Why Dont Show Heifers Dont Make Good Cows?

Can anybody answer this?

Mothering abilites milk BW etc.

Our ex show heifers have made wonderful cows. That being said, there are a whole lot of other traits that go into making a great, productive female. Only a handful of these traits can be judged in a showring. It is the responsibility of the showman to look beyond a pretty phenotypic package. You must also learn your bloodlines, examine the dam and other siblings, ask about birthweights, find out about recessive defect status, and know that high muscle and high milk production are typically antagonistic traits.

My advise is selection for extremes in a single trait will get you in trouble in a hurry. I am a big proponent of moderation, of any trait.

FutureBreeder said:

Can anybody answer this?

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That's all our cows are, except the recips. They make pretty darn good cows for us, but they're not on range conditions like some out west are.

Your question is a very common myth among various people.

Ex-show heifers can and DO make good cows.

Simply feeding grain to cattle doesn't ruin their genetic potential. Often times the problems arise if the heifer gets too fat or she is quickly taken off her grain diet and expected to survive on just grass without any adjustment period.

Sorry, edited to fix a few grammatical errors!  <party>

because thats what everyone says so it must be right...  : : : everyone is usually wrong too.

Thanks for the relpies.

This is somthing Ive heeard from alot of people and was wondering if it was true or not thanks for clearin things up once again

Weve had some that made real good cows-breeding has alot to do with it O0

That's not always true. I have a CharXAngus ex-show cow that has the biggest udder in our pasture. When all our cows have their calves they will nurse off of her sometimes rather than their dams. She even has milk 2-3 months before her calf is ever due. So, it all depends on the breeding and how u take care of them.

I don't know if this will help but here it is!  ;D

We have had good luck with our show heifers making good cows, however we have had many calving problems when it comes to getting that first calf out of them.

And Lola big udders aren't always a good thiing.

Our ultra hairy ex-show heifers never breed back as fast as their slicker herd mates. The humidity really seems to get to them in the summer too. Seems like the fit cows breed back faster than the really fat ones too in my experience.

Rocky Hill said:

Our ultra hairy ex-show heifers never breed back as fast as their slicker herd mates. The humidity really seems to get to them in the summer too. Seems like the fit cows breed back faster than the really fat ones too in my experience.

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Try shearing the hairy ones off in April or May. Our cows just seem to start off the summer better since we started shearing them.

In typical cattle management, many, many many show heifers do not make good cows.... they are usually too fat, too spoiled, too hairy.

In many "show herds" where they get the spoiled treatment and where calves are creep fed from day 20 and momma's milk isn't all that important, then yes, some show heifers do just fine.

Many times it is management that dictates the success of failure of an individual animal.... if you treat a show heifer as a show heifer for her entire life, then yes, they will be fine... if you treat them as a commercial cow then no, probably not. Exceptions to every rule, but they are just that.

My follow up question is along the same lines: Why do I hear in show barns "She can't feed her calf, but sure has good ones, so we flushed her 10 times"  (or a variation of such) or "She can't have her own calves, but her genetics are superb" (or a variation of such)  Or, "She hasn't had/raised a calf in years...because we flush her" (or a variation of such). Some show heifers actually NEVER give birth or raise a calf on their own. How can that be a good thing?
Seems to me, these statements support the fact that show heifers do not make good cows....

Guess we could pick on bulls too.....

I think that heifers that have good milk genetics have a better chance of becoming excellent brood cows after their show days are over. I have seen some awesome cows that have had show careers, but I also think that some of these cows that are bred to have a pile of hair, are not suited for life after the shows without a bunch of extra management. Who really has the desire or the extra time to slick shear a herd of cows that have been past show heifers? I certainly don't!  I find it interesting that it is awful hard to sell genetics to Australia, from cattle with lots of hair. They want no part of them because of their climate, yet people in the hotter parts of the US still like cattle with hair. I have always found that my most fertile cows are the first ones to shed in the spring. I think this is just a normal part of selection for fertility, so I have to ask if by continually selecting for hair on brood cows... are we also selecting for lower fertility traits?

