TH and PHA in correlation with quality

[oakview]

You would have a hard time convincing me that you need to have TH or PHA carriers to be competitive in the showring.  I recently watched the Shorthorn show in Louisville and I can't recall too many carriers in the winner's circle. 

 

[PRO]

I am trying to avoid the defects.  I am starting a herd and trying to breed for look and maternal qualities.  I really like the Monopoly calves, but I don't want the TH or to pay that much for his semen.  My alternative is to try his full sib, All Aboard.  I am hoping that he will produce similar results.  Sometimes the people promoting bulls also have a hand in perpetuating these defects.  I am not pointing the finger........but Lautners have a major role in the rise of Monopoly.  I am curous what some of the clean bulls would do when bred to the best cows in the country. 

 

[Show Heifer]

People THINK they see an improvement with carriers in hair and hip structure, but like I said before.... it just is an excuse to take the easy way and use carriers.
The people SEE what they WANT to see......
No, the eye sight test is not accurate. In fact, just for research lets test the winners. I don't care about pedigree, just to see if they carriers or not. That would be fun!


Jeff, People are really good followers.... I mean a few years ago you couldn't GIVE AWAY a smoke colored calf, in fact, they were laughed at! Now they are the hottest thing going. Why? Because one smokie calf won a show and BAM, everyone wants one.  Once a carrier bull won a show, everyone wanted to use that bull. Following the leader. So, since a carrier bull won one show, somewhere EVERYONE started to use them. Yeah, heatwave has won all the "major shows". But he has been bred to how many millions of cows. Odds are with him!
Just like your example of NH in angus.....

Oakview - were the Louisville show winners tested? What were the results?

PRO - You nailed it! Lets breed those clean bulls to the best cows in the country and see what happens!!! Good Point!!

 

[JSchroeder]

It would be MUCH easier to manage a herd free of defects but for some reason people keep breeding them.  If you want to ignore that reason, please feel free to do so and avoid messing with cattle with a perfectly manageable genetic disorder.  I've chosen not to pretend that reason doesn't exist.

You are blatantly choosing to avoid the cause and effect of why people do what they do.  Heat Wave wasn't bred to thousands of cows for no reason.  The parallel rise of smoke colored cattle and slick shows is no coincidence.  1680 wasn't spread throughout the entire Angus breed at the same time carcass traits were becoming popular just out of dumb luck.  People don't keep cows or use bulls that limit their choices of mates because they are lazy.

 

[DL]

You would have a hard time convincing me that you need to have TH or PHA carriers to be competitive in the showring.  I recently watched the Shorthorn show in Louisville and I can't recall too many carriers in the winner's circle. 

oakview - AMEN!

Jeff - dozens doesn't really qualify as a good sample - if we knew the function of the gene we could hazard a guess at what it might correlate to phenotypically - but having no lymphatic system, very small lungs, and a waterlogged body in affected calves doesn't translate to bone and muscle - there may have been some advantage that we are unaware of - but you can't convince me you can visually pick out carriers - if you could we wouldn't need a test

 

[CAB]

if everyone cuts off at least 1-2 inches of hair, what do you need all the extra hair for other than to smooth out condition and give a general impression of fullness or extra bone that is antagonistic with marbling?  the other thing that's confusing is that there is a general problem of being too straight in the hocks, yet clip job after clip job seems to accentuate this.

Knabe when is the last time you sat at a larger show and actually had a judge pay much attention to the carcass quality traits? It's been too long in most cases, and one that will actually stick to his/her guns has been longer ago yet.
 As far as the hip structure goes and too strait of set of the back legs, TH does nothing but make cattle too strait, but as long as the judges allow it and pick'em, PPL are going to move in that direction until we have a bigger wreck to deal with.
  Most of the PB shows are moving away from carrier lines thus the not too many carriers in the SH show, Louisville. It's kind of suicide in the PB business to keep on using the carriers. When you look at the  sire directories it's not rocket science trying to figure out where bulls are being used or what segment of the industry they are targetting.
 I think that some of the rise of the smokes comes from PPL wanting to get back to some cattle that are perhaps more honest, but that maybe wishful thinking on my part, although we have seen a rise in the use of Chars., Simi's, Chi's, & Herefords. I would be extremely careful when using the stouter new lines of Hereford bulls. I think that some maybe possible closet carriers, ie. Carpe Diem. I'm not saying that it's bad and we all know that he is an example of a carrier that some may use & not report properly. I'm just saying, I'd be carefull. JMO.

 

[JSchroeder]

DL, I said a dozen sets (all sales with 10-100 bulls in them), I did not say that it was a scientific sample, and I pretty clearly stated that the eye test is in no way 100%.

I’ll agree that selecting bulls for specific traits and finding out they were more often than not carriers was the same kind of "random chance" that some want to pretend the spread of PHA, TH, NH, and AM was.

 

[oakview]

Check the sale catalogs where most of the Shorthorn heifer winners were sold at and you will see they are clean.  Most of the sale catalogs clearly state that all animals are free from genetic defects unless otherwise stated in the footnote. 

 

[JSchroeder]

oakview, I'm not sure if you were repyling to me but Shorthorn heifer shows have very little to do with the type of cattle I'm talking about selecting for.

 

[qbcattle]

So Jeff are you saying that you think there could be a strong correlation with PHA and body mass?

