RESEARCH PROJECT/Cattlemen/women need your HELP

[kobo_ranch]

I'm doing some research on FEMALE cows.  Specifically quality and show type females.  Would appreciate any of your thoughts and information you can provide regarding the following;

On your average herd (OF SAY 50- 100 cows) how many females do you feel can go on to be a embryo flushing- type female?  (per year) 

Or females you go on to sell embryo's from?

On average, what would a good embryo type cow be worth?  (range)  If you sold this cow?    ALSO  how much would you sell a cow with proven genetics?  (or history of champion type cow)

On average, how many years do you 'flush' a proven female?
On average for a lifetime would a good cow of this type be worth to you as a producer?

What would value DIFFERENCE be on say a proven embryo type cow.  VS a standard AI recipient cow or breeding cow?  But still proven good quality.

IF anyone would comment with experience in embryo flushing,  I'd reall appreciate you're sharing your knowledge with me. 

IF you don't want to post you can personal message with me.

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP AND INFO...  any extra info would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ZNT]

I will try to hit several of the questions on this post.  With the nature of the cattle business and the variability between herds and breeds, it is very hard to put a generalization together.

Different breeders have different uses for embryo transfer (ET).  Some use it to continually improve their herd by multiplying their top cows to produce the best replacement females for their own herd, some use it to produce more offspring out of their successful show animals to produce more show animals, and unfortunately, there are lots of breeders that have to resort to ET to propagate offspring out of females that have reproductive and maternal issues.

There is no way to put a blanket percentage on the amount of donors vs production females in a herd.  I think the 2 main criteria that determines this percentage is the quality of the herd, and the breeders ability to market offspring for added value.  Commercial breeders have no need to spend the extra money on embryo transfer when they can just spend extra on a good herd sire who contributes half the genetics to 30-40 calves per year.  A seedstock producer needs to use ET to continue to produce the highest quality product for the breed and the cattle industry, while multiplier herds (category that most purebred breeders fall in) need to use ET to constantly improve the base genetics of their females in their herd, and not so much for producing animals to market.

For our herd, we have gone through some changes a few years back, requiring us to reduce the amount of females we could keep for production purposes.  We kept the very best of the best of these females.  All of our cows are donor quality in my opinion, but we still only use ET moderately.  We only flush our cows once every year or two.  I do not believe in flooding a market with identical genetics because I feel the more you have of one thing, the more you devalue all of them (basic supply and demand).  Secondly, I feel that continually flushing a cow is detrimental to their reproductive longevity.  The drugs are very hard on their bodies, and they need to have a calf naturally after every 1 or 2 flushes to let them recover.  Just my opinion.

Many will agree with me on this board, and just as many will disagree.  It's just the opinion from a breed that has been at it for a few years.

Good luck with your project!

 

[flacowman]

Even in a well above average herd less than 1% of the females will deserve to be donor cows, that said some herds have more, most have less or none.  We have 400 cows and while most rank in the top 25% for at least most epd's we only flush 2 or 3 a year, and rarely flush one more than twice in her life.  Our goal is a herd that is all above average, we focus more on bringing poor numbers uo than good numbers better, though most of the time a bull can be found that will do both.

 

[simmyman67]

Some of these questions are very hard to answer...you will have to put numbers together(possibly from sale data?) on some of them.

 

[kobo_ranch]

Some of these questions are very hard to answer...you will have to put numbers together(possibly from sale data?) on some of them.

Sorry for the difficult or vagueness of the questions.  Any range of answers are fine.  Averages or even 'guess-ti-mates'.  Just trying to get some ideas of what percentage of these type females exist and on average what a femaile like this can be worth to the ranch owner.  Really just looking for more opinions and discussions on the subject. 

Thanks Flocowman and ZNT... any ranges of values on such females are appreciated as well.  Thanks!!

 

[ZNT]

Some of these questions are very hard to answer...you will have to put numbers together(possibly from sale data?) on some of them.

Sorry for the difficult or vagueness of the questions.  Any range of answers are fine.  Averages or even 'guess-ti-mates'.  Just trying to get some ideas of what percentage of these type females exist and on average what a femaile like this can be worth to the ranch owner.  Really just looking for more opinions and discussions on the subject. 

Thanks Flocowman and ZNT... any ranges of values on such females are appreciated as well.   Thanks!!

These are rough ballpark, but is see super females that are proven by game changing offspring, $20-50K. Top end females in a multiplier herd, $5-20K.