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Beef Improvement Federation Fertility Traits Gain Momentum By Lindsay King Fertility traits have quickly gained momentum as valuable considerations for making breeding decisions about cattle. Bob Weaber, Kansas State University (K-State) professor and cow-calf extension specialist, explained the current state and future advancement opportunities of the complex traits at the 2019 Beef Improvement Federation (BIF) research symposium in Brookings, S.D., June 18-21. “We need more fertility records and more estimates for both fertility and longevity traits,” Weaber said. “I don’t disagree with that or genomics being a tool we use to get there.” Getting from point A to point B is complex for a number of reasons, but mostly because fertility is hard to define. “If I had given a talk over this topic 10 years ago, the list of breeds and traits for fertility records would have been much smaller,” Weaber said. “That is the encouraging part.” While discussing the ideal traits of a beef cow, Weaber reminded the audience that cattle harvest grass first and foremost. Some of the other characteristics of the ideal cow include minimal maintenance, plenty of milk for a healthy calf, conceives on the first try every time and excellent maternal instincts. 14 | AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2019 “As we think about the idealness of a beef cow, reproduction is central to that,” Weaber said. “It is influenced by a lot of things — environment, management, the bulls we turn out — but that shouldn’t dissuade us from pursuing it.” There is quite a bit of data available on fertility traits. However, Weaber said progress for this topic starts with capturing new information and precisely deciding what is meant by “fertility traits.” One example Weaber presented pertained to the reasons producers might cull a cow. A cow might leave the herd because of disposition, reproductive ability, health and nutrition, or any number of other reasons. “We need to be careful how we record longevity, because it might pertain to several different traits,” Weaber said. “We need to come to a consensus about what traits to incorporate and how to use that in a selection index.” Consequently, the seedstock system presents mostly inaccurate longevity estimates simply because many females are culled at a young age. There isn’t a great way to capture cow longevity currently. It’s one of the challenges for fertility trait selection tools. “We have made a lot of headway in the last 20 years as we moved either full or partial breed