AHDB Stocktake data shows the top third of beef producers just about breaking even and average producers losing around £150 per cow per year. With the prospect of the beef industry having to compete with potentially cheaper and higher quality imports, or increase production to become self-sufficient after Brexit, it’s time to think hard and scrutinise our breeding programmes if we, in the UK, are going to compete profitably.

At the same time this scenario offers a huge opportunity to producers who can adapt, and adapt quickly, to market pressures. I believe this can to a large extent be achieved by focusing on EBVs for economic traits and a commercially targeted indexing system.

My Background

I graduated from Reading with a BSc in Agriculture and MSc in Soil Science. After this I worked as a project scientist in a counter mine warfare team. Following this I taught agriculture at Plumpton College. When deciding to return to the business my brother was pushing forward with the arable enterprise; this meant the beef enterprise was an obvious place to focus my enthusiasm and an obvious place to enhance another revenue stream and create a profitable business to support another family.

The Farm

Burling Brothers Ltd is based in Cambridgeshire on the edge of the fens. The farm comprises of around 550ha of combinable crops and 30ha of forage maize with soil type being heavy clay overlying gravel. Milling wheat is sold on contract to Warburtons and is the predominant cash crop, with Hesston bales being sold to the straw burning power station. Minimal tillage and direct drilling have been used for over 20 years. Precision farming is also extensively used.

Grassland is permanent rough river bank and flood plain along with various RSPB and wetland trust reserves either in HLS stewardship or on different holdings outside of our management. Forage cannot be made from this rented grass.

The beef enterprise is now running with 250 suckler cows, finishing male progeny as bulls for Morrisons alongside producing Stabiliser breeding stock as a multiplier herd for the Stabiliser Cattle Company.

Cattle background

On returning to the family business around 9 years ago cattle numbers were around 60–70 breeding cows. These were predominately Saler cross cows using a Charolais terminal sire, a Saler bull for breeding replacements and a Limousin bull for heifers. Male calves were finished entire on a bought in cereal blend and heifers sold as stores. The idea was to produce cattle with a large pelvic area to calve a larger terminal calf that produced maximum dead weight.

What needed to change?

On the surface this system worked well. It utilised available straw and justified retaining a third member of staff over the winter. It allowed for retention of grass area eligible for SFP payments. It produced large well graded bulls. High value breeding bulls were always used.

However it did not make any money.

Stocking rates were too low. Feed costs were too high. Labour and depreciation costs were too high. Vet bills were too high. Time spent on the enterprise as a proportion of total farm income was far too high.

Cow condition on weaning was very poor. Cows were far too large. Cows were too inconsistent, making them hard to manage on scale. Weaning weights as percentage of mature cow weight were too low. Carcass weights were too big, too lean, too inconsistent and too old for a changing market. Feed conversion rates were too low.

Barren rates were slightly too high. Calving intervals were creeping up. Calf assists were too high. Calf mortality rates were too high and vigour of large bull calves too low. Breeding bull longevity was questionable. Cow and breeding bull temperaments were becoming a concern.

Although none of the above was individually that dramatic I realised that marginal losses together added up over the entire enterprise to a larger financial problem which was unsustainable.

This needed to be reversed using the same machinery and current labour. Although we are in the fourth generation of farming, the farm size had increased dramatically in the previous generation, however this is not as a result of any windfalls such as building land and the like, therefore capital investment has to be carefully planned and justified. Any changes in the enterprise have to pay for themselves. The predominant focus of the business was to increase farm profit.

The cow solution

After extensive research, an economic focus and thankfully not coming from a farm blinkered with a history of showing cattle and visiting markets we decided to trial a Stabiliser bull. At the time this was one of the earlier commercially available Stabiliser bulls available.

The breed offered the desired improved maternal traits, consistency and uniformity of performance, ease of management and good temperament with a very economically and commercial focused breed programme, and very importantly for me; heavily grounded in a scientific approach.

Calves are vigorous and cattle are hardy and very feed efficient. Cattle have a moderate frame size and can function on very marginal grazing, which allows a dramatic increase in stocking density.

Carcass traits are very compatible with current markets trends and will be even more so moving forward.

The Stabiliser system of integrated supply chains works very efficiently for the business.

The Stabiliser breed is heavily founded on the use of performance recording, EBVs and economically focused indices. We looked at other successful beef producing countries such as the USA and Australia and found that using Hybrid bulls was the norm and particularly the use of EBVs was far more accepted. It was also apparent that the variety and range of breeds was a lot less than that of the UK, leading to a more consistent product. It also seemed that because they are more focused on market requirements driven by processor carcass trait incentives, as opposed to the UK breed specific incentives, variation within breed seemed less. I saw this first hand on a study trip to the USA last summer.

