Beef Genomics offers EPD information to today's cattle producer with more accuracy than we have ever seen- so says Ryan Ruppert with the American Angus Association. Ruppert was with Neogen when Radio Oklahoma Ag Network Farm Director Ron Hays talked with him last month at the Cattle Industry Convention in San Diego.
Ruppert says the seedstock producer has a better chance than ever before to offer cow calf producers exactly what they say they need to improve their beef herd. "I can now start delivering what that cow calf producer wants on a much more consistent basis, making my reputation such that the producer will want to come back to me- to rely on me to provide the best bulls or heifers possible. It's like writing a contract that I have never been able to write before."
Ruppert says that now with the Genomic enhancements- a commercial producer can afford a bull that gives him a 60% chance of delivering exactly what he wants- which has been the same level of predictability that traditional EPDs have offered for the best AI sires. He calls that a huge step forward from where we were just two or three years ago.
And we can learn what the potential of a bull calf is at the ripe old age of one day. Ruppert tells Hays "we can take a day old calf and get the kind of accuracy that we used to have to wait for years through AI." He adds that we are now starting to work on obtaining this same type of information from an embryo. He says that very soon, we will be able to get the genetic information that will give us a genomically enhanced EPD with 60% accruracy on embryos.
With that type of information, we will be able to select for the traits quicker than ever before that will help us with not just production improvements- but also meat quality improvements to offer a better eating experience for the end user. Ruppert says that this will allow us to be as nimble in our breeding as our protein competitors in delivering a product that the consumer wants.
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