Where Great Females Make A Difference

[RyanChandler]

Looking through the sale catalog, I noticed some discrepancies as far as some of the heifer's color designation.  Lot 5 is registered as red.  She clearly has white marks.  Lot 16 is reg as roan and is r/w.  Lot 18 reg as red. Shes r/w/m. Lot 24 is r/w. Lot 26 appears to have a white udder. The lot 31 bull has white marks....    Is this something that is common or am I missing something.  I would think, to some, this would raise some serious concerns as to the legitimacy of the operation.  I mean if your not even registering the cattle with something as obvious as the correct color, what else is being recorded inaccurately?

 

[Doc]

Man , you need to get a life. The 16 hfr I will give you. She's not roan, with that being said because she is an applied for application that means the info was input manually so it could be a typo. The 24 hfr , the only white I see is in the switch of her tail. The others would be up for serious discussion in my book. But I geuss I must not run a legitimate operation.
There is no guidelines by the ASA to my knowledge to determine how much white is allowed before you say R&W or RWM or red. The other thing is there is like 3 or 4 different farms that those cattle were registered by.

 

[Okotoks]

Lot 16 and 23 are red and whites but 5, 24 and 31 are definitely red in my opinion. In our herd book if the white is in the switch, on the belly or udder they are still registered as red, any white on the body or legs then Red and white. It drives me nuts when people register dark roans and red roans as red or Red and Whites as roan. Some colors would cause a lot of debate and I don't think any of these colors are being registered wrong intentionally but it wouldn't hurt to have color guides put out by associations with examples.

 

[itk]

I don't mean to offend you but some posts are so ignorant that I don't want to reply to them but I just want to let you know that Greenhorns are some of the most respected people in the breed. I don't know if your new to the breed or have just lived under a rock for the last ten or so years but Dave and Josh have built things the right way and IMO have made more smart purchases over the last decade then about anyone. I don't know if you've ever put together an catalog but I don't care how many times you go over things there will always be some sort of error you miss until things get back from printing. If errors in sale catalogs are a measure of how trust worthy a breeder is there are no trust worthy breeders. I almost want to take away a karma point for even thinking Greenhorns aren't legit but instead I just feel sorry for you.

 

[sue]

I have not looked at the catalog.

I wish sometimes my dad could chime in on this board - "color" is sort of his pet peeve when it comes to how you paper shorthorns. Often he'll say "in my day we didnt have red with white mark option" .... you had red white or roan. His "roan " comment is a book in length... often he will argue there is no such thing as a red neck roan? Dark or light roans.

All this being said and without even looking at a catalog - sometimes its best to photo a animal with a white mark "opposite of camera" .  Reds can have white on a belly line .... however white on feet or legs ?

Again welcome to the breed..... alot  of fun options in upcoming shorthorn sales this fall! 

 

[Doc]

I don't mean to offend you but some posts are so ignorant that I don't want to reply to them but I just want to let you know that Greenhorns are some of the most respected people in the breed. I don't know if your new to the breed or have just lived under a rock for the last ten or so years but Dave and Josh have built things the right way and IMO have made more smart purchases over the last decade then about anyone. I don't know if you've ever put together an catalog but I don't care how many times you go over things there will always be some sort of error you miss until things get back from printing. If errors in sale catalogs are a measure of how trust worthy a breeder is there are no trust worthy breeders. I almost want to take away a karma point for even thinking Greenhorns aren't legit but instead I just feel sorry for you.

Kinda the point I was trying to make. Going from memory but it seems like the cow was originally was registered by Rasor(WHR) & then one of the hfrs was registered by a Coyne or someone like that. So not even all Greenhorn registered cattle. Your right about the catalog. I do the catalog every spring for our state sale & i think I'm pretty good on proofing & still miss something every year.

 

[sue]

Chandler - another example:  your avatar has a roan female ... I doubt anyone at the time of her birth would question her color.
We had a white bellied mostly red calf born in august.... his tail is roan.... good chance he will be dark roan and not red? Many white hairs throughout his lower body. My point is wait to paper this one?

Old timers will tell you even a solid red bull with "white testicles " will throw more white??  dye hard red short breeders will only use bulls with dark colored testicles.

 

[Okotoks]

Chandler - another example:  your avatar has a roan female ... I doubt anyone at the time of her birth would question her color.
We had a white bellied mostly red calf born in august.... his tail is roan.... good chance he will be dark roan and not red? Many white hairs throughout his lower body. My point is wait to paper this one?

Old timers will tell you even a solid red bull with "white testicles " will throw more white??  dye hard red short breeders will only use bulls with dark colored testicles.

