All Purpose Index (API) & Terminal Index (TI)

Economic indexes are easily the most efficient and effective tools to select for future profitability. They are the ONLY genetic selection method that allows you to factor in the COST of selecting for traits, as well as the benefits.

For example, what’s another 25 pounds of weaning weight worth? Well, that’s pretty easy as there’s plenty of market information to determine the benefit of added pay weight. But, that 25 pounds of weaning weight isn’t free! It’s more than likely going to require more feed intake or milk production, but maybe it’s also related to more birth weight and potential calving problems. Or, maybe it’s related to more mature cow size with higher maintenance costs because she still needs groceries year-round, whether she’s raising a calf or not. In a nutshell, that’s what indexes do - they take all the economically-relevant traits and calculate their value based on all the costs and benefits associated with those traits.

So, which indexes should you use? Luckily, that answer is pretty simple. If you’re keeping replacement females, the All-Purpose Index (API) is the best choice. However, if you market 100% of your calf crop every year, the Terminal Index (TI) puts absolutely no weight on any maternal traits and it will allow you to maximize the market value of your calf crop.

Lastly, it’s important to have a reference for how these indexes are tabulated. Indexes are displayed in dollars per cow exposed.

So, if a bull breeds 30 cows per year for an average of 4 years, that’s 120 total cows exposed.

If Bull A is a $100 API and Bull B is a $150 API, over their lifetime, Bull B will generate $6,000 (120 cows exposed x $50 difference in API) more NET PROFIT than Bull A!

API Breed Average $130.48

TI Breed Average $78.10