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Red Angus EPD Base Change!
In late 2012, in order to take advantage of an unprecedented 11 million animal data base, Red Angus and the American
Simmental Association released growth and carcass EPDs on a common base. This partnership gave the beef industry
the first EPDs that can be compared across two breeds.
Why does this matter? Selection for Growth (BW, WW, YW, Milk) and Carcass (MARB, YG, CW, REA, FAT) EPDs will be
greatly simplified for commercial customers who need to compare EPDs between the Red Angus and Simmental breeds.
In addition, EPDs of hybrids and composites now have an EPD that can be compared across Red Angus and Simmental
for those traits on the common base.
What changes will I see? The Red Angus EPDs for growth and carcass look different. That is because a new base was
established for both Red Angus and Simmental breeds to use. Although the base is changed and the EPD looks different,
the cattle are the same. Percentile rankings can be used while learning to understand the EPDs with the common base.
Below is a comparison of the EPDs of Breed Average Sires showing the old Red Angus base and the new Multi Breed
base.
The graph illustrates that even though the average animal is exactly the same, he is now described with a different set of
numbers.
For example, let’s say you had a dog named One. You gave
it to your neighbor. He named it Ten. It is still the same dog,
acts the same, probably chases the wrong things the same.
Nevertheless, your neighbor is using a different word to
describe it.
Use Percentile Ranking. It is very important that you take
the time to understand each EPD and where it fits within the
percentile ranking. That way you can put selection pressure
where you need to so that you move your program forward.
For that reason, Mushrush Red Angus is once again
publishing the percentiles in the catalog.
Please note that all the other EPDs published in our catalog
are still on the current Red Angus base. This leaves their base unchanged and therefore not comparable to Simmental at
this time. Those EPDs include CED, CEM, Stay, HPG, ME.
Although the Multi-Breed base allows for a direct comparison of Red Angus and Simmental in the Growth and Carcass
traits, the percentile ranks for Red Angus animals will continue to simply compare the genetics of Red Angus animals
against other Red Angus. Thus, an animal in the top 10% of the Red Angus breed under the old base will still be in the
top 10% of the breed using the multi breed base.
Trait BW WW YW Milk MARB YG CW REA FAT
‘New’ Multi Breed average -1.2 55 83 19 .39 .00 18 .13 0.0
‘Old’ Red Angus average -0.5 33 62 17 .09 -.02 37 .07 0.0
Percentile 50% 50% 50% 50% 50% 50% 50% 50% 50%