... there are some feeders out in the pen that as soon as they came off the truck, we knew they'd never laid eyes on a human, other than at the auction mart. You can just tell by looking at them that they are basically feral cattle.

This low maintenance, low handling management protocol that's so popular these days has one major drawback, and that's the fact that these cattle are not handled. You can be as slow and quiet as you like, but it's not going to calm them down if they panic whenever they feel confined. When you open the front of the chute, they come out like rockets, no matter how gentle you are getting them in there.

We've also observed over the years that the wild ones are not the ones who gain either. It's the ones who are calm, quiet, and sensible who perform the best. I believe there have been studies done that prove the quiet ones produce the most tender beef as well.

[tman]

That's why it's just as important to work or train our livestock just like we do our horses or dogs. No average person hops on a horse to go do a job or compete that has never been handled and trained before. Like wise with working/service dogs of any kind or just pets for that matter. Some animals take more time and more patience and more training but the end result is attainable. At that point, working with animals of any sort becomes very enjoyable, among other things.

[per]

Good topic Kato. As far a temperament goes I have to say from my experience it is largely genetic to start with. Having said that, handling them inappropriately at some point in their life can tip the scales away from every being able to handle them and some with the wrong genes couldn't be tamed not matter what you do. Our herd is mostly hands off but when you stop to visit them for sure you will have a group of curious George's visiting. When working, head hunters and the severely uncooperative are culled.

To the Angus weight question. Having a Sim history but currently an Angus cross herd. No doubt a smaller calf in the spring equals a smaller calf in the fall but as far as back grounding goes, if your feeding for shorter keeps you need to keep some exotic blood in them, if grass is your game it is easier to get fat on grass with a smaller frame. Kind of depends on the market you want to swim in.

Nothing here is written in stone, just my own experience. I won't be going back to European cattle very soon but my blood bank has plenty continental left in it yet. Then maybe a trip to check out some Gelbvieh's.

[PureCountry]

Regardless of breed, here's a point to
ponder. You go through your heifer calf
crop and look for what?

- Temperament
- Momma's track record including feet
and udders
- individual conformation
- Growth rate on the cow

So, you evaluate these things, and you
put together a uniform, consistent group
of heifers. Why then, do you go to
someone else's farm, with different
conditions, different genetics,
different selection criteria, and buy
their bulls? Your heifers have you close
to improving on your consistency, then
you throw in different genetics by
breeding them to an outside bull.

If you went through your own bull calves
- and there are only 10 because you
castrated all but the top 10 out of the
best proven cows in the herd - and
selected for what's important to you,
and bred those bulls to your uniform
group of heifers, would you not be
improving on your consistency? Would
that not make sense since you are
drawing both sides of the equation from
the best cows in your own herd which is
already adapted to your conditions?

The only reason I see for buying outside
genetics is if you're starting out and
want to improve on what you got.
Otherwise, once you're off and running,
every time you buy in outside genetics
it's like mixing a batch of cookies with
a blindfold on.

My apologies to Randy for potentially
hurting bull sales.

[smcgrath76]

PC - I guess that depends on what your
goals are, and if your 10 best bull calves
are the 10 best bull calves you can source
genetics from. If they are the 10 best
for what you are trying to do, and you are
trying to lock down your genetics so to
speak, that may be a reasonable approach,
but...

[SADIE]

Kato--

Reading this thread has made me sit back and think about all my former cow-calf client customers with their herds and also reflect on the direction we started 15 years ago on building our cross bred cow herd F1 genetics and maintaining that herd trying to achieve the goals that we put out were important to our family operation.

When you are within one breed Ie Black angus or red angus, Gelbvieh or whatever I feel one can stay within your own herd with replacements much easier.---Following pc thread.

Maintaining a true F1 cow-herd when you are under the 150-200 cow range needs self decipline and sourcing outside genetics IMHO.