I agree Sue, a lot of breeders don't want the white testicles or white in front of the testicles because they don't want the bull's daughters to have white udders as they sunburn and chap more easily especially when the sun reflects off the snow. Also if they are roan in the tail or inside the back legs they are going to breed as a roan, they should sire some whites bred to roans or whites even though they look red.

 

[RyanChandler]

Man , you need to get a life. The 16 hfr I will give you. She's not roan, with that being said because she is an applied for application that means the info was input manually so it could be a typo. The 24 hfr , the only white I see is in the switch of her tail. The others would be up for serious discussion in my book. But I geuss I must not run a legitimate operation.
There is no guidelines by the ASA to my knowledge to determine how much white is allowed before you say R&W or RWM or red. The other thing is there is like 3 or 4 different farms that those cattle were registered by.

I am new to the shorthorn breed, though unlike some who like to play dress up with your cows, I'm a cattleman.  My cows are in the pasture, not in their doll houses.  I ask a legitimite question and I thank Okotoks, clearly a cattleman, for his informative response. Clearly many jumped to conclusions.  There are over 15 consignors to the sale so I'm not sure why anyone felt I was singling out GCC. I don't know these people (Nor does anyone outside the shorthorn dress up guild) and I like it that way.  I prefer to have an objective opinion of cattle outside of whose prefix they carry.  Lot 24, I agree, is red.  I was looking at 23 when I wrote that. As far as the other lots, I'm still in question.  If there is ANY white on the animal, how can one say its only red? I called a man who runs over 200 purebred shorthorns (PRC) when registering some heifers and was told that animals w/ white on the underline, udder, or tailswitch were registered as RED WITH WHITE MARKS (R/W/M) as obviously they are not all Red. And like Okotoks said, if the animal has white on its legs or body, then it gets the RED AND WHITE (R/W) designation.  If this is not correct then there are going to be MANY incorrectly registered calves in the near future.  

As far as the legitimacy of your operation Doc, I don't know. Why don't you post an udder pic of the cow you bought in the Duis dispersal and let the audience determine...

If errors in sale catalogs are a measure of how trust worthy a breeder is

They errors aren't just in the catalog, they're on their registrations as well.  So, so much for your typo "theory."

I have not looked at the catalog.

I wish sometimes my dad could chime in on this board - "color" is sort of his pet peeve when it comes to how you paper shorthorns. Often he'll say "in my day we didnt have red with white mark option" .... you had red white or roan. His "roan " comment is a book in length... often he will argue there is no such thing as a red neck roan? Dark or light roans.

All this being said and without even looking at a catalog - sometimes its best to photo a animal with a white mark "opposite of camera" .  Reds can have white on a belly line .... however white on feet or legs ?

Again welcome to the breed..... alot  of fun options in upcoming shorthorn sales this fall!  

From my understanding there is a DNA test for cattle to distinguish cattle that are roan. The roan in Shorthorns  is controlled by the mast cell growth factor (MGF) gene, also called the steel locus, on bovine chromosome 5.  Mast cell growth factor promotes pigment production by pigment cells, and without it, skin and hair cells lack pigment. With two functional MGF genes (homozygous dominant), cattle are fully pigmented; without any functional MGF genes (homozygous recessive), they are white. MGF-controlled roan occurs when cattle possess one functional and one non-functional MGF gene (heterozygous), resulting in a roughly even mixture of white regions and colored regions.

 

[RyanChandler]

Chandler - another example:  your avatar has a roan female ... I doubt anyone at the time of her birth would question her color.
We had a white bellied mostly red calf born in august.... his tail is roan.... good chance he will be dark roan and not red? Many white hairs throughout his lower body. My point is wait to paper this one?

Old timers will tell you even a solid red bull with "white testicles " will throw more white??  dye hard red short breeders will only use bulls with dark colored testicles.

I agree Sue, a lot of breeders don't want the white testicles or white in front of the testicles because they don't want the bull's daughters to have white udders as they sunburn and chap more easily especially when the sun reflects off the snow. Also if they are roan in the tail or inside the back legs they are going to breed as a roan, they should sire some whites bred to roans or whites even though they look red.

I would think this would be even more reason to be precise on the color when marketing your animals.

