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Relationships between liveweight and condition score in Aberdeen Angus crossbred and Limousin crossbred commercial suckler cows

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 November 2017

J J Hyslop*
Affiliation:
SAC Select Services, FBS Area Office, Bush Estate,, Penicuik, Midlothian, United Kingdom
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Extract

Since the announcement that mature cull cows can re-enter the human food chain, there is increasing interest from commercial producers in devising systems that finish suckler cows to an acceptable degree of fatness and conformation score. A detailed understanding of the relationships between cow liveweight (LW) and condition score (CS) is necessary if cows are to be grown and finished to achieve optimum carcass weights and marketed at optimum commercial returns. Previous work conducted over 20 years ago with traditional UK suckler cow types at that time, showed that for every one unit change in suckler cow CS the corresponding change in cow LW ranged from 61 – 110 kg with an average value of 95.6 kg (Wright and Russel, 1984) for cows that ranged in average LW from 434 – 560 kg. However, little information is available on the relationships between suckler cow LW and CS in suckler cow genotypes present in the UK today. The objective of this study was to estimate the relationship between suckler cow LW and CS in modern Aberdeen Angus cross (AAx) and Limousin cross (LIMx) suckler cows.

Type
Poster presentations
Copyright
Copyright © 2016 The American Society of International Law

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References

Lowman, B. G., Scott, N. A. and Sommerville, S. H. 1976. Condition scoring of cattle: revised edition. Bulletin No 6.Google Scholar
SAC, Beef and Sheep Select, Bush Estate, Penicuik, Midlothian EH26 0PH.Google Scholar
Wright, I. A. and Russel, A. J. F. 1984. Partition of fat, body composition and body condition score in mature cows. Animal Production. , 38: 23-32.Google Scholar