In today’s Beef Buzz, senior farm and ranch broadcaster Ron Hays features comments from Dr. J.R. Tate of Allied Genetic Resources about selection indexes developed for the American Wagyu Association. Tate spoke with associate farm reporter Carli Davenport at the American Wagyu Association’s annual meeting in Oklahoma City. Tate explains how the indexes combine multiple economically important traits to help producers identify genetics suited for either F1 Wagyu-cross production or full-blood and purebred Wagyu systems.
New Indexes Combine Multiple Traits
Tate says the selection indexes are designed to bring several economically important traits together into one measurement. “The selection indexes are a way to combine a variety of traits that have economic importance to production systems.”
He says two indexes were created, with one focused on F1 production and the other geared toward full-blood or purebred Wagyu cattle. “We created two selection indexes: one oriented towards creating F1, the Wagyu cross typical commercial production system, or a full-blood or purebred oriented, really high premium product with a lot of extra value for extra high quality from a Wagyu carcass.”
Rather than evaluating individual traits separately, Tate says the indexes combine available EPDs into a single value designed to help identify profitable animals. “It blends all of the traits that have EPDs available into a single measure that’s oriented towards identifying the most profitable animals.”
F1 and Full-Blood Indexes Have Different Goals
Tate says the full-blood index is more closely aligned with the traditional emphasis on extremely high-quality Wagyu genetics. “The full blood index is more the traditional activities that the American Wagyu Association membership have been selecting on, really identifying super high quality, high marbling animals that are going to bring tremendously high value and prices to the producers.”
The F1 index, meanwhile, is designed around producing cattle that combine high quality with more of the growth and performance characteristics found in commercial cattle. “The F1 is really intended to be something that would compete strongly in creating USDA Prime kind of cattle, but increasing the performance attributes.”
Tate says the goal is to help producers avoid giving up as much growth and performance potential while still maintaining the quality associated with Wagyu genetics. “Instead of giving up so much growth performance potential.”
Matching Genetics to the Production System
For producers using the new EPDs and indexes, Tate says the first step is understanding what kind of cattle they intend to produce and market. “It really comes down to making sure that they know what the production system they plan to sell their animals out of.”
That means determining whether the goal is a full-blood-oriented animal or an F1 animal before comparing the genetics available.
The American Wagyu Association will also provide percentile rankings for the indexes, giving producers another way to compare animals. “They’ll know if this animal is at the top 1%, top 10% for that index, and then they can go in and assess which animals are they going to be able to afford.”
Tate says producers can then use those rankings to help balance the traits that matter most to their operation with the price they are willing to pay for genetics.
Genetics Could Play a Role as the Herd Rebuilds
Looking across the broader cattle industry, Tate says genetics can become an important consideration as producers make replacement decisions while the U.S. cattle herd rebuilds. “As we think about growing the herd from its low numbers today, the interest of producers is to keep back the highest quality animals and the genetic potential of those animals is an important factor they are considering in which replacements to bring in.”
He says producers have more tools available than simply looking at a heifer’s weaning weight. “There can be a wide variety of tools that help them understand besides just the weaning weight of the heifer candidates. What are other attributes that they can select for?”
Tate adds that genetics and management work together, with producers who understand the value of genetic differences able to use management to help realize that potential. “Genetics become important if you are a producer who understands and believes that genetics are important. Then you have strong management, and you’re able to get the full expression of the genetic differences of those animals.”
Wagyu EPDs Give Producers More Selection Tools
Tate says one of the biggest developments for the Wagyu breed has been the move from relying primarily on information about bloodlines and breed history to using data-based EPDs. “The cool thing about the Wagyu breed is they went from just information about the lines and the history of the breed to actually having expected progeny differences or EPDs that are based on data submitted from producers within the past few years.”
He says collecting and combining producer data has been a major effort, but the resulting EPDs give breeders another way to make genetic decisions. “Now that those tools are there, they can continue to advance the breed with understanding what the genetic potential of the animals are, as well as utilizing these indexes to blend the traits in an economically appropriate way.”
More Traits Could Be Added in the Future
Tate says the American Wagyu Association could eventually have EPDs for additional traits as more data is collected. “I think there’s also going to be an awareness and an interest in new traits that they don’t have EPDs on today.”
He points to female records as one potential area for future development, including information that could help evaluate heifer pregnancy, cow longevity and herd stability. “All of those kinds of things will be opportunities to continue to characterize the population and improve the utility for their producers and their customers who use Wagyu Genetics.”
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and is a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR above for today’s show and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
