Beef Cattle Performance Testing

Performance testing offers beef cattle breeders a way of measuring differences among animals for traits that have economic significance. The economic traits are those that contribute to production efficiency, carcass desirability, rapid growth rate, efficient use of food, regularity of reproduction, and carcass quality desired by the packer and consumer. The differences measured in these traits are inherited differently. The systematic measurement of these differences, the recording of the measurements, and the use of the records in a selection program will increase the rate of genetic improvement in a herd