Does anyone know if Clipper King of USA has ever been tested for TH? I have been told that his sire Clipper King of Bapton was a TH carrier, however, it does not show this on the ASA website. Clipper King of Bapton came along long before Deerpark Improver and I have my own theory about what may have happened in this case.
When Dr Beever was originally researching TH in the Shorthorn breed, we had a few phone conversations about it, and in one conversation he said that it was interesting that the TH defect in Shorthorns was exactly the same defect that the Galloway breed had in the 50s. The Galloway breed took a completely different approach to the defect and totally eradicated every animal that had it. Dr. Beever said it is possible that a genetic mutation exactly the same could happen in another breed but it would be a rare occurrence. He then asked me if I knew any more of the background to the pedigree of Deerpark Improver? I related a conversation I had with Kevin Culhane from Ireland in which we were discussing the Irish cattle and I asked him about the sire of Improver who was a bull named Clare Man. There was no pedigree behind Clare Man, so I asked him if he knew where he was bred. He said that after several decades of having a closed herd, the Quane Bros. of Deerpark decided they would bring in a bull from outside their herd. They found Clare Man at a local auction market and seeing that he was solid red, they purchased him. At that point, Dr Beever stopped me, and he said... and I will almost guarantee it that Clare Man was part Galloway breeding. He said that was one of the first things that made any sense to him regarding this defect.
In regards to Clipper King of Bapton, it is interesting that he was bred in the Bapton herd who also raised purebred Galloways as well as Shorthorns. I also remember when Clipper King of Bapton was imported into the US, I was told that he was different than any Shorthorn sire at the time. I also remember people saying he had hair like a muskox. This makes me a bit suspicious of his real heritage!
I also will mention that I had the opportunity to have a great visit with Donald and Diana McGillvary of Calrossie in Scotland four years ago, and it was a visit I will remember for the rest of my life. Even though they were well into their 80s, they had amazing memories of virtually any animal they had ever seen. Donald McGillvary made the comment that he was very suspicious of heritage of many of the polled Shorthorns that started to appear in the 50s. He said there were some breeders in that day, that would do most anything to get ahead or win ( sounds almost like today!) and he said some of the polled animals that started to appear in significant numbers were much different in appearance than their horned brothers, sisters and cousins. He also made the comment that many of the polled cattle came from herds that had purebred herds of a polled breed besides their Shorthorn herds. Of course, there is no way to be sure of any of this, but it does raise a slight question about the purity of any breed. For me, this is not of any concern. In my opinion, we cannot change the past so we should just worry about what we are doing today and try to produce the best beef animals we can that can add improvement to the industry. Today, we have far more ways to "police" our gene poolespecially in the breeds that demand DNA profiles on all sires that have progeny to be registered as well as parentage testing of any ET calves.