 

[sue]

chandler - we had a large commerical black cattlemen use a dark roan/white testicle bull ( not mine). Nearly every calf was blue .... NOT what they wanted.  When they called me I asked.... the bull was papered "red"??? Your right it is a sensitive issue at times?  In the case of this breeder using sh bulls -

 

[rarebirdz]

I agree Sue, a lot of breeders don't want the white testicles or white in front of the testicles because they don't want the bull's daughters to have white udders as they sunburn and chap more easily especially when the sun reflects off the snow. Also if they are roan in the tail or inside the back legs they are going to breed as a roan, they should sire some whites bred to roans or whites even though they look red.

Excelent pt thx I hadnt thought of that facter

 

[itk]

Looking through the sale catalog, I noticed some discrepancies as far as some of the heifer's color designation.  Lot 5 is registered as red.  She clearly has white marks.  Lot 16 is reg as roan and is r/w.  Lot 18 reg as red. Shes r/w/m. Lot 24 is r/w. Lot 26 appears to have a white udder. The lot 31 bull has white marks....     Is this something that is common or am I missing something.  I would think, to some, this would raise some serious concerns as to the legitimacy of the operation.  I mean if your not even registering the cattle with something as obvious as the correct color, what else is being recorded inaccurately?

I have no problems if you have questions about why a calf was registered a certain way. There are so many color combinations it is hard to decide which way to go sometimes. One day a calf might be red and the next a roan. My issue (and I think Docs) is with your last few sentences where you are insinuating GCC and the other consignors, who you do not know, aren't honest people because of a different POV on color. I don't think speaking up when someone is trying to slander a fellow breeder makes us less of a cattleman. We just chose to focus on a different part of your comment.

 

[Doc]

Chandler, On lot 16 I said it "might" be a typo , because it was an applied for app. I haven't gone to the website to look it up & don't plan on it, because it's not going affect me either way so I don't care.
Also, ITK is correct, in my opinion you approached a very viable subject in an inappropriate way. I've learned some stuff off this post , like the testicle deal that Sue brought up. So anytime I can learn something then it was a good thing. What I didn't appreciate was the way you ended up your topic by questioning the legitimacy of their operation because of discrepancy of a subject which so many people are unclear. We discussed this on here before a little one time & someone said on a animal that is in question wether red or roan, look on the bottom side of the tail. If there are white hairs on the bottom side, then they breed as a roan.
As far as the Lily cow I bought at Duis' sale , I am attaching a pic as per your request. Why, I don't know? She is registered roan & in my opinion she is as roan as you can make one.

 

[r.n.reed]

This post brings to the forefront the divergence between the two Shorthorn camps.Color and the location is crucial to the breeder whose customers depend on a black calf crop from their Shorthorn bulls.The only criteria for hair in the show arena is length.
Speaking of paying attention to details,how would you like to spend the money Sullivan's did on their catalogue and have them misspell Quality on the front cover!I made sure I used spell check before posting this one!

 

[justintime]

I think there are some variations in how breeders record the color of their cattle. I have seen some cattle that are basically red with a few roan hairs in their tails or on their heads, that some will register as red, and some will as roans. Personally, roan anywhere on the animal makes it a roan in my opinion. Animals with white markings also bring up some issues. Is a solid red animal with a small white star on it's forehead, considered red or red with white markings? I know what I believe, but I also know that there are differences of opinion. When I started in this business, there were many more color classifications than there are today. Some examples of these are : red with white underline,red roan, dark roan,  red with star, roan with star, white with red markings( for animals with the biggest proportion of their body white with some red markings) and there were a few more. Many years ago, these were changed to smaller number of color classifications.

No matter what an animal's color is stated on the registration paper, you have to decide yourself if it's color is acceptible to your program. If a bull has white testicles and this is an issue with you, then you have do make the judgement call as to whether to use him or not regardless what his color is recorded as. There are also some discrepencies between breed associations of different countries. For example, our Irish import IDS Duke of Dublin was registered as Red with white markings in Canada and as red and white in the US. Duke was basically a solid red bull with a fairly small white mark on one side behind his shoulder. He had white on his underline as well. We did get calves of all colors from him. When we had Duke on display in Denver, Dick Prentice from Arrowhead Farms, was looking at him. He picked his tail up and looked on the backside of his tail. There was a small white spot about the size of a quarter on the back of his tail. Dick said that Duke would sire white calves because he had a white spot on the back of his tail. This was something new to me, and I was unsure if I believed him or not. Our first calf crop from Duke started to arrive a week after we returned home, and the third calf born was white. We had 2 white calves from him in the next two calf crops.

