Breeding costs?

[grassfarmer]

That's when I start to worry about breeding programs
- when marketing supersedes breeding. This whole
"Angus beef" deal has been great marketing but it's
been bad for the cattle breeds in my opinion. With
the requirement being only for black hided cattle in
many programs this has diluted the genetic
consistency to the point the end product can only be
generic beef.
Is there a website for the ABC program? I confess I've
never heard of it although I'm familiar with the Clay
centre work as well as Beefbooster and their spinoff
CL super crosses.

Here are links to a couple of images which I hope will
come through for people.
http://plantandsoil.unl.edu/Image/siteImages/B73Mo
17,hybridPlantsLG.gif
This one shows corn plants with the two rows on the
left being the inbred parent stock lines and the one
on the right being a hybrid created by crossing the
two parents.
http://plantandsoil.unl.edu/Image/siteImages/B73Mo
17,hybridEarsLG.gif
This second image shows the cobs off the same
plants with the hybrid in the middle this time. I think
these demonstrate well how the best hybrids are
created in plant breeding. Yet in the cattle world most
either breed unrelated parent stock to each other or
they use hybrids as breeding stock. Why does nobody
follow the corn model and maximize hybrid vigor for
the commercial producer producing the feeder
calves/fat cattle?

[grassfarmer]

I guess the links don't work - try going to:

http://plantandsoil.unl.edu/pages/printinformationm
odule.php?idinformationmodule=1075412493

scroll down until you come to pictures 10a and 10b.

[GaryE]

Thanks for the comments...The best crosses for maintaining hybrid vigor yet control over the seedstock are phenotypically similar yet genetically diverse and those are hard to find within purebred programs. EPD's are great for single trait selection but poor at identifying optimum for a large number of traits.

[grassfarmer]

You'll have to explain this to me Gary I'm not
following:
"The best crosses for maintaining hybrid vigor yet
control over the seedstock are phenotypically similar
yet genetically diverse and those are hard to find
within purebred programs."

I assume you mean as an example that you would
want to start with a Hereford and an Angus that are
phenotypically similar? Surely they would
automatically be genetically diverse by the fact they
are two unrelated breeds? I also don't understand
what the "control over the seed stock" you speak of
is?

[GaryE]

One of my concerns about buying off the shelf bulls is that you often find bith wt, udder, fertiltiy and feet problems in the nest generation. Many purebred operations using EPD's are only looking for single trait selection

[forage]

Gary E what is off the shelf