Every herd has its own set of breeding objectives, designed to drive improvement for their operation and meet their customers’ needs. To help meet breeding objectives, there are 34 genetic selection tools updated weekly for registered Angus animals, 25 individual expected progeny differences (EPDs) and nine dollar value indexes ($Values). When considering potential matings, using a planned mating tool that provides the average genetic values predicted for that mating and also projects inbreeding coefficients for the future offspring, can be helpful when planning for the next generation of your herd.  

Accessing the tool

In your AAA Login account, you can find the planned mating tool by following Reports > Interactive > Planned Mating Tool. 

This tool is designed to help determine the average EPD profile of future offspring from a particular mating. The resulting EPDs are the average values of the sire and dam listed for the mating. The projected values are not calculated through the weekly genetic evaluation like traditional EPDs and $Values and should not be published as such. It is also important to note that the actual EPDs for progeny from the mating are likely to vary from the average EPDs from the mating tool. 

Using planned mating

Any sires, such as artificial insemination (AI) sires or walking sires, can be added to the tool to mate with females in your herd. Up to 50 sires can be included per run of the tool and a maximum of 100 sires per day. 

Females from your herd, including any owned by memberships linked to your account, can be added to the planned mating tool. Up to 50 females can be included per run. 

There are several ways animals can be added to a run within the tool. Sires or dams can be added individually with their tag or registration numbers. Animal sets and pastures can also be used to add animals into the tool. Another option is to upload a file with registration numbers for sires and dams. 

In order for sires and dams to be used in the tool, they have to have a full suite of true EPDs. This means animals with interim EPDs or EPDs that are missing are not eligible to be included in the planned mating tool.

Calculating results

Once the animals are selected for matings, click “Calculate.” This will return each female mated to each sire, grouped by female. The results can also be exported to Excel® for more detailed sorting of results.

The resulting EPDs and $Values returned by the tool are averages based on the sire and dam’s values for each particular trait. Also included in the results is the projected inbreeding coefficient of each potential mating. This value provides a projected coefficient of inbreeding that can be used to manage inbreeding for the next generation of your herd. More resources can be found linked on the planned mating tool in AAA Login. 

The EPDs and $Values used by this tool for the sires and dams are those currently listed on EPD/Pedigree lookup, meaning the values update each Friday. If you have groups of animals you are planning mating decisions for in the upcoming breeding season, creating animal sets could be an efficient way to recalculate matings as needed.

While there are many factors to consider when planning matings in addition to EPDs and $Values, this tool can help simplify the process as you make the decisions to work towards your herd’s breeding objectives and ultimately serve the needs of your commercial customer.