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Calving in Harding County

Tap

Well-known member
Here are a few photos of our calving activities lately. I am envying Soapweed branding