At Black Grove, we continue to believe fundamentals survive fads. We try to take a long-term approach to our breeding program. We believe the Angus cow is the most efficient and productive manufacturing plant in the cattle industry. We are concerned with the trend toward statistical selection based on individual breeder reported contemporary group data and terminal trait characteristics to the exclusion of or regard for the functionality of the Angus cow. While we use the multiple trait selection tools offered by the Association, we also focus on breeding and selecting functional cattle.
After years of study, we have determined the best measure of functionality is longevity (a trait not presently measured by the Association). We believe logic dictates that cows who live a long time would have been culled if they were not functionally sound. If a cow did not have good feet, good teeth, good udder and teats, milk well or maintain her fleshing ability, remain fertile and productive, she would have been culled. It is also logical to assume these cattle will be easy-fleshing, low maintenance cattle that will reduce our annual operating costs. If we can breed cattle that live for 12-15 years, we will dramatically reduce our turnover in the cow herd and the huge capital cost of raising replacement heifers.
To that end, we have been working to develop a new longevity trait selection index, which allows us to identify animals that should have a higher probability of living longer. The result is less turnover of productive females (our factories), lower capital investment in replacement heifers, and therefore, higher profitability and improved return on investment. We believe longevity/functionality is one of the most important selection traits for a commercial or registered cow-calf operation.
To come up with the score that we used to determine a cow’s longevity, we sent letters to the last owners of the cow’s mother, grandmothers and great-grandmothers and asked if they are still alive and if not, when they died. In case their owners did not know, we asked for written permission to access the American Angus Association records, to see when their last registered calf was born. (The Association would not provide information without written authorization from one of the owners.) We devised a formula (available on request) to calculate a weighted average of the lifespan of the cows in our subject cow’s pedigree going back three generations. We only used cows in our calculations that were born before 1998. The numbers we came up with fall into one of the following six categories.
Cows with a pedigree average of 6.9 or less = no stars
Cows with a pedigree average of 7-8.9 = 1 star 
Cows with a pedigree average of 9-10.9 = 2 stars
Cows with a pedigree average of 11-12.9 = 3 stars
Cows with a pedigree average of 13-14.9 = 4 stars
Cows with a pedigree average of 15 or higher = 5 stars
Each cow that we know is still alive in a pedigree, but is more than 9 years old presents a challenge for our formula. We solved this by adding a + symbol to the stars, to indicate that the value could go up as the cow’s mothers or grandmothers continue to produce cows. (Cows in the pedigree born after 1997 are not considered in any part of this formula.) For example: A cow with a score of 11 and a mother or grandmother that is 9 years old or older and still alive would get a score of +. A cow with the same score of 11, but with all of its ancestors that were born before 1998 having died, would get a score of .
We also came up with an accuracy rating for each of the cows. This was necessary because we were not able to obtain permission to look at the records of all the cows in our family tree, and some of our cows have mothers and even grandmothers that were not born before 1998, and therefore are not considered in this formula. If we were able to obtain the information on all of the cows in the pedigree, and they were all born before 1998, the cow would get an accuracy rating of 100%. For each great-grandmother not included in the calculations, the accuracy drops 8%. For each grandmother not included in the calculations, the accuracy drops by 16%, and if the mother is not old enough to be included in the calculations, the accuracy drops by 33%. To qualify for a rating, an animal cannot be missing information on more than two ancestors.
We believe that star indexing the scores will provide breeders with an easy comparative analytical tool to evaluate relative probability for longevity and functionality. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at (803) 276-9385.
Black Grove heifer tops the 35th Annual South Carolina Angus Futurity. Black Grove Polly 804 sold to Mr. Mike Gillispie from North Carolina for $4,750. Black Grove Polly 704 is a New Design 208 daughter out of a SVF Bandolier dam and the great maternal grandam, Black Grove Polly 819 who is an own daughter of 124. She was bred to OCC Emblazon.
Thank you for your presence at and interest in the Black Grove Mature Cow Dispersal Sale. It turned out to be the all time record breaking sale for the Carolinas averaging over $5,000 per lot and cattle going to thirteen states. Although we sold nearly all of our mature cows, we will continue breeding Angus and hopefully, replenish our numbers of high quality females over the next three years. We will keep you updated on our progress. Again, we would like to thank you for sharing in our special day. We hope to hear from you soon, and remember, you will always be welcome at Black Grove.
Our bulls are fed a maximum of 2.5% of their body weight for the test period and range over a hilly fescue pasture supplemented with fescue/bermuda hay. We do not overfeed our bulls like so many other bull tests where they create potential problems such as foundering, long hooves, fertility and melt down.
To administer out test we hired Brandon Hurley of Hurley Farms in Gray Court, SC, in consultation with Clemson University advisors to run our bull test. All bulls have passed breeding soundness exams administered by George P. Copeland, DVM.