Points of NB to our operation. Uniformity in genetics/body type/ temperment/color & growth and TEMPERMENT and Predictable Heifer calving ease. I have mentioned before that we only buy Bred heifers to keep young stock current coming into our herd.

Because of repeated availablity we selected the Red Angus/Simmental Angus bull on Fleck simmental cows Not the reverse Simmental Bull on Red angus cows. we can see the difference in the two by trial and error.

Bl Angus/Simmental I feel would be a better genetically built animal yet because of Bl Angus has a stronger genetic pool IMHO.

15 Years ago our operation was into the 3 way terminal cross with these animals being bred to the power Charolais bull resulting in the real performance animal in the feedlot.

Now because of aging of our labor pool, off farm income we selected breeding the F1s to Power Rd Angus bulls (performance) rather than calving ease. The 1/4 sim/34 angus heifers we have sold as replacements we have followed that progeny into other herds and see what another breeding to angus progeny does (Past their heifer year).

The best success to those animals as mothers is the cross to the Char, Gelbvieh,etc (3 way cross).

Going into this fall of 2011 another post asked the Price of Bred cows/Bred Heifers?

The Bred Heifers for our replacements will be on offer at 4-5 places. Could be an interesting fall??

I posted this thread because of my 40 year interest and involvement in genetics of cattle and the my interest in the cross-bred animal.

[grassfarmer]

SADIE - could you maybe clarify for me what you are actually breeding? You are talking about keeping an F1 herd and selling 1/4 sim - 3/4 angus replacement heifers but also mention using sim/angus bulls or am I reading that wrong?

[SADIE]

Because of repeated availablity we selected the Red Angus/Simmental F1 animal.

(Angus bull on Fleck simmental cows) Not the reverse (Simmental Bull on Red angus cows). we can see the difference in the two by trial and error.

To these F1 animals (basically they are the universal female) Any breed of bull can now cross with this animal and things will work well.

We choose away from the third breed---at this time and breed the f1 cows back to Purebred Angus bull focusing on Performance type of genetics and not just ease of calving genetics that the angus breed at this time is well noted for.

The progeny produced off our operation is 1/4 simm 3/4 angus calves. They are all sold off the farm as feeder steers (growthy and in demand) and (open heifers sold in the spring grass market).

Keeping my own heifers in my herd and breeding again angus ones herd will soon result in the shorter, high angus influence animal that Kato ranch is possibly experiencing. SOmewhere along the line one has to choose a third breed IMHO.

Different stokes for different folks.

[kato]

Our approach with our own cow herd is to stick with what works. And that equation does not include Angus here. We have had two black cows that we bought after BSE, due to breds being worth less than calves. One is gone, and the other one is on the "hit list". Her calf, off the Limo bull, is OK, but she's a horrible thing to work with when she calves. I will be glad to see her get on a truck.

Our herd is based on Charolais, other than a couple of odds and ends that we picked up like those two blacks. We only keep Char replacements. We breed them either Char or Limo, but this year we brought in four new Char bulls and got rid of four Limos. Within a year, the only Limo will likely be a heifer bull.

We've been noticing that the discount of white calves and premium for the blacks has disappeared, at least in Manitoba. Maybe feedlots are seeing the same rate of gain issues that our backgrounding operation has???

I guess our approach comes from living through the high interest rates and droughts of the 80's. The lessons we learned then were...

1.Time is money. When you've had a 20% operating loan, you learn that real quick. By the time our neighbour's calves are hitting the pasture for their yearling year, ours are likely in a grocery store somewhere.

2.If you're going to be short of feed, you'd better have some calves in the fall that you can sell, otherwise you're looking at losing some money.

I guess if we had a large land base with a bunch of pasture and lots of time we could go another route, but for our farm, this is what works.

I think the pendulum has swung a little too far the other way from what it was, and needs to come back to the center some. As has been said here, balance is the key, and it wouldn't take too much to correct the issue.