Beef – What traits do you breed for? – Tea gas sc

April 27, 2024

Wesley Browne aims to breed a functional, dairy cow capable of producing heavy weaners and discussed breeding and genetics on his farm with Chris Daly, ICBF, as part of a recent Teagasc Future Beef webinar.

Wesley is a full-time farmer and keeps 90 suckler cows that calve in the spring on 58 hectares of land in four blocks just outside the town of Monaghan. The bulls are ready at 15.3 months. The heifers that he does not keep himself are sold as replacement heifers to other farmers.

Wesley’s main focus is on profitability:

• Calf per cow per year
• 200 day weight of >300 Kg
• Meets factory specs with the bulls
• Reducing the age of the finish to reduce costs
• Had a 400 kg heifer die in May
• Having a marketable heifer

Top class genetics

Looking at what Wesley needs is top class genetics, a dairy cow that is heavily weaned to reduce the cost of the finishing period. She must have good conformation to breed a U bull. The bull bred from her must also have good conformation to be able to produce a U animal after 15.3 months.

Wesley also sells replacements, an important consideration has always been her color. Wesley says: “Farmers want a beautiful red heifer with a white face. But with the introduction of BDGP and then SCEP, these purchasing farmers also wanted to purchase females that were eligible for the schemes.”

This is not a problem for Wesley, he has been following genetics for years and uses stock bulls to complement each other. “I want a functional cow that calves after 24 months, gives me one live calf per cow per year and produces a good animal that can calve within 16 months.”

How does Wesley achieve his breeding goals?

Wesley has looked at the characteristics of each bull and the combination of bulls to produce the replacements he wants, “one bull can’t do everything for you”. Wesley is chasing milk, he wants a good, hard birth, so let’s review his Simmental Bull – SI474. He is:

• +29.3 kg on carcass, which is a good weight
• +1.52 on conformation, so a clearer animal
• +10.5 kg of milk, so really strong here (you wouldn’t want it much stronger).

He also has a negative calving interval of -2.09 days, which is excellent as Wesley wants one calf per cow per year.

But Wesley is killing bulls and he wants them judged. That is why he uses a strong Limousin bull.

LM0940 is a large bull that weighs +37.7Kg on carcass and +2.65 on conformation. This bull is used to add size and conformation to a replacement heifer. He is only +2.3 kg of milk, so he does not take anything away from the milk in the herd, but neither does he add anything. So Wesley has to be careful. He has +2.53 days on calving interval, so he does not help maintain that 365 day calving interval.

Wesley has 90 cows and runs them in 3 separate groups, so he wants another bull. What should he choose? Wesley has had a Saler bull in recent years: SA1124. Again he is carcass lighter with +21.3kg, clearer in conformation with +1.39, he has a lot of milk with +7.5kg and he reduces the calving interval by -6.4 days.

So when Wesley looks at the contribution of each bull, he builds the type of cow he wants and produces the kind of stock the market demands.

Listen to more about Welsey’s breeding plan below:

More information about the Future Beef Program can be found here.