EXECUTIVE CORNER

EPDsHOW MANY DO WE NEED?

by Darrell Wilkes, Ph.D., International Brangus Breeders Association (IBBA) executive vice president

In this issue of the Brangus Journal you will be treated to a very interesting report from Dr. Harly Durbin on the hair shedding study that she spearheaded as a Ph.D. student at the University of Missouri. Dr. Durbin suggests that International Brangus Breeders Association (IBBA) develop a program to collect more hair shedding scores with the goal of creating an EPD for hair shedding. Please read the article carefully. It is informative.

I spent some time on the phone recently with a Brangus breeder who believes that we should look at an EPD for foot structure and maybe another one for prepuce design. I’ve heard from others that we should get serious about an EPD for temperament. We will soon be sending sire-identified steers produced through the Brangus Value Project to feedlots, and subsequently to a packing plant. We haven’t decided yet whether to spend the extra money for feed efficiency testing and I haven’t yet asked what it would cost to pull a steak from each carcass to submit for tenderness testing. If we pull the trigger on both items, we will move a step closer to EPDs for feed efficiency and tenderness. Dr. Durbin suggests we should create an EPD for hair shedding.

With all this talk about more EPDs, it is a bit ironic that I recently accepted a speaking invitation from a very progressive member who has requested that I address an audience of commercial producers and answer the question, “What do all these numbers mean?” The paradox is that we might be overloading many of our commercial bull customers with too much information, while many of our progressive breeders are asking for more EPDs. What should we do?

In my opinion, we should develop EPDs for any and every trait that is economically relevant and has high enough heritability for the EPD to be meaningful as a selection tool. We don’t necessarily need to show every single EPD on every single bull to every single customer. In fact, I would argue that we need to show them fewer EPDs and replace the dozen or so EPDs with a few selection indexes that properly weigh genetic/biological factors with economic factors and, thus, produce what are called bioeconomic indexes. This is not a new idea. The pork, poultry, and dairy industries have done this for decades based on the notion that the objective of genetic change is to improve profitability. Period.

I think it’s fair to say that most commercial producers don’t want to see more EPDs. So why do we need more EPDs if our commercial customers want to see fewer of them? For the simple reason that EPDs are the most powerful tools available for making genetic improvement. Those of us in the seedstock business have wittingly or unwittingly embraced the challenge of creating the PERFECT BULL. It is an elusive goal. It has never been achieved and never will be, but we all accept that and still strive to get as close to perfect as we can.

The breeders who strive to produce the next generation of breed leading AI sires are constantly fine-tuning everything. If we had a foot structure EPD and a hair shedding EPD, they would use them. But this does not mean that every breeder should publish those EPDs in their sale catalog and present them to their commercial bull customers who already feel that they have more information than they can realistically use. Let’s be honest. Most commercial bull customers are focused on the big picture – growth and phenotype. All the intricate genetic fine-tuning that you do behind the scenes to produce cattle that are profitable and hassle-free is something they expect you to do because you’re a seedstock producer. That’s your job. They should be able to take for granted that you are paying attention to such things. Their confidence that you are, in fact, sweating the small stuff, leads to the single most important factor in the relationship between a seedstock breeder and his or her customers – TRUST.

Whether or not IBBA proceeds to develop a hair shedding EPD as Dr. Durbin suggests, or whether we forge ahead to produce EPDs for such things as foot structure, prepuce design, or temperament, I can assure you that these topics will be sliced and diced and discussed in the IBBA committee process. We’ll look at the science – is it heritable? We’ll look at the feasibility of collecting an adequate volume of useful data on traits like this that are measured or evaluated in a more subjective way (compared to a weight, which is an objective measurement produced by a scale). One thing is known for sure – our competition is asking the same questions and, in some cases, has already decided to go forward and produce EPDs for such things as foot structure and hair shedding.

I want to acknowledge the hard work and persistence of Macee Prause, IBBA director of genomics and research, as it relates to the hair shedding study. She already had a full load of work trying to keep up with DNA testing, but she took on this project anyway because she could see the importance of it and didn’t want IBBA to be on the sidelines of this research.