Sand Mountain Elite Heifer Development Program II: Heifer Performance

An abstract of a study by Kriese-Anderson et al discussing the Sand Mountain Elite Heifer Development program II is presented. Even with the poor ADG performance of groups 1 and 2 during the first 28 days, WDA of heifers in groups 1 and 2 were very close to their final ADG. This indicates they were on a fairly steady or even growth pattern from birth. Heifers in group 3 had a significantly lower (P < 0.05) WDA than the other 2 heifer groups until they had been in the development program for 90 days. Perhaps some of the continued differences in growth were due to compensatory gain. However, no significant differences existed between groups for final weight.