The Drysdale family’s Blairgowrie based Glenericht Charolais herd was recognised at the Stirling Bull Sales with the presentation of the Harman Charolais Genetic Improvement Award for the Scottish herd making the greatest genetic progress in the British Charolais Herdbook during the last 12 months.
Herd progress was measured by the highest improvement in the Self Replacing Index (SRI) for the calves born in 2013, and recorded over the 2013/2014 recording years.
During that period, the 26-cow Glenericht SRI increased by +11.8 to an average SRI +45.7.
“We are delighted to receive this award,” saidAllen Drysdale, who farms the herd with his parents Peter and Rita.
“I believe that if we breed quality females, then the bulls will follow.
“Consequently we select our sires very carefully to match specific females.
“First and foremost they have to come from strong female lines by using a mix of older and newer sires.
“Then we use EBVs as a backup tool, in particular for the estimated muscle area and growth rate traits. The combination of both criteria is enabling us to start to reap the benefits both in the show and sale ring.
“In fact we were one of only a couple of herds in Scotland to achieve a maximum five-star rating with Completeness of Performance, the new rating system which reflects how much data has been submitted by the herd to Breedplan.
“While the herd is relatively young, it has made a lot of progress in a short space of time, and we hope this will continue.”
Ben Harman commented: “The winners of this year’s awards have once again embraced the demand from our suckled calf producer customers for cattle that the Breedplan tool kit enables us to identify.
“They are breeding bulls which deliver progeny that are easier to calve, combined with unbeatable growth potential.
“Charolais cross steers, for example, are averaging £125 a head over all other breeds, according to recent analysis,” he added.