Scott Poock

Adopting technologies such as artificial insemination, and the associated improvements in beef herd genetics better position livestock producers to meet anticipated demand increases for high-quality beef. If we examine the factors that influence technology adoption, then we will be better able to envision the producer operations of the future. This research examines Missouri cow-calf producer survey data to determine the impact that producer, operation, and management characteristics; production risk; and location have on the adoption of reproductive technologies regionally. Binary choice models are estimated to assess adoption of artificial insemination and estrus synchronization (AIES).

The beef industry's share of domestic meat demand continues to decline, as increasing vertical coordination in pork and poultry contribute to these industries' ability to offer convenient, consistent, and less expensive products. For such vertical coordination to be effective, incentives must be properly aligned so that those responsible for making the most important investments for system profitability are appropriately compensated. This study demonstrates that cow-calf producers who invest in quality registered cattle and those who are interested in incorporating feedlot and carcass data into herd management decisions are also more interested in retained ownership.

Figure S1. Linear regression of 39 endometrial genes differentially expressed in lactating dairy cows between week 5 and week 9 postpartum in cows that were either cycling or non-cycling by week 5. Figure S2. Linear regression of 21 endometrial genes differentially expressed at week 5 and week 9 postpartum between lactating dairy cows that were either cycling or non-cycling at week 5. Figure S3. Linear regression of 27 endometrial genes differentially expressed in lactating dairy cows at week 5 and 9 postpartum in response to the endometrial microbiota at week 1 (WK1_PC1). (XLSX 174 kb)

Table S1. Relative abundance of operational taxonomic units in endometrium of postpartum dairy cows. Table S2. Endometrial genes differentially expressed at week 5 postpartum between cycling and non-cycling dairy cows. Table S3. Endometrial genes differentially expressed in dairy cows at week 5 postpartum in response to WK1_PC1 microbiota principal component. Table S4. Endometrial genes diffentially expressed in dairy cows at week 5 postpartum in response to WK1_PC2 microbiota principal component. Table S5. Endometrial genes differentially expressed in dairy cows at week 5 postpartum in response to WK5_PC1 microbiota principal component. Table S6. Endometrial genes differentially expressed in dairy cows at week 5 postpartum in response to WK5_PC2 microbiota principal component. Table S7. Endometrial genes differentially expressed between weeks 5 to 9 postpartum in dairy cows not-cycling at week 5 and cycling at week 9 (day 13 of the estrous cycle). Table S8. Endometrial genes differ...

Pregnancy testing in cattle has evolved over time. The simplest and most definitive test for pregnancy is to wait until the cow gives birth to the calf. This approach is perhaps acceptable for extensive systems but for intensive systems waiting until calving to identify the pregnant or nonpregnant (open) cows takes too long. The desire for an earlier pregnancy diagnosis led to the routine use of rectal palpation of the uterine contents for the purpose of detecting the pregnancy. Although traditionally practiced from 40 to 60 days after insemination or later, pregnancy diagnosis by rectal palpation can be pushed to its limit of detection (30 to 35 days after insemination) to identify open cows sooner. Additional sensitivity can be achieved by using transrectal ultrasound for pregnancy detection. Transrectal ultrasound can be used as early as 25 days after insemination but is more typically applied after day 30 (Fricke, 2002). If performed later (60 to 80 days) then the sex of the cal...

Context Ketosis in grazing cattle has been sparsely studied. A large commercial grazing dairy in southern Chile, representative of a significant proportion of the systems in the country, was used in this case study. Aims The study had three objectives: (i) to establish a cut-off for β-hydroxybutyrate (BHB) concentration for subclinical ketosis (SCK), and use this to measure the proportion of cows with SCK at 7 days postpartum in spring- and autumn-calving cows; (ii) to describe the relationship of SCK and other periparturient diseases and fertility; and (iii) to compare milk yield of healthy cows and those affected by SCK in a dairy herd with autumn and spring parturitions under grazing conditions in southern Chile. Methods During 2016, 234 cows with autumn parturitions and 632 cows with spring parturitions (n = 866) were assessed for blood BHB at 7 days postpartum. A receiver operating characteristic analysis for a BHB cut-off value was completed. Models were developed for disease ...

An outbreak of clostridial abomasitis was diagnosed and described on a Missouri, USA, dairy farm with seasonal parturitions during the fall of 2016. The outbreak comprised 9 fatality cases and 11 clinical cases in calves 4–12 days old. The epidemic event began 10 days after the calving season started. Postmortem examination results reported clostridial abomasitis. Clinical cases were characterised by anorexia, depression, bloat, abdominal distension and yellow‐greenish haemorrhagic pre‐stomach contents. The outbreak was resolved in a period of 11 days and was handled by consistently reinforcing and monitoring standard operation procedures of the entire calf operation. Factors such as proper methods of milk replacer preparation and delivery, quality and temperature of water, osmolality, hygiene, tool disinfection and stress proved to be critical in controlling the outbreak in the calf operation.

