Researchers at West Texas A&M say they got consistently high-grading meat from calves that were the offspring of cloned cattle, says U.S. Farm Report. Seven of the calves were slaughtered as a test of the research project last month and one of the carcasses was graded Prime, a grade given to less than 5 percent of carcasses, three graded High Choice and three were Average Choice.
Cloning could be a dramatically quicker way than traditional breeding to improve carcass quality, said the researchers. In the West Texas experiment, researchers used a tissue cell from a high-grading carcass to clone a bull with similar traits. “From there, they had three heifers from the same DNA line,” which were bred by the cloned bull to produce the seven calves, says U.S. Farm Report.
In the longer run, the goal is to make it easier for cattle producers to breed stock with higher-value meat. “If the product does nothing more than shift a greater percentage of cattle towards the choice quality grade, it’s successful,” said Dean Hawkins of West Texas.