Getting it done in Colorado

Ryan Noble of Noble Ranch, Yuma, Colo., is well-known for his heifer-development program. Unfortunately, his family had to rebuild their cow herd in 2019-2020, more recently than most due to drought.

“God had a plan for us, and we sold every cow for every dollar we asked for them,” Noble said. “It was an opportunity for us. We went out seeking high-quality heifer calves. We knew what we wanted to raise.”

Noble said their ranch shifted to being a service provider, developing heifers and building back their herd, aiming for what he calls “an apology-free cow herd.”

Noble’s ideal set of females would be docile; healthy, with good feet and eyes; and fertile, calving once a year with a good udder.

“She’s got the appropriate amount of growth for your environment,” he said. “She is going to go garner premiums through the next two stages. You put her on feed, she’s going to get it done. You hang her on the rail, she’s going to get it done. That’s an apology-free cow, and she’s going to do it with a minimal amount of inputs and a minimal amount of labor.”

In pursuit of this stockman’s dream of a cow herd, Noble has come to place great value on known genetics and strategic nutrition investment. He uses genetic testing tools and makes heifers prove they have what it takes to go to work for him in his sometimes-unforgiving environment.

“I figure by the time we end up with a bred heifer, she’s probably lived through five or six sorts on our range,” he said. “If she can make it through all that and become pregnant, that’s when we are ready to invest more money.”

Investing in the right females pays dividends, Noble says, because he expects them to have longevity enough “until you’re so old that everybody knows your number.”

And in Oklahoma

Jimmy Taylor of Taylor Ranch, Cheyenne, Okla., has his own ideal cow herd, and he has dug into the data to help it become closer and closer to reality. The Taylor Ranch began transitioning to its current model of backgrounding their own calves on the ranch, retaining ownership through the feedyard and selling them on the grid in 2005.

“I wanted something where I could get a bonus or premium on every calf,” Taylor said. “So I looked around and decided that the best route to do that would be raising carcass cattle while raising good replacement heifers.”

He said his first set of steers graded 13% USDA Prime in 2012. Today their range is typically between 50% to 75% Prime.

Taylor’s carcass data and 10-plus years of genetic data on his females shows his system is working.

“What really got us into high gear was when what I called enhanced GeneMax® Advantage™ happened in 2016, where they had 10 traits and [percentile rankings for each animal] in those traits,” Taylor said. “Now I can target traits, and I can make rapid improvement doing that.”

Taylor said individualized data with trait-by-trait analysis has helped him use a more diverse pool of sires and “match specific females up to my bulls’ strong points and weak points.”

GeneMax Advantage now has 19 traits, and the American Angus Association continues to crank out expected progeny differences (EPDs) as tools for genetic selection with registered bulls.

Both Taylor and Noble said it is worthwhile work to get a handle on their own herd’s data and identify clear targets.

“What gets us from point A to point B are these tools,” Noble said.