OLDS, Alta. — Finding cattle that eat less and gain more could soon be easier than searching for that needle in a haystack.
The Canadian Hereford Association is sponsoring a three-year residual feed intake trial on 900 bulls.
The project is expected to be completed in 2015 and the results will be used to develop statistics for expected progeny differences ratings.
The research team includes the association, Olds College, Cattleland Feed Yards at Strathmore, Alta., Alberta Agriculture and the University of Alberta.
However, producers will still have to collect weights and performance data because animals are always evolving.
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“After the initial investment of measuring RFI, you could probably scale it back a little bit after testing your present generation, but you will never get away from testing for RFI,” said John Crowley of the U of A’s Livestock Gentec.
Feed efficiency is a heritable trait, but breeders have not selected cattle for their ability to put on the pounds over the last 40 years.
“With long-term selection for feed-to-gain ratio, we end up with animals that grow faster and eat more,” said lead researcher John Basarab of Alberta Agriculture.
“We don’t end up with an animal that is any more efficient. We just end up with bigger cows, and they eat more,” he said at a producer day held at Olds College Jan. 23.
Feedlots are paid by the pound, but the costs to fatten those cattle are also critical.
Knowing which cattle are the most efficient could be more profitable, said William Torres, research manager at Cattleland Feedyards.
“It is hard to make money, especially when you don’t know what it is costing you to raise these animals,” he said.
Torres calculates that feeding more efficient animals could save five cents per head per day, which means a 5,000 head feedlot would save $37,000 in feed costs because the steers ate less to reach market weight.
He sees residual feed intake information as a good marketing tool that producers need to adopt.
“Calves with good RFI produce less methane, have lower heart rates and spend less time eating,” he said.
For example, performance data during a 77-day growing trial from Texas A & M University showed two steers coming in at 538 and 535 lb., respectively.
The more efficient steer at 535 lb. gained the same as the other but ate 485 lb. less feed to get to market weight.
Feedlots want to find those efficient animals, but no one knows if buyers are willing to pay more for calves from feed efficient bulls.
Basarab said the Hereford research project is looking for bulls that grow fast and eat less.
The bulls are fed using the Growsafe system, in which every bite of feed is measured along with other data, such as how often each one visited the feed bunk.
The first tests in 2012-13 involved 320 bulls.
The average animal was rated as zero on a scale, while an efficient animal was assigned a negative value and inefficient animals received a plus number.
They were fed 18 lb. of dry matter per day and gained about three lb. per day. The range in gain was 2.5 to 3.5 lb. per day.
The test found that 107 were rated at zero, meaning they are average,107 were considered inefficient and the rest were deemed efficient.
Researchers are also looking for the genes that indicate which animals are more efficient. Crowley said finding the part of the genetic code that is responsible for that trait will make it possible to predict what future progeny might do.
Purebred breeders will see the more immediate benefits from this research, but Crowley said the next step is to genetically assess crossbreds for valued traits.
“The big challenge at the moment is to get genomics working at a crossbred level for the commercial guys,” he said.
Another project at Agriculture Canada’s research centre in La-combe, Alta., is testing replacement heifers for feed efficiency. That ability seems to continue throughout their lives.
Those cows would be cheaper to keep, but real herd improvement comes from the sires.
“The heifer is probably not where I would start,” Basarab said.
“There is so much genetic improvement that comes from the bull side.”
