There’s no doubt that when you’re buying a bull, his physical and structural soundness must be factored in. But what you can’t see is just as important.

Using breeding values allow you to see ‘under the hood’ of an animal. You can see his weak points and his strengths to decide if he’s the right fit for your herd.

In this presentation, MLA’s Clara Bradford talks through breeding values and how you can use them to accelerate the performance of your herd. Clara is joined by Queensland beef producer, Kara Knudsen, who shares how she has used breeding values to more than double the fertility in her herd.

You can watch the full recording or use the playlist below to jump to the start of a particular section within the presentation.  37:20, published 13 June 2019 by FutureBeefAu.

Download a copy of the presentation: Breeding values: your tool for looking under the hood of your next sire (PDF, 2.0MB)

Full recording

Playlist

1. Breeding values: your tool for looking under the hood of your next sire
2. Section 1: Why breeding values matter
3. What influences an animal’s performance?
4. Looking under the hood
5. Section 1 summary
6. Section 2: How breeding values help with buying bulls
7. Estimated breeding values
8. Available traits
9. Compare two bulls (an example)
10. Designing a breeding objective
11. Linking your business to genetics
12. Section 2 summary
13. Section 3: Kara Knudsen – a producer’s perspective
14. Section 4: Next steps
15. The genetics one-stop-shop
16. Short courses and other resources
17. Section 5: Sneak peek – to the next webinar
18. Selecting a high-performing sire
19. Section summary
20. Conclusion – take home messages

Read more

Bull buying checklist →

An in-depth discussion of Estimated Breeding Values →