Guest blog post by Dan Brady
Find YOUR Passion…with your genetics!
We would like to thank Dan Brady of Ferme Blondin, for allowing us to share this post on our website!
This might be a bit of a longer post, but I’ve had a number of young breeders and old asking about their breeding goals and what “they should breed for”.
When I was younger, before heading to university my parents told me to always find a job that you truly love. When it is your passion it doesn’t feel like work and your going to do it for the rest of your life, so you might as well enjoy it!
We’ve all heard the Steve Jobs quote, “Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with there results of other peoples thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your inner voice. You’ve got to find what you love.”
He goes on to say “your work is going to fill a large part of your life and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”
My passion is type, pedigrees, showing and genomic type, these are no secret. I love researching and answering questions about bulls, heifers, genetics and pedigrees. But what I have noticed when speaking to young breeders and ones that have been doing it a long time, they ask what bulls should they be using and what should they be breeding for?
My response is always the same, what is your passion? What do you love? What are your breeding goals? What do you want to achieve with that mating?
Too many breeders think they need to change their breeding goals for the “industry”. For me you shouldn’t be changing your goals for the industry, you should be setting your goals for what you are passionate about and using the data and information available to help you achieve it.
Do you want to have a class winner at Madison or the Royal? Then set it as a goal and go for it! Do you want to breed for A2A2 milk from high producing cows, awesome, then make it so! Do you want to make the #1 DPR heifer in the world? Great, then go for it…and don’t look back or be discouraged because others might not choose the same direction as you. If that is where your passion is, you will find others with like goals. Do what you really enjoy, breeding and working with cattle is a lifetime of goals.
Just because right now “everyone” wants to breed for this trait or that index, doesn’t mean you need to! That’s not to say that you don’t keep up to date on what is happening in the industry or in genetics. Maybe there is a new trait that you could be adding to your breeding program or new research that shows an improvement in this trait or that. Stay up to date, but don’t change your entire breeding program for something that is not your passion.
Farming is a life time of work, so you might as well enjoy what your breeding for instead of just chasing the “It” thing of the moment.
Love what you do!