TO OL S OF THE TR ADE ~
bull buying BY DEAN FISH, PH.D.
Bull Buying: As Simple as 1-2-3? Todays discerning bull buyer has a lot of information available to make his or her bull choice easier. One must wonder though, how much is too much information and what is relevant? If you study a bull sale catalog, you’ll find a plethora of information that can blur together and become overwhelming. More detailed information has driven our beef
industry to produce higher quality beef as a larger percent of the market than ever before and this trend will continue. US beef is known around the world for its high quality and this will drive future markets, too. Where do you as a bull buyer need to take your program and how much data do you need? Many of our breed associations have simplified these genetic tools and created indexes. Let’s look
at a couple of areas that are important for bull selection, regardless of the segment of the beef industry that you are involved in. Many commercial beef producers take advantage of crossbreeding and breed complementarity to best utilize the breeds available to them. US Meat Animal Research Center (MARC) scientists started looking at germ plasma for many breeds, beginning
FIRST CLASS STAMP
PG. 42 :: SPRING 2019
