Recently, I attended an online seminar which looked at evaluating beef cattle. The main speaker was international business manager with Trans Ova Genetics in the US PJ Budler.

This company produces 300,000 embryos per year and works with gene editing, clones and trading of live and frozen genetics.

PJ is known worldwide and has travelled to 89 countries as a breeding consultant. He has judged cattle in 31 of these countries, adjudicating 55 breeds.

Forefront

His wealth of knowledge has put him to the forefront of the cattle breeding industry. One of the key topics touched off at the recent seminar was the ideal cow size.

This is a much-debated topic, but he explained as long as the cow does what she is supposed to, there is no ideal.

However, he said there are more valuable traits that can’t be sacrificed.

He said: “The most important economic traits - fertility, longevity, adaptability and efficiency - are the top tier, or most important.

“Growth, muscle, milk and marbling are second tier. Despite how important they are, they’re meaningless unless we lay that foundation first.”

PJ's top four traits

  • Fertility is 10 times more important than growth.
  • Longevity is massive due to the expense of breeding replacement heifers. The longer they can do what they’re doing, the more money they can make.
  • Adaptability: it’s a lot more expensive to change the environment to suit the cattle than to change the cattle to suit the environment.
  • Efficiency, no matter what type, has an economic value.

    • So, looking at the second tier, he said we need to ask ourselves how much growth we want and at what point do we get so big or so small that we start giving up the four top-tier traits? This is the same for muscle, milk or marbling.

    PJ said: “There is no ideal size of a cow. We have put together a seven-step [checklist] and once the cows pass these steps, then they are the ideal size. It’s dangerous for people to advise a size as this changes with different environments and management practices.”

    These seven steps are:

  • 1. The animal gets appropriate nutrition and management for its environment.
  • 2. They calve by 27 months.
  • 3. They conceive within a 90-day breeding season - that’s a maximum; it might be 60 for when management gets tight enough.
  • 4. She does this annually and on time.
  • 5. Establish a minimum weight for her calf at seven months old, depending on environment; depending on breed this will be different.
  • 6. Calf must be at least 45% of dam’s weight at seven months. Cow and calf need to be weighed on the same day each year. This may be moved up to 50% when the herd gets better.
  • 7. The cow needs to do this year after year; as long as she does so, she stays in the herd.

    • Whatever size your cow is, as long as she meets these parameters she is the right size. Within four or five years of using these parameters, your cows will be the right size for your environment.