A few years ago while attending Canadian Western Agribition, I had breakfast one morning with Louis and Jean Latimer, founders and owners of Remitall Cattle Company, Olds, AB. There were 300 Polled Hereford heifer calves shown at the show that year, and Louis said that they( Remitall) never show their best heifer calves at the shows. He said that they were more interested in getting their best heifers into production, and showing heifer calves delayed or even greatly reduced the breeding potential of these heifer calves. In our discussion, Louis said that he would bet me $1000 that there would not be a single one of the 300 heifers shown that would show at Agribition two years later in the Two year old heifer with calf at side class. ( Here in Canada we have classes for two year old and mature cows, with calves at side). I did not take him up on his wager.  Two years later, Louis came up to me at the show and asked me if I remembered the bet he wanted to have with me. I said I did, and he replied that he had checked the entries, and if we had made the wager, he would have won. I find that quite amazing that out of 300 heifer calves shown, not a single one made it back as a two year old female. This may not mean that they eventually do not make good cows but it does take them longer to come into proper production. On this occasion, every two year old Polled Hereford female shown with her calf at side, had not been shown when it was a heifer calf. As I said, this may not be the same situation in all breeds, but I do find this interesting to ponder on........

Show Heifer said:

In typical cattle management, many, many many show heifers do not make good cows.... they are usually too fat, too spoiled, too hairy.

In many "show herds" where they get the spoiled treatment and where calves are creep fed from day 20 and momma's milk isn't all that important, then yes, some show heifers do just fine.

Many times it is management that dictates the success of failure of an individual animal.... if you treat a show heifer as a show heifer for her entire life, then yes, they will be fine... if you treat them as a commercial cow then no, probably not. Exceptions to every rule, but they are just that.

My follow up question is along the same lines: Why do I hear in show barns "She can't feed her calf, but sure has good ones, so we flushed her 10 times"  (or a variation of such) or "She can't have her own calves, but her genetics are superb" (or a variation of such)   Or, "She hasn't had/raised a calf in years...because we flush her" (or a variation of such). Some show heifers actually NEVER give birth or raise a calf on their own. How can that be a good thing?
Seems to me, these statements support the fact that show heifers do not make good cows....

Guess we could pick on bulls too.....

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The only person to dictate on whether its a good thing or not is the owner him self. If I had a world champion heifer ( steer producer, mind you) and she had a knock out calf but didn't milk enough to feed a kitty cat, no doubt i would flush her and put the embryos in cows who could raise a calf. Show Cattle =/= Commercial cattle. I'm talking like the HW mommas out there. Purebred cattle are a different matter in my book.

IMO the old wives tale show heifers dont make cows dows hold some weight. I will list some reasons why i agree with this.
1) MANY heifers are heat waves or out of heatwave genetics, not exactly known for his maternal traits
2) some freaky good heifers are so good due to "heterosis" crossing to purebreds to make a hybrid , doing this maxximizes maternal and terminal traits, yet this cow that now is so good wont make a calf as good as her unless you cross her to another outcross
3) certain heifers will make good cows, exp: cows that are of purebred or half blood orgin

Our show calves have gone on to make great cows, our herd is based around mostly old show heifers. 
JIT, to respond why they don't come back and show the next year, it is a pain in the butt and huge amounts of work to show a cow/calf pair and keep them penned where they can be worked with as opposed to sending them to pasture and letting them fend for themselves, we have shown them, but they have to be spectacular to make it worth the effort.

Jill said:

Our show calves have gone on to make great cows, our herd is based around mostly old show heifers. 
JIT, to respond why they don't come back and show the next year, it is a pain in the butt and huge amounts of work to show a cow/calf pair and keep them penned where they can be worked with as opposed to sending them to pasture and letting them fend for themselves, we have shown them, but they have to be spectacular to make it worth the effort.

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Jill, I agree with your statement regarding it being a big pain in the butt to show a cow/ calf pair, but there was still a class of 18 of them in the Polled Hereford show at Agribition two years later, of which none of them were shown there as heifer calves. I will agree that our show calves have gone on to make excellent cows as well, but I am wondering if there may be some breed differences in this case. I have no other experience with this. I also have been told by others that show heifers oftentimes don't milk as good as heifers who have not been shown, but I have not seen any evidence of that in my own herd. Mind you, we don't have our show heifers in high rig for months on end and through a long show season like some do, so this may be a difference as well.

I think truely good heifers can make good cows, or even great cows down the road.  The problem I have with it is feeding a show heifer doesn't prepair her to be a cow, they get raised on a totally different diet that does not help them to become a cow that is raised on minimal intake.  It makes problems with things like feet, and udders that may have been fine if were not for the nutrition that they consumed as heifers.  You can realy hurt some females futures as cows, that's why it is so imprortant to me to get those show heifers that are so maternal, that can make it as a cow some day.  I don't like going in any one extreme or the other.

When you say maternal are you talking about the pedigree or the way the heifer looks.