It’s a Girl! ‘Rita’ Gives Birth to First Calf to Kickstart ETAMU’s Registered Angus Herd
A new four-legged bundle of joy appeared at the East Texas A&M University Farm last week, as “Rita,” the university's recently purchased Angus cow, gave birth to a healthy calf.
Born on October 2, the newly dubbed “Rita 1889” signifies the genesis of East Texas A&M's registered Angus program as the first heifer calf. Gabriel Rita 0108, commonly called “Rita,” the calf's mother, was purchased from Gabriel Ranch by the university in Spring 2025 to serve as the basis of the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources' (CASNR) first-ever Angus embryo donor cow. Other cows on the university farm will serve as recipients, or surrogate mothers, to Rita’s offspring, utilizing embryo transfer.
“Rita 1889” was born at 85 pounds and sired by the bull Baldridge Heat Seaker H925. Both parents display several desirable qualities for Angus cows, such as expected progeny difference (EPD) values, which are predictions of the genetic transmitting ability of a parent to its offspring.
Rita is rated in the top one percentile for weaning weight (weight of a calf around six months old that has been separated from its mother) and yearling weight (weight of a bovine at one year). She also has tremendous carcass merit—the quality of meat an animal produces based on factors like weight, yield and leanness quality—with EPDs in the top 10% of the Angus breed for both marbling and ribeye area.
Heat Seaker also has outstanding EPDs and is in the top 3% of the Angus Breed for marbling and top 10% for carcass weight and ribeye area.
Dr. Bryan Rank, dean of CASNR, had high praise for the calf and what she represents for the future of Angus breeding at East Texas A&M.
“This calf is just the type of genetics that we want as we move toward dedicating part of our herd to Angus,” Rank said. “I am excited about the future of this segment of our herd and thankful to ranches like Gabriel Angus Ranch for working with us to expand our capability to provide experience in this segment of the beef industry to our students.”
Learn more about the university's registered Angus program in this May 2025 article. See more photos of “Rita” and her calf in our online photo gallery.
