Roan Calves

upnortheast

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Northumberland
Breeding roan is not an exact science, as mentioned above a lottery . Common in Shorthorn types, any combintion of red , white & roan is possible.
An old friend in Cumbria was a master at breeding roan cattle.
While there are folk out there who will bid up for a "bonny roan " IMO the conformation of the animal is far more important than colour
 
The genetics behind breeding roans is quite simple. One copy of the white gene is roan, two copies is white, no copies is the base color. Easiest way is to use a white bull either Shorthorn or Belgium blue, both will leave 100% roan calves, the shorthorn red roans and the BB Black roans, a roan Bull will leave 50% roan calves. The expression of roan is variable and some roan animals will look red, with very little roaning, I worked on a farm who had a "red" bull but he was out of a white cow and through white calves from roan cows so must have been roan, on closer inspection he had a small amount of roaning under his tail and low down on his flank.
 

Bald n Grumpy

Member
Livestock Farmer
Only know about dairy Shorthorn but wouldn't guarantee using a white bull would work.
Someone asked what colour bull he should be using on Holsteins to produce blue roans. He was using a white bull and getting black , red and white calves but no roans
 

Bald n Grumpy

Member
Livestock Farmer
The genetics behind breeding roans is quite simple. One copy of the white gene is roan, two copies is white, no copies is the base color. Easiest way is to use a white bull either Shorthorn or Belgium blue, both will leave 100% roan calves, the shorthorn red roans and the BB Black roans, a roan Bull will leave 50% roan calves. The expression of roan is variable and some roan animals will look red, with very little roaning, I worked on a farm who had a "red" bull but he was out of a white cow and through white calves from roan cows so must have been roan, on closer inspection he had a small amount of roaning under his tail and low down on his flank.
o_O
 
1615830312098.png
 
Roan Simmental heifer calfs out of whitbred x cows make extremely good money round here!! 7 month old heifer calfs making nearly 1K or £4.00 a kg.

The whitebred shorthorn is definitely the bull for the roan calfs(y)
 

choochter

Member
Location
aberdeenshire
Roan Simmental heifer calfs out of whitbred x cows make extremely good money round here!! 7 month old heifer calfs making nearly 1K or £4.00 a kg.

The whitebred shorthorn is definitely the bull for the roan calfs(y)
In my experience, a WS bull used on continental cows will produce calves with a high degree of variability in the quality of their conformation.
For example...
WS_crosses_2015.jpg
 
Last edited:

JSmith

Member
Livestock Farmer
Try a Guernsey cross Lim and you might get a Brindle.
My old Father always said you never get a bad Brindle!!!
Had some longhorn cows with lim heifer calved on, kept heifers an put shorthorn bull on, they through big dark brindle calves with white stripe down their back, turned out good big cows
 

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