04/25/07 High Tech Genetics I

High Tech Genetics Cattle genetics evaluation is moving forward almost as rapidly as the rest of our new technology world. I'm Jeff Keane; I'll be right back to fill you in. Evaluation of genetic potential of cattle has just taken another step forward. Historically, the beef cattle industry picked cattle that looked good to show ring judges to be the gene pool for future generations. This was one of the first steps in selection by man. Before that Mother Nature did the selecting and the best ones as far as early cattlemen were concerned were the cattle that survived range conditions. After the hey-day of the show rings beef cattle selection turned to performance testing. This evaluation selected animals that actually performed to certain standards for traits such as daily weight gain, weight per day of age, or weaning weight. Animals that excelled were used as seed stock to supply breeding animals for the cattle industry. The next logical step was testing the progeny of these higher performing individuals. Records from these offspring were gathered and this data was used to come up with an evaluation called Expected Progeny Differences or EPDs. The accuracy of EPDs increased as the number of offspring tested increased. All of the selection processes up to this point started with what you could see or measure. Now there is a tool called "molecular genetic value" that uses DNA markers for certain traits to calculate the potential worth of beef animals. I'll discuss that little term tomorrow. I'm Jeff Keane.