 

[JSchroeder]

I used to be in the same camp as DL but after a while I realized what I was seeing with my eyes didn’t match what I was told.  At first it was a few cases of “too bad those were carriers, they were massive cattle” type thoughts.  Then the consistency that it was happening became suspicious.  I'm all for science over anecdotes but eventually it just got to be too much to ignore.

My opinion now is PHA does not mean an otherwise poor calf will be big boned and stout but in the upper tier of calves, yes, it provides a “bonus” in bone and mass.

If you plan on heading East toward the Floresville area any time soon, shoot me an e-mail and I’ll show you a bull that I’d call the stereotypical PHA carrier.  When we first saw him my exact words were “that s.o.b. has to be a carrier”.

 

[oakview]

Show heifer asked if the Louisville winners were tested and I replied that most were.

 

[DL]

Oh - she must be the Queen of England because she wears a crown - no actually I think that's Mrs Butterworth -

Mrs Butterworth (or maybe the Queen of England, or perhaps the homecoming queen or the queen of pop or the queen bee) didn't see all the other queens but made her statement based on what she saw and it turned out not to be true (or maybe it was true - who knew) but not seeing all the other offspring meant her skewed view became her truth based on it being too much to ignore.....that darn Mrs Butterworth

 

[JSchroeder]

First you mispresented what I said and now that Mrs Buttersworth foolishness.  I'll be frank, that type of reply seems to be pretty far beneath you based on what I’ve come to expect from your posts.  

If you would like to do that so be it but you have yet to explain what you think the driving factor behind PHA spreading the way it did is.  If the only manifestation of it is dead calves, which you seem to want me to believe, what caused it to propagate in the manner it did?

 

[knabe]

Knabe when is the last time you sat at a larger show and actually had a judge pay much attention to the carcass quality traits? It's been too long in most cases, and one that will actually stick to his/her guns has been longer ago yet.

'89?  i've been to the state fair 2 times out of the last 4 years, and i gotta say i was slightly disappointed.  i did go to a local county show last year, and it was pretty clear there was only two animals that were remotely finished and this was a terminal show and the judge rubbed every steer, probably to avoid criticism.  the reserve was probably better finished but was a profile nightmare.  i would think one has to go to bakersfield or red bluff for a decent steer show in CA.

 

[JSchroeder]

I let this slide earlier but…

The TH gene involves the formation of the hindlimb, hence the mutation influences structure of the hindlimb giving it that "look"

but you can't convince me you can visually pick out [PHA] carriers - if you could we wouldn't need a test

So using your logic, why do we test for TH?

 

[chambero]

I don't know enough about breeding brahman-X cattle to tell you for certain what would work for our "Texas steers".

There are clean black bulls that can get it done down here, particularly for the slick shows.  If I really wanted to try to stay clean, I'd pay a visit to Charles Burk and try some of his true ChiAngus cattle.  We had a bull from him a few years ago that put a bunch of steers in the sale in Houston with one of them a breed champion.  I truly believe there have to be some half blood Simi bulls whose calve could get it done in slick shows.  We bought three this fall out of Nebraska in an attempt to give it a whirl.

That being said, we just finished AIing 139 head last week and most were bred to TH-positive black bulls. 

I really think Collins's clean Heatseeker son named "The Punisher" can work.  I've got two real good babies out of him this year and we tried him on a lot more this year.  I don't know if his calves would be too big on Brahman-X cows or not, but you might give Yellowjacket a whirl.  He sure makes them stout enough.

Until our steer judges start creeping back up in height on what they pick for steers, I think the current lineup of AI bulls - mostly TH carriers - will continue to dominate.  If they ever start to move up in size, I think it would open things back up for some of the old heavier Chi influenced cattle - i.e. the Full Flush lines and make the Simi influenced cattle work a little more consistently.  There are a lot of good, solid black, half blood Simi cattle out there if you want to look hard enough to find them.  Plenty with good necks and not from the Meyer and Dream On lines.  Go snoop around some big feedlots.

I haven't been around enough of the PHA-carrier cattle to know for certain whether there is a trend or not in phenotype.  I've seen some awful good, clean black cattle at Griswolds - but he told me a year ago he still didn't like any of them better than he did Irish Whiskey.  He ought to know.

 

[DL]

Dear Mr Butterworth - we are so sorry that our post was not up to what you expect - mea culpa mea culpa - now if you tell us the function of the PHA gene maybe we can dissect the phenotype that goes along with PHAC mea culpa Mr Butterworth - we know that the phenoytpe was selected for in THC and what those THC calves "have", we know that the dwarfism mutation was selected for in Dexters - giving the smaller stature that was desired - probably similar selection in other breeds with dwarfism as well Angus, Hereford - bulldog, snorter etc. We assume that the carcass traits lead to the proliferation of 1680 and 9J9 genetics in the Angus leasing to AM and NH rearing their ugly head, but as I understand it neither of those genes are involved with positive carcass traits so it may be that the mutation just traveled with more desirable carcass traits or that the promotion of these carcass traits lead to the proliferation of the lethal recessive mutation. It is not unreasonable to assume that there was something that caused people to use more PHAC bulls or ISC bulls but what that phenotype is has not as far as I know been tied directly to the mutation of the gene - so Mr Butterworth we hope this post meets with your approval, people see what they want to see

 

[JSchroeder]

???  I've got a kid of my own if I wanted to discuss things in the manner you have evidently decided to turn.

 

[Telos]

I think when a breeder selected his eight or more bull battery of which were 100% PHA carriers, says something to me (this being before the test). Logic tells me that there was something visual in the selection process and this has to be taken into account... What are the chances this was coincidental?