Ultimate three way cross for commercial feeder calves?

What do you believe would make up the ultimate three way cross for commercial feeder calves? What breeds and the percentages of those breeds? Explain why you think this way from foundation cows to the end product.

For me it would have to be Charolais, red angus, and Maine Anjou, the maines have hair, charolais seem to gain weight fairly easy, and red angus are good animals too. Oh, probably half Charolais, one fourth red and one fourth Maine.

As far as a good set of commercial calves I'm very excited about  a KEY X CHAR bull on a good set of Angus cows ... You will have half your calves smoke an half black but these colors are the two popular colors for feeder cattle in  this county ....

In everywhere but the south: most any Continental on a good Baldy cow (Angus/ Hereford)

In the south: Charolais on a Brangus or Tiger Stripe cow.

Herefordxangus momma (everybody likes a baldy) have carcass and longevity and use a charolais bull for growth performance and more muscle

Red angus/ black angus cow on a shorthorn. Melts in your mouth, not in your hands. For freezer beef I have found it is incredibly tender. Maybe not the performance of a continental but a great carcass. JMO. I had a heifer bred like this here this summer. She was born on April 1 and at 8 months she weighed 770 on just pasture. I was pretty happy with that. She was a free martin so I shipped her to buy christmas for everybody

There are 2 things you have to look at for this one, that being whether you sell the calves as feeders or fats. If I was selling loads of 7-8 weights I would want an angus bull on char x sim cows. That way all smokes or blacks keeping the market happy but the angus they will grade, char they grow, and simi keeps a shot of maternal in there on my F1s.
Now if I was selling fats I'd want the cross mentioned with angus reds and shorthorn. Shorty bull on the angus females, and wouldn't be against a shot of charolais on the mom side for growth.

Very interesting opinions so far. Thanks for the replies. I am building a commercial cow calf operation right now and I plan on having Angus x Shorthorn x Maine Anjou. Ideally, I would want the females to be 50% Shorthorn and 50% Angus. This would make some awfully good tasting beef with the excellent marbling and tenderness. Also, I think the maternal instincts, milking, and docility of the Shorthorn will help with healthy calves which will allow them to grow well once they are in the feed lot. The Angus will hopefully get most of them black and contribute more in the calving ease area. I would then top it off with a black purebred Maine Anjou to add extra thickness, bone, and growth. I think the Maine's are pretty good with marbling also and have decent docility. Not sure if I can find a bunch of Shorthorn x Angus 3-4 year olds but at least I will be breeding for something close to this.

Angus x Shorthorn x Charolais

Interesting topic...I have a question,

Let's say I have a herd of commercial angus cows (or young cattlemen starting out should find these cattle fairly easy to aquire).

What A.I. Shorthorn bulls would I use to make these F1 Angus x Shorthorn replacement females?

The majority of high end feedlots prefer Simmental for the exotic influence.  Most will tell you they want no more than 50% exotic. Straight Angus or Hereford-Angus baldy cows are hard to beat.  If you have exotic influence cows, use halfblood bulls.  Right or wrong, most feedlot buyers will run from much Shorthorn influence.

Performance wise, Charolais crosd calves will probably beat anything, but there is too much prejudice against the color- to my chagrin.

advocate said:

Herefordxangus momma (everybody likes a baldy) have carcass and longevity and use a charolais bull for growth performance and more muscle

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DITTO!

I would have a herford angus cow and then a sim-angus bull.  A little shot of maine in with the sim-angus wouldn't hurt.  That old f1 black baldy cow is hard to beat in this country.  Easy breeding, easy calving, docile, good enough milk. 

SEA said:

Interesting topic...I have a question,

Let's say I have a herd of commercial angus cows (or young cattlemen starting out should find these cattle fairly easy to aquire).

What A.I. Shorthorn bulls would I use to make these F1 Angus x Shorthorn replacement females?

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I would suggest using any of the bulls on the "shorty heifer bulls" thread. I think JamieDiamond put a link to a pdf around page 53 that has a large list of what I would say would be exceptable. I think I would use the Select Sires bull JSF Capiche heifer semen. I just ordered a bunch of it on special for $30 a unit. A pretty good deal. If I knew my bull was proven on calving ease I would definitely suggest him but he is too young to make a judgement.

I agree that it would depend on your location  Assuming your not in the deep south

Short horn x Angus or Herford x Angus cow base crossed with Simm for continental influence of 25 to 50%.  I only have a couple of shorthorn x angus comming yearling heifers so far but like them as well as the baldies.  If you use more solid pattern SH bulls, I think it would be hard for buyers to doc them especially when this influence is further diluted with the terminal cross.

I changed my own thoughts on the crossing Maine as the terminal sire:  If you have SH cross cows, you may not get as much hybrid vigor as you could with char or simm since there is some Maine influence in the SH breed and how close the genetics of the breeds were previously.   

commercialfarmer said:

I agree that it would depend on your location   Assuming your not in the deep south

Short horn x Angus or Herford x Angus cow base crossed with Simm for continental influence of 25 to 50%.  I only have a couple of shorthorn x angus comming yearling heifers so far but like them as well as the baldies.  If you use more solid pattern SH bulls, I think it would be hard for buyers to doc them especially when this influence is further diluted with the terminal cross.

I changed my own thoughts on the crossing Maine as the terminal sire:  If you have SH cross cows, you may not get as much hybrid vigor as you could with char or simm since there is some Maine influence in the SH breed and how close the genetics of the breeds were previously.   

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I understand your point about using the Maines on the SH cross cows. So far, my experience with crossing purebred Shorthorns with Maine Anjou has shown very noticeable hybrid vigor. I do agree that their may be an option to get even more using another breed but I have seen very satisfying results so far. I also agree on the solid pattern Shorthorns, I am going to try to go that way. Good points...

SM X AN cows bred to MA X AN bull OR SM X AN bull for F2s

For me it would be Angus Brahma and herford.

Deep red pedigreed, polled bulls like some of Wakaru's bulls for example mated to straight Angus cows would make black calves which would be hard to doc at the sale barn.

JTM said:

What do you believe would make up the ultimate three way cross for commercial feeder calves? What breeds and the percentages of those breeds? Explain why you think this way from foundation cows to the end product.

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didn't read a single comment.. but bwf cows (herf x ang) x a char bull. hands down best cross in this world <party>