Breed Improvement Total Herd Reporting Benefits Producers

and EPD Quality

by Lindsay Upperman, Ph.D., Director of Breed Improvement

An important part of Total Herd Reporting is precise and accurate data submission. Reporting information on females that didn’t produce the best calves isn’t always the highest priority on the operation’s to-do list, especially if there are other females that raised the largest calf at weaning! However, making sure to report calf information on all females, as well as disposal codes for the cows within your herd inventory, is critical for THR.

Maintaining an up-to-date animal inventory where every female is accounted for annually is the basis for THR. A THR assessment for the 2023 year means that the producer will be reporting performance over the next 12 months. Additionally, a producer will also be recording any disposals from the previous year. During the next 12 months, producers will then register calves to the assessed females that are born or report the reason why a calf was not recorded (calf loss, death of dam, etc.). Ultimately, the goal is to know what is happening to the females in an operation’s herd.

Total Herd Reporting provides various benefits for cattle producers. Each record generated for every cow and calf is valuable information in the ability to calculate EPDs for low heritability traits such as heifer pregnancy and stayability. Also, THR allows for complete contemporary groups to be utilized for traits such as weaning weight, and even to account for sequential culling. An example of sequential culling is if a calf is weaned at a lighter weight, the animal may be culled before a yearling weight can be recorded. This results in more accurate EPDs, providing the most advantageous selection tools for utilization in both seedstock and commercial operations. Let’s dive into the benefits of THR.

Focusing on traits such as heifer pregnancy and stayability, let’s compare two females in a THR program and a traditional reporting program. Female A has four calves, each registered with RAAA. This female would be determined in both programs as a success for heifer pregnancy and stayability, as she had a calf reported each year.

Female B has four calves, the first is not registered with RAAA and the other three are registered.

In a traditional reporting program, Female B would not be considered a success, as her first calf was not reported. However, in a THR program, Female B’s data would be a success, as THR would necessitate reporting of the first calf in the database, thereby giving her a complete record. Thus, THR allows for producers to correctly identify those females who get bred every year and wean a calf, which is a crucial tool for selection towards increased female reproductive performance and longevity.

Furthermore, THR can provide more accurate information for performance traits. As THR requires weaning weights entered on entire calf crops, this maximizes the size of contemporary groups. Larger contemporary groups allow the genetic evaluation to better account for shared environments and management during the EPD calculations. Essentially, this means that any variation within phenotypes can be distinguished between being caused by genetic differences or differences in their production environment.

Additionally, if only reporting weaning weights on the top-performing animals in the herd, the average weaning weight of that selected group will be larger than the true average of the entire group. This means that those calves who out-perform the entire group, may not out-perform the selected group average, resulting in the superior animals not living up to the numbers shown in the database.

The importance of THR will continue to grow as maternal traits, or traits such as cow fertility and longevity, become more heavily emphasized within the beef industry. Without the use of THR, traits such as heifer pregnancy and stayability are practically impossible to develop into a useful selection tool. As producers, taking the initiative to accurately report as much information as possible can help to accelerate genetic progress and eventually, the bottom line of your operation’s goals. //