Page 3 - Kerrah Catalogue eBook

PROFIT-A-BULL EXCELLENCE

Dear

Well another interesting year has flown by, with farming being a bright light in a somewhat dim Covid
world despite the challenges in front of us. It is with great pleasure we present 80+ quality, sound, polled,
performance driven young Simmental Sires on Tuesday, 25th May.

We are delighted to be able to bring you the first line up of Neogen 100K tested polled Simmental bulls for
sale, guaranteeing parentage, stipulating bulls homozygous for the polled gene and bulls free from the dilution
gene.
Practically, what does this homozygous mean? A bull that is homozygous for the polled gene will sire 100%
polled calves whatever the cows horn status is. A heterozygous polled bull over horned cows will sire 50%
polled and 50 % horned calves and over heterozygous polled cows 25% horned 50% hetero polled and
25% homo polled or over pure Angus cows 100% polled. Scurs are an incomplete development of horns
that are detached from the scull and do not need dehorning. The scurred gene is a separate gene still under
investigation from the polled gene, but will only be displayed in a heterozygous polled animal so a scurred bull
will throw the same percentage polled animals as a hetero polled animal. Note - no bulls in the catalogue have
had any dehorning - scurs are as they are.

What does the Dilution gene mean, the dilution gene is a gene that when crossed with a black animal the
progeny come out grey/smoky/brown, coat colour whatever your preferred description is. In Simmental,
animals affected by the dilution gene are usually called blondes but a lot of the red Simmentals carry a copy in
their background so when crossed, give a mix of red/black/smoky grey calves. Here at Kerrah, we have been
trying to isolate the dilution gene so that bulls such as lots 20 and 21 will produce nearly all grey calves over
angus or Friesian/Hereford or dairy cows and are expressed as A in the catalogue. Bulls marked N are free of
the dilution gene and will only produce Black or red calves over black cows and will leave more red and white
marked straight bred calves. Bulls that are identified as C, carry a copy of the dilution gene so will leave the
range of colouring we are used to.

The Neogen test also gives us a tenderness score and Leptin test but we have not printed the results in the
catalogue. All bulls are BVD negative by DNA test. We have now been docility scoring for some years. In
the most recent sire search, 9 out of the top 10 sires by docility EBV, were Kerrah bred or used including
Food Truck, Fortress, Finetuned - all sires of sale bulls - and Kerrah Go To being used heavily in the stud at the
moment.
This year’s bulls have been selected from a drop of 240 bull calves and farmed in mobs of 40-50 bulls through
to 400 days and scanning. The first 13 lots are all bulls out of 2yr hfrs followed by bulls out of MA cows with
Lots 70-80 also 2yr heifers’ calves. All bulls put up for sale have passed a service and semen test by Farm Vets
Wairoa on the 13th April 2021 or subsequently prior to auction.

We trust a purchase of a Kerrah Bull is an investment in the future profitability of your herd and welcome
feedback to help us further in the future direction of the stud.
Regards Jon and the Knauf family

KERRAH SIMMENTALS BULL SALE 2021 1 1
KERRAH SIMMENTALS BULL SALE 2021