Reducing enteric methane emissions from beef cattle is an important step toward making livestock production more sustainable. One potential strategy is to select animals that naturally produce less methane. However, methane emissions are often linked to other traits, such as how much animals eat or how fast they grow—traits that are already part of many national breeding programs. In the present study, 1,700 growing crossbred beef cattle in a commercial feedlot were monitored for individual methane and carbon dioxide emissions using Greenfeed systems. Performance data of feed intake, feeding behavior, liveweight, live animal ultrasound scans, and slaughter information were also available. The results revealed that daily methane production is under genetic control, with the extent of genetic variability relative to that observed in the field being similar to traits like feed efficiency that have been successfully improved through selective breeding. However, most of the genetic variation in methane emissions was related to feed intake, growth, and body size. Approximately half of the exploitable genetic variation in methane was independent of these traits. This implies that consideration needs to be given to its correlation with other traits when attempting to quantify the cost-benefit of genetically selecting on methane emissions.

Read the full article in the Journal of Animal Science.