Canadian Charolais Association

CANADIAN CHAROLAIS ASSOCIATION

2320, 41st Avenue NE, Calgary, AB T2E 6W8 403.250.9242 F 403.291.9324 www.charolais.com @canCharolais www.facebook.com/cdncharolais PROVINCIAL REPRESENTATIVES:

ALBERTA President: STEPHEN CHOLAK, Lamont Secretary: Deb Cholak, Lamont SASKATCHEWAN President: JORDAN MOORE, Redvers Secretary: Saskatchewan Livestock Asso., Regina MANITOBA President: MICHAEL HUNTER, Roblin Secretary: Rae Trimble, Portage la Prairie ONTARIO President: JOSH TAYLOR, Dunsford Secretary: Doris Aitken, Mount Forest QUEBEC President: MARK FROST, Kingsey Fallss Secretary: Chantal Raymond, Sainte-Eulalie MARITIMES President: BRETT FRANCIS, Crapaud, PEI Secretary: Nancy Milton, Nine Mile Creek, PEI STAFF:

General Manager: CRAIG SCOTT Registry: LOIS CHIVILO Registry/Member Services: HAYLEA JONES French Membership: Bernard Dore 514-910-4935 • bernarddore@videotron.ca EXECUTIVE:

PRESIDENT: KASEY PHILLIPS Box 420, Waskatenau, AB T0A 3P0 780.358.2360 C 780.656.6400 kphillips@mcsnet.ca 1st VICE-PRESIDENT: SHAWN AIREY Box 639, Rivers, MB R0K 1X0 204.328.7704 C 204.724.8823 htacharolais@hotmail.com 2nd VICE-PRES: RYAN NESBITT 17100 Cedardale Rd, Nestleton, ONL0B 1L0 905.242.2046 ryan@cedardalefarms.ca PAST PRESIDENT: MIKE ELDER Box 216, Coronach, SK S0H 0Z0 306.267.5655 C 306.267.7730 mjelder@sasktel.net DIRECTORS:

DARWIN ROSSO 78 325 4th Ave SW, Moose Jaw, SK S6H 5V2 306.693.2384 rosso.c@sasktel.net ROGER MALONEY 2420 Jermyn Line RR 1, Indian River, ON K0L 2B0 705.295.6439 C 705.761.7316 malrog64@hotmail.com MATHIEU PALERME 814 Pink Rd., Gatineau, QC J9J 3N3 819.682.2723 C 819.213.3143 matpalerme@yahoo.ca JEFF CAVERS Box 237, La Riviere, MB R0G 1A0 204.242.3467 C 204-242-4448 c2charolais@inethome.ca LORNE LAKUSTA Box 37, Andrew, AB T0B 0C0 780.365.2079 C 780.719.0264 spruceviewcharolais@gmail.com ROD McLEOD 293113 Twnshp Rd 263, Rocky View County, AB T4A 0N5 403.540.7986 rodmcl@telus.net FROM THE CANADIAN CHAROLAIS ASSOCIATION Investing In The Commercial Industry

Charolais cattle are well positioned to serve the needs of the commercial beef industry. Every spring, thousands of registered bulls are sold by members of the Canadian Charolais Association into the commercial industry where they add performance and profit to commercial cow herds.

Often we hear opinions about the “purebred” industry and their lack of connection to the commercial industry, however the Charolais breed and breeders have invested significant resources into developing tools and cattle that continue to provide value to the commercial industry. A few examples follow:

Data collection and evaluation – Charolais breeders consistently report data on their animals. This includes traits that matter to commercial customers including birth weight, calving ease and growth. As well, many cattle are also scanned using ultrasound to determine differences in carcass merit. Currently the CCA

Sean McGrath

has a database of member contributed data that exceeds 1 million animals and contains performance data on hundreds of thousands of animals. More importantly, this huge investment in data collection is followed up by an investment in science and analysis of the data. A good example of this investment serving the commercial industry is the genetic trend in calving ease and birthweight. By investing in science and tools to evaluate data, Charolais breeders have provided cattle with reduced labour requirements and more live calves.

More importantly, over that same time investments in genetic evaluation tools have maintained or increased weaning and post-weaning growth genetics.

It is very commercial industry relevant to have more live calves that grow faster.

Another exciting and fairly recent investment by the Charolais breed is working with DNA technologies. This has several implications for the commercial industry but a few of them include:

Figure 1. Canadian Charolais genetic trends for Calving Ease (CE) and Birth Weight (BW) since 2007 ..continued on page 18

Increased pedigree accuracy – this is extremely valuable as it improves the integrity of the Charolais herdbook which means that the product purchased by the commercial industry is more accurately evaluated and described.

Increased genetic evaluation accuracy – the scientific investment by the Charolais breed in genomics has resulted in higher accuracy EPD. This is a huge advancement to the commercial industry for a couple of reasons. First is that the more accurately we can evaluate an animal’s genetic merit, the faster breeders can make genetic progress. The faster breeders make progress, the faster better bulls are available to the commercial industry. Secondly, improved accuracy of evaluation greatly reduces the risk associated with using a bull. For example, we can look at a yearling bull at a sale and check his birth weight in the catalogue. Judging from his phenotype and birthweight, we may decide to use the bull on young cows or heifers. Now imagine if instead of just this limited information you had information that was the equivalent of having already bred and calved out 10 heifers to the bull. This is an example of the power of the genomic investment made by the Charolais Association and it’s members.

Charolais breeders have always been involved in the industry and have a long history of being commercially focused. Investments in data collection and evaluation tools to serve the industry total in the millions of dollars over the years. There is a lot of good information available on many of these investments and genetic selection tools that may benefit your operation at www. charolais.com. This spring is a good time to see if those investments can provide a return to you and your operation.

Figure 2. Canadian Charolais genetic trends for Weaning Weight (WW) and Yearling Weight (YW) since 2007

Canadian Charolais Association Current Breed Average EPD

BW WW YW MILK TM CE CW REA Fat LY Marb

Current 0.8 44.6 85.8 21.2 43.5 5.5 17.5 0.44 0.60 1.04 0.20 Sires 0.7 44.5 85.5 21.2 43.4 5.4 17.2 0.45 0.60 1.04 0.19 Dams 1.4 42.8 82.1 21.0 42.4 4.3 17.0 0.43 0.37 1.03 0.11

You can now check out individual animal’s performance data, index and ranking on Animal Search at www.charolais.com. It’s great for researching genetic potential for your herd.