by Quin LaFollette, Western Region
Let’s Do Our Best
Hi everyone from northwest Wyoming.
I hope you all are having as nice of a fall as we are. I love fall. It’s my favorite time of year. The cows come home from the mountain, and it’s our first good chance to see how the year’s calf crop is coming along. We start to get a feel of how matings from last spring worked out. While I love the cooler weather and of course a little hunting, it is also a very busy time. While finishing up this year’s calf work, it’s time to get cows enrolled in Total Herd Enrollment (THE) for next year.
If you aren’t currently using the programs offered at ASA for calf recording, I would strongly recommend contacting the good folks in Bozeman and taking a serious look at THE, Calf Crop Genomics, and Cow Herd Roundup. All calf data turned in with DNA is way more useful to all of us in the breed. A pool of data with unverified parentage is usable, but not near as good as it could be. It has been proven time and time again, and no matter how close you watch things at calving, ten to 15 percent of the parentage info you turn in is wrong. DNA is the only way of
doing the best job we can at making sure our data is correct and useful. It has surely proved to be true in our operation. Because of this, we won’t even consider purchasing an animal that hasn’t been parent verified with genomically enhanced EPD.
Dr. DeClerck and staff have been on a roll with hiring some incredible new folks at the ASA. I would encourage everyone to try and make it to Oklahoma City in January for the Annual Meeting to meet some of the new staff. I think you’ll agree we have a lot of talent and smarts working on our behalf.
Industry-wide, things look very good for the foreseeable future, and I’m certainly encouraged and looking forward to a great bull sale season coming up. The interest in cattle with known genetics, and that have a record of how they will feed and kill, will remain high. The commercial sector of our industry is getting more and more educated in regards to the true genetic value that is identified in genomically enhanced EPD, and producers are asking for them. Let’s do our best to give them what they need and continue to be known as a performance breed.
Take care everyone and have a great Christmas and a happy New Year!