 

[oakview]

I never saw Duke of Dublin in person, but from the pictures I've seen, I would have bet a lot of money that he would never sire a white calf.  Interesting.  I know the old timers used to say every red one had some white hairs somewhere and every white one had some red hairs somewhere.  If you look hard enough, they're there.  My rule of thumb is that if a red animal has a spot of white on it, other than just a very few white hairs in the tail switch, I record it as red with white marks.  There were some guidelines published regarding color at one time.  Best of luck to the Greenhorns.  It looks like another quality group of cattle, red, white, or roan!

 

[Dale]

I'll second Oakview's comment about Duke--Dick Prentice just taught me, again.  It brings to mind a major (200 cows in  Dakota) breeeder's  bull, registered as red, that sired a white calf some years ago, and I presumed that the bull was really not a red, but maybe an extremely dark roan.  Duke's spot was under his tail, right?  Thanks. 

Weebollabolla Theodore is registered ":roan" Down Under and "red" in U.S.  Here he has sired a white calf, so is he really roan?  Thunder Down Under, help me out.  Great topic about color for us Red, White, and Roan people!

P.S.  My late father, Burke of Homeplace Farms, used to say that a white animal with lots of red hair around the muzzle and ears might breed like a genetically roan beast--Aberfeldy Deacon did that for us.  Dad cautioned me to avoid white ones without any red hair around those areas, since he considered them closer to albino.

Our first eight fall calves by JJC Wild Side are like opening Christmas gifts--red cows are having calves that are beautiful, dark strawberry roans, one white with red marks (red and white?), red as the Ace of Diamonds, and, finally, a true RWM from a roan cow.  The Shorthorn color is great fun, unless you are hung up on predictability.

 

[oakbar]

the genetics of color can be a very funny thing.  I don't believe I've ever seen a true mono color Shorthorn--I'm not saying they don't exist, I've just never seen one and I've looked at a lot of shorthorns over the last few years.  I've never had a completely white one--usually there are red hairs around the ears at least, and they've always had red spots on their skin when they get wet.  Also, every "red" calf ever born on our farm has had at least a few white hairs ---usually under the tail.

For that matter, what is black?  There are different black colors as well.  Some are inky black, some have a brownish/reddish tinge to the hair, etc.    I have a plus heifer this year out of a roan shorthorn cow and a black Maine bull that, as far as I can tell, only has about 5 white hairs on her navel.  I'm sure she would qualify to be registered in any black breed.    I've also had calves that look almost brindle in bright lights.  Some of the blackest Plus calves I've had came from light roan cows---usually when I was trying to get a blue roan!!

I guess I'ven never considered white on the udder or underline up to the navel enough reason not call an animal red.  It gets a little iffy though when the entire back half of the belly is white.

My point is without better delineation on this by the association itself and official observation in questionable cases, the color will still be in the eye of the beholder.

I remember a Paint stallion who was considered a non colored breeding stock animal by the association(they require white skin and enough white to reach across a two inch circle) who threw a lot of wild colored colts.  The problem was that his white spot was only obvious when he was ready to breed a mare.  If you don't understand what I mean, think about it for awhile, then ask one of your close friends, and-- as a last resort-- PM me and I'll explain it to you!!  Ha, Ha!!!

 

[Okotoks]

I'll second Oakview's comment about Duke--Dick Prentice just taught me, again.  It brings to mind a major (200 cows in  Dakota) breeeder's  bull, registered as red, that sired a white calf some years ago, and I presumed that the bull was really not a red, but maybe an extremely dark roan.  Duke's spot was under his tail, right?  Thanks.  

Weebollabolla Theodore is registered ":roan" Down Under and "red" in U.S.  Here he has sired a white calf, so is he really roan?  Thunder Down Under, help me out.  Great topic about color for us Red, White, and Roan people!

P.S.  My late father, Burke of Homeplace Farms, used to say that a white animal with lots of red hair around the muzzle and ears might breed like a genetically roan beast--Aberfeldy Deacon did that for us.  Dad cautioned me to avoid white ones without any red hair around those areas, since he considered them closer to albino.

Our first eight fall calves by JJC Wild Side are like opening Christmas gifts--red cows are having calves that are beautiful, dark strawberry roans, one white with red marks (red and white?), red as the Ace of Diamonds, and, finally, a true RWM from a roan cow.  The Shorthorn color is great fun, unless you are hung up on predictability.

I think Weebollabolla Theodore is really a roan as registered in Australia. (he is also registered as a roan in Britain and Canada)I have attached a photo where he looks to be a dark roan. the link to the Weebollbolla catalogue has another photo where he looks roaner.(reference sire section) Interesting catalogue!
http://www.weebollabolla.com.au/pdf/Weebolla%20intro%20pages%20for%20internet.pdf