For seedstock operations, genomic enhanced (GE) EPDs contribute to economic indexes that give producers an easy way to properly select combinations of traits that impact the cost and production revenue.
“The main benefit of genomic testing in seedstock is that for young animals, it enhances the accuracy of all the individual trait predictions that are expressed as GE-EPDs,” Dr. Kent Andersen, director of beef genetic technical services with Zoetis, told WLJ. “And then, by extension, we have economic indexes, taking the trait predictions, weighting them according to the impact they have on the cost and the production revenue. And so they’re ranking animals for combined genetic merit. By extension, the genomic testing results in enhanced accuracy associated with the indexes.”
Kent continued whether it is a seedstock, commercial, unregistered, straight or crossbred female, there are a set of maternal traits that can help with replacement heifer selection. At Zoetis, the INHERIT Select test and weekly genetic evaluation provides commercial cow-calf operators genetic predictions and indexes that historically only seedstock producers have had access to for better informed heifer selection and breeding decisions.
INHERIT Select is a genetic evaluation for commercial crossbred Bos Taurus replacement cattle that provides GE-EPDs and percentile rankings for 19 traits and five economic indexes to assist with breeding and marketing decisions. INHERIT also provides the genomic breed composition to help producers manage maternal heterosis.
According to Kent and Zoetis’ technical bulletin, access to this information helps with replacement heifer selection and breeding decisions, bull-buying through understanding the strengths and weaknesses of your current cow inventory, and eventually is envisioned to help inform feeder cattle price discovery and management of feeder and fed cattle throughout the supply chain.
“INHERIT Select trait predictions and indexes are updated weekly through the Zoetis Multi-Breed Genetic Evaluation, which currently includes over 1.3 million animals—as well as an expanding database of traditional and unique phenotypes intended to comprehensively inform profit functions for commercial cow-calf producers,” according to Zoetis.
The data collected from other animals is updated every week and producers can go into their account to get results updated.
“The classic example where that happens is a cow-calf producer who might test a set of heifers, but they haven’t gotten their bulls tested for enabling the sire parent verification,” Kent said. “So maybe then whenever it’s handy, or when the bulls go through to get breeding soundness exams, they later might get a sample. Then once that bull gets tested, every week, they’ll get updated genomic information showing which bulls sired specific heifers and be reported through their account, which the producer can query at any time.”
INHERIT Connect is the companion test to INHERIT Select that enables the testing of bull batteries to determine daughter parentage.
In the context of seedstock, Kent spoke about progeny equivalents: the average number of progeny records it would take to see an equivalent change in accuracy from a genomic test. Or as he puts it, what it would take to get a bull to higher accuracy in conventional genetic evaluations.
“More than a lifetime of calves’ data from cows, and basically data from an entire first calf-crop of sires would be needed to provide as much accuracy as a DNA test at birth, branding or weaning, or very early in life,” Kent said. “So you’re informing those decisions more dependably than what would otherwise require either a whole calf crop for a bull or a lifetime of calves for a cow and so you making fewer selection and breeding mistakes.”
Zoetis provides tissue sampling units free of charge, and collecting samples takes about the same time as putting in an eartag. For commercial cow-calf producers, Kent and the staff will give producers guidance on which animals to test and select based on the criteria of the operation. The results benchmark trait and index predictions against other animals in the reference population. Using results is as easy as sorting tested females from highest to lowest based on the most applicable economic index—keeping the highest, and typically eliminating potential troublemakers with undesirable GE-EPD for individual traits.
“So the indexes rank them for evaluated maternal traits, as well as for feedlot and carcass, and for all evaluated traits to give us a first sift from the best to the worst based on the most suitable index,” Kent said. “Then based on what the customer tells us, we’ll flag animals that may be troublemakers for one reason or another.”
For example, females identified as genetically predisposed to problems with docility or teat and udder quality can be evaluated by the producer against their observed behavior or the udder quality of their dams to decide then if they want to keep or cull the animal.
“In every group, we find extreme amounts of variation across most every trait and that’s usually a shocking thing for commercial cow-calf producers just to see just how genetically variable they really are,” Kent said.
Through INHERIT Optimize, Zoetis can test feeder cattle and report genetic differences across post-weaning traits, including growth, dry matter intake and feed efficiency, carcass weight, fat thickness and ribeye and marbling.
“As we’ve started to test feeder cattle, carcass data is accumulating,” Kent said. “So in the not-too-distant future, there’s carcass data from commercial tested animals that are anticipated to feed in as well. We think it’s a pretty innovative thing to have an evaluation that brings all the traits and all the sophistication that has historically only been in seedstock, but now it’s also available to commercial crossbred animals.”
To test a commercial replacement heifer costs $25. For feeder cattle, testing for genomic breed composition and parentage costs $12, and another $8 for feedlot growth, feed efficiency and carcass traits.
Kent notes if you test roughly 75% of the heifer calf crop and have a 20% or so replacement rate, Zoetis value proposition modeling indicates producers can expect a rate of return for replacement heifer selection ranges from a 3-4:1 return as you amortize the cost of testing across the first six calf crops of females selected using the technology, versus traditional visual appraisal.
Kent also works on Genemax Advantage with the American Angus Association and Angus Gentics Inc. for Angus commercial females, and the costs are relatively the same. — Charles Wallace, WLJ editor