Research is clear in telling us that taking advantage of hybrid vigour will dramatically improve performance. Although the original herd did inadvertently use this theory we have found by using a composite breed we can still maintain vigour at each mating in a far more predictable and uncomplicated way. As a result of this being proven in practice, the herd is rapidly heading towards being ‘pure’ Stabilisers.

The adage of ‘if you don’t measure it you can’t improve it’ has been embraced. After the first season using a Stabiliser bull it was apparent this was a system that would suit the farm and intention of the business. We swapped all breeding bulls to Stabilisers for the following season and began to increase cow numbers.

Increasing numbers required more housing. We were confident the Stabilisers could be out wintered and calve outside at grass; however the grassland did not permit this. The solution was to build outside straw yards for dry cows in the winter and to calve in. This system has suited the breed well and negated the need for more expensive housing. The only cattle now housed with a roof are the young bulls during finishing.

EBV use in UK

Use of EBVs in the UK is still shockingly low ‘Bulls with high EBVs were always used by 16% of holdings breeding beef cattle in 2017’ Greenhouse gas mitigation practices – England farm practices survey – DEFRA.

How we use EBVs in the breed programme

As a starting point we only used EBVs to select breeding bulls because the base cows were not performance recorded. I selected bulls based on EBVs that would suit the likely purpose of the calf. For example I selected a Stabiliser bull with high beef value figures as a terminal sire to use on cows that I did not want to retain heifers from.

I used a bull with high calving value figures on heifers to reduce calving problems. As a starting point this worked very well and allowed us to breed more high value maternal animals to retain into the growing herd.

It was very apparent after the first two seasons that the bulls progeny performed as predicted and as a result we started recording all animals via Signet from 2007/8. This allowed us to really push forward allowing us to rank cows and match with bulls more successfully resulting in faster more predictable gains that we could control.

To start with accuracy was an issue as the data build up with the base cows was not there, but after time this improved.

Today almost all our selection is based on EBVs. The main figure we have been trying to select for is maternal production value as this has been as close to a measure of profitability as we could get with the emphasis on producing good replacements. Herd replacement rate is high at around 23% due to the rapid improvement of herd figures.

Calving value has been an important trait to monitor, and we have selected heavily for it because it’s essential for easy management of the herd. I have tried not selecting for calving with a detriment to beef value. This is one of the main challenges of using EBVs, trying not to select one trait that will negatively impact another. I have come to learn that balance in traits and not extremes are the key. I have found it more useful to select for grouped traits; calving value, beef value and maternal production value. Stand alone traits are useful to know if they are extreme but are hard to effectively pull into a breed programme.

I have found the most effective use of EBVs within the herd has been aiding heifer selection. Without using EBVs to select replacements there is little information other than phenotypic selection. This is an easy trap to fall into and a problem with show based selection.

We scan all heifers for breeding soundness and a level of stockmanship is still essential to look at functionality and correctness of the animal but by selecting on looks or weight alone I’m sure would lead to an increase in cow size and calving problems.

Currently we use heifers with poorer EBVs as embryo recipients. We aim to synchronize thirty heifers a year to implant embryos selected from the top 1% (based on the US indexing system) of the USA Stabiliser breed programme. Inbreeding is also tightly managed and kept to a 6% maximum to maintain vigour, the use of embryos maintains fresh bloodlines.

Another use is cull selection. We cull for the usual problems, anything functional, anything scanned not in calf, late calvers, cows that have had eight calves. We will also cull based on cows with poorer EBVs traits in categories such as calving value or any individual traits we are putting pressure on in the cow population such as cow mature size or NFE values.

It has been very useful each year to review our herd average EBV position to plot herd trends over seasons. It’s been reassuring to see this moving in a positive way and being reflected in business performance.

The rate of genetic gain suggests that in five years time today’s elite cows will be average cows. The key has been to select breeding bulls with the highest ranking figures; traits selected for should be of economic value to the herd and produce a product that meets market demand.

How using EBVs affected the herd performance

Using EBVs within the breed programme has absolutely changed the way we breed cattle. Rather thanselecting breeding bulls from a certain breed to gain a certain perceived breed quality or relying on breeder (albeit educated) guesses on performance, or on phenotypic traits, we can chose animals with desirable economic qualities.

The Stabiliser breed system has enjoyed particularly robust genetic gain year on year. A total herd approach can be gained by increasing downward selection pressure on certain traits, and because as a breed farmers are selecting on EBVs this means the national herd moves in one direction. The most recent example of this is the mature cow weight EBV.

Figures 1 and 2 below show UK Stabiliser herd genetic trends, this demon strates how key economic traits can be selected for whilst complimenting each other so as to progress genetic gain.

Figure 1

Figure 2

Table 1 demonstrates the genetic trends seen in our own herd. Figures shown are EBV values.

