"Premium" Red Baldy Program

[strojanherefords]

Why is the AHA and the ARAA pushing a program that favors the stud companies but excludes half the breed?

[lcc]

Did you miss the memo? They want to do to cattle what they did to hogs -- confine everything and AI everything.

[franklinridgefarms]

I may just be a conspiracy theorist, but I believe certain breeders have discovered the semen market to be lucrative and the companies love the idea of expanding their interests. I don’t remember the name individual or the post it was in, but am pretty sure someone on this forum once made a statement to the affect of that there were too many people trying to make money off of his cattle. I said at the time that was the most truthful statement I had heard in a long time and it really started me to thinking and consequently have changed a lot of what I was doing. I believe that AI can be a good tool to bring in outside genetics if desired, but I also don’t see it s the great superior improver that many tout it to be. I think a handful of breeders from several breeds and the semen companies are working diligently to push the product simply for profit. If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard some random cattle person say I’m improving my herd by using AI, or the AI calves are so much better quality I would have several more dollars.
I honestly don’t believe that quality is improving, I think just the opposite. Cattle generally work better in regional areas. Some great doing cattle from the upper Midwest would likely have a hard time in the heat, humidity and fescue toxicity in our area. I think reproductive capabilities are declining across the breeds in part because of increased needs of newer modern paper bred cattle.
As for the individual red baldy program, I don’t know much about it but would suspect that a few breeders and the AI companies see it as a way to make money for themselves first.

[rockmillsherefords]

I think anytime someone spending some time promoting red cattle it's not such a bad thing.