Establishment of pregnancy in cattle is complex and encompasses ovulation, fertilization, blastocyst formation and growth into an elongated conceptus, pregnancy recognition signaling, and development of the embryo and placenta. The objective here was to investigate sire influences on pregnancy establishment in cattle. First, 10 Holstein bulls were classified as high or low fertility based on their sire conception rate (SCR) value. In a field trial, pregnancy at first timed insemination was not different between high and low SCR bulls. Next, 5 of the 10 sires were phenotyped using In Vitro and In Vivo embryo production. There was no effect of SCR classification on in vitro embryo cleavage rate, but low SCR sires produced fewer day 8 blastocysts. In superovulated heifers, high SCR bulls produced a lower percentage of unfertilized oocytes and fewer degenerated embryos compared to low SCR bulls. Recipient heifers the received 3-5 In Vivo produced embryos from either high or low SCR sire...

Abstract Text: An experiment was designed to test the hypothesis that pregnancy rates in beef heifers after fixed-time artificial insemination (FTAI) may be improved by delaying insemination of those heifers that have not expressed estrus prior to the standard FTAI time. Estrus was synchronized for 931 heifers across three locations using the 14-d CIDR-PG protocol (CIDR insert [1.38 gm progesterone] on d 0 with removal of CIDR on d 14; 25 mg PGF2α 16 d after CIDR removal on d 30; and 100 μg GnRH on d 33, 66 h after PGF2α). Estrous detection aids (Estrotect) were applied at PGF2α on d 30, and expression of estrus was recorded at GnRH on d 33. Treatments were balanced across locations, and heifers within each location were randomly assigned to one of two treatments based on reproductive tract score (RTS) and weight: (1) FTAI (concurrent with GnRH, 66 h after PGF2α) regardless of estrous expression prior or (2) FTAI for heifers having expressed estrus, and delayed AI (20 h after GnRH) ...

This paper defines some of the scientific terms used when discussing genetic conditions, and reviews the genetic implications and consequences of mating individuals with various genotypes. Many genetic defects are recessive, and the reason for this is that mutant alleles often render the resulting protein nonfunctional. These are called “loss of function” alleles. In many cases if an individual inherits a functional allele from one parent, there is no deleterious phenotype associated with inheriting the loss of function mutant allele from the other parent. As such, a heterozygous “Aa” (A symbolizes the dominant functional allele, a the recessive loss of function allele) animal, or carrier, appears normal. Because carriers appear normal, newly created recessive alleles can increase in frequency in a population more easily than dominant or additive alleles. There is an obvious connection between inbreeding and homozygosity. The main purpose of inbreeding is to make animals more uniform and homozygous for superior genes, however deleterious allelic variants also become homozygous at the same time, unless such variants are lethal in which case there is obvious natural selection against them. With inbreeding, widely used ancestors contribute alleles on both the male and female sides of an animal’s pedigree. It is for this reason that deleterious autosomal recessive alleles are often identified in the descendants of widely used sire lines. It is not because sire’s with excellent genetic merit carry more deleterious alleles, it is because such sires are more likely to be represented on both sides of a pedigree opening up the possibility that an animal will inherit a deleterious allele from both its sire and dam. With the advent of genomic sequencing technologies, our understanding of the prevalence of autosomal recessive conditions has advanced. Given that the average human carries approximately 2,000 deleterious autosomal recessive variants and a similar number is likely to be found in cattle, overtly avoiding the mating of any carrier animals is going to become increasingly unworkable as more deleterious autosomal recessive variants are identified. Management of recessive conditions has to be balanced with other important issues such as the management of trait merit, genetic diversity, other genetic defects, genome-wide inbreeding, logistical constraints and costs. It is likely that decision support software will be required to facilitate the management of this information. Such software will provide an approach to make judicious use of carrier bulls with superior genetic merit while reducing the risk of generating affected calves and strategically working to slowly eradicate the undesirable alleles from the population. While precluding all matings between carrier animals may not be possible, avoiding matings between animals that carry identical alleles is achievable. There is a need to optimize the matings that involve carrier animals in accordance with their genetic merit and actual genotype for undesirable alleles rather than prohibiting their use entirely, and this can best be accomplished using mate selection software.

Limited transfer of existing and emerging technologies to beef enterprises, especially to small-and medium-sized farms, precludes those enterprises from reaching their economic potential and places them at a competitive disadvantage relative to livestock enterprises where ...