The above trends in EBV values can be seen in physical herd performance. We have seen a decrease in barren rates from around 7% to between 3–5%. Calving assists have dropped dramatically to around 2% with no vet interventions. Our calving period has been reduced to 10 weeks with 79% being born in the first four weeks. Calf survival rate has increased dramatically with 95% of calf’s born being reared to weaning. Weaning weight of calves as a percentage of dam’s mature weight has improved despite the removal of creep feed to 45%.

One of the most dramatic changes from the breed programme is the reduction in the cost of dry cow feed by around 30% and decreasing. This has translated to an increase of over 20% in stocking rates that could easily go higher without stewardship restrictions.

This has also been replicated with the fattening bulls achieving a 4.9:1 feed conversion rate and meeting market requirements well. Average weaning weights of bulls were 330kg at 226 days old with heifers averaging 284kg at 221 days. Bull killing out percentages are 57% on average with average carcass weight being 357kg. 92% hit weight spec required with 100% hitting grade spec. Bull performance is improving each year.

We are currently aiming to reduce cow mature weight; 670kg average for animals 4 years and older and 640kg across the cow herd. This is resulting in more efficient cows. An 800kg cow will produce a similar size calf to a 650kg cow, but cost more to maintain.

Combining these herd performance figures with considerably reduced costs per cow have resulted in dramatic increases in overall herd profitability and created a sustainable enterprise. The key is to have a system that focuses on multiple balanced economic traits.

Next step

We will continue to select for maternal traits to maintain cow efficiency and performance as its clear two-thirds of the cost of a kilo of beef produced is keeping the cow.

We will utilise the Stabiliser NFE (net feed efficiency) data to further reduce costs and increase efficiency of all animals. Research shows that selecting for this trait could reduce the cost of keeping a cow/calf unit by £100 a year without reducing output. When you consider 80% of nutrient use in a suckler system is used for maintenance with the biggest cost in the system being those nutrients, and realise this can be reduced through selecting with a 37% heritability rate (the same as growth), then it is clear this is a major priority.

Bulls on trial within the top one-third of NFE results eat 17% less feed and had a 13% FCR rates than their peers. This means by selecting on NFE EBVs I could reduce my daily feed costs per head per day to 1.40 from 1.70. These gains scaled up will make a huge difference to farm profitability.

We will also scan and select for IMF (intra muscular fat) and rib eye area. Momentum is building rapidly towards a move away from the EUROP grid system that incentivises lean muscle yield and towards a system that incentivises eating quality. This will have a huge impact on the UK beef industry. It may mean that we move away from breed based incentives to measurable quality incentives, which will benefit the UK beef industry in the long term. It may stop farmers chasing short term premiums and end carcass values and moving towards systems that make money over a sustained period.

IMF is strongly correlated to eating quality, and has an EBV that we can select for. The aim of this will be for us to continue to produce a product with a high demand. We could have the best performing herd in the world but it’s no use if there is no demand for the product. The person buying and eating our beef arguably has the greatest impact on farm profit.

£Profit Index

The most exciting and most important recent development within the breed programme will be the new multi-trait index system, called £Profit Index, that will make selecting the most profitable animals a lot easier. It will allow us to avoid selecting one trait that may negatively affect another. It will allow us to use one figure to select for the most important trait of all; profitability.

The new £Profit Index will help farmers select on EBVs at optimal economic levels not necessarily maximal levels. Look at growth for example, increasing it will increase end value but eventually too much will have a negative effect due to costs associated with overweight carcases, fertility issues, dystocia and the feed costs with bigger cows.

As mentioned earlier accuracy is the key to good quality EBV data and the more good large data sets the better the accuracy. The Stabiliser breed has been lucky having a very large proportion of its herd recorded. The £Profit Index will enhance this further by pooling UK data with over 1 million recorded animals in  Australia, New Zealand and the USA. Data can also be analysed at the point of input to pick up any abnormal distribution in data.

The £Profit Index accurately weighs relevant EBV recorded traits against each other in simulated market conditions. The model predicts partial budgets based on genetic data.

£Profit Index assumes one bull will sire 140 calves in his lifetime and that 30% of these calves will be kept as replacements, and the remaining 70% will be finished to slaughter on farm. These assumptions are used to weigh the relationship between economically relevant traits and associated farm costs such as grass, feed and premiums/discounts associated with the EUROP system.

The £Profit Index figure accurately compares cattle against each other based on relative differences in profitability. So, if one sire has a £Profit index of £10,000 and another has a £Profit index of £6,000, the model predicts a lifetime advantage of £4,000 from the higher bull.

This system will cause some EBV reranking within the breed but will revolutionise the way we use EBV data. It is reassuring that our highest £Profit Index ranked animals are 2017 born calves.