Breeding Better Beef

By Dennis Meyer

Dennis and Kelly Meyer, Bern, Kansas, share their experience with the Gelbvieh breed as well as some of the management decisions that have made their ranch successful in this Commercial Producer Spotlight:

I like to describe myself as a beef producer, rather than a cattleman, because the cattle are a resource that we manage to produce the best possible quality beef. Our operation begins with planned matings of carefully selected Gelbvieh and Red Angus bulls and cows that we retain from our own calf crops. We raise the calves, wean them, grow them, and then finish them for slaughter using almost 100% home raised feed. We have a crossbreeding program, utilizing purebred Gelbvieh and purebred Red Angus bulls. We feel the Gelbvieh contributes maternal traits, growth, feed efficiency and greater carcass yield. The Red Angus add in more maternal traits, moderate size, and carcass quality. We do some rotational grazing that gives us more flexibility with our breeding groups, as we can more easily match grass production to the size of our breeding groups. We like to use purebred bulls as opposed to Balancers because we want the heterosis that results from the initial cross to be a benefit for us, rather than that heterosis benefit going to a seedstock producer. I recognize that using Balancer bulls would make breeding management easier, but we believe the heterosis bump is worth the extra management. Our herd is split almost evenly between spring and fall calving because we feel this allows us to utilize our facilities, feed resources, labor and bulls more efficiently. In addition to our bromegrass pastures, we have some converted crop ground planted to eastern gamagrass and novel endophyte-infected fescue. These two forages fit into a grazing system well, because their peak productivity occurs in different seasons. The fescue greens up early in the spring and goes dormant in July & August, when the gamagrass maximizes its production, and the fescue begins to produce again in September & October when the gamagrass goes dormant. We also utilize crop residue, cover crop and hay to overwinter the herd.

My interest in Gelbvieh cattle began in 1984. I was getting ready to graduate from K-State, and I was looking for a bull to use on my small herd of Hereford-based cows. I came across some research done at the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center in Clay Center, Nebraska, that evaluated the various beef breeds for their performance in various areas of economic importance. The Gelbvieh breed was ranked at or near the top of almost every category, especially the categories pertaining to maternal traits. As I remember, the only category the Gelbvieh breed didn’t have a top five ranking turned out to be the ranking for mature cow size, so the breed seemed to fit with my goals of having a highly fertile, productive, and efficient cowherd. I attended a local production sale, but was unable to purchase a bull on my limited budget, however I did come away with a 50% Gelbvieh bred cow. I was hoping to get a bull from her, but her first calf turned out to be a heifer-a heifer that outperformed all of my bull calves. We then AIed the cow to a Gelbvieh bull called Mr. Red, and her second calf for me became my first herd bull. The performance that bull produced in my calves gave me the confidence to pay more than I was comfortable spending for my next Gelbvieh bull, but I came to realize that genetics are an investment, not a cost, and superior genetics are generally worth the investment, especially if a producer retains his own replacements, as we have always done. I have come to really appreciate the Gelbvieh breed’s Dam of Merit and Dam of Distinction programs to identify superior females within the breed and I rely on these programs to help me screen potential bull purchases.

Our goal has always been to produce the very best quality beef at an affordable cost, but we needed a way to measure the quality of our product with respect to the different genetic bloodlines we were using, so we began using EID tags in our cattle as they went to the packer. The packer provides us with the yield grade, quality grade and weight of each carcass. Using this program, we have been able to identify bloodlines that produce superior carcasses, and maybe more importantly, bloodlines that cannot produce the best carcass. We were actually able to identify a Red Angus bull that consistently sired calves that produced yield grade (YG) 4 and 5 carcasses that mostly graded select, and another bull (Gelbvieh) that consistently sires calves with YG 2 and 3 carcasses that grade choice or better. This is kind of “counter-intuitive” to popular opinion in the beef industry, but we had the data to back it up, so we had the confidence to eliminate the inferior bloodline from our

herd. Our ultimate goal is for every calf we sell to produce a YG 2 carcass that grades Prime.

When selecting bulls, we use EPDs to narrow our choices in any given sale. We initially focus on calving ease, weaning weight, yearling weight, and maternal trait EPDs and then move to the carcass EPDs. We trust the former group of measurements more because we know there is more “real” data that goes into them, because it is easier to obtain. Almost every purebred producer measures birth weight, weaning weight, and yearling weight on every calf, but few get very much carcass data back on their bloodlines. We also watch yearling frame scores and carcass measurements closely.

We market all of our calves (except replacement heifers) as finished calves and we market them on a grid program through Tyson. We used to market our calves as 800-900 pound yearlings in the early 2000’s, but we didn’t feel like we were getting much of a premium for what we felt like were premium quality calves. When we sold our first cattle on the Tyson grid and received a $110 per head premium, our decision to finish our own calves was well validated. The Gelbvieh Association had developed a marketing grid back in the mid 90’s and the data we got back on the few steers we sold back then showed our calves with all YG 1 and 2, but few Choice carcasses. Now we typically have 92% YG 1, 2, or 3, with 96% Choice or better, and averaging 15% Prime grade. Much of this is due to our crossbreeding program, but our EID data shows that the Gelbvieh breed has made a great deal of carcass improvement in the last 30 years. FF

Editor’s Note: Dennis and Kelly Meyer ranch in Bern, Kansas, where they have raised their children: Samuel, Isaac, Micah, Lydia, Jessica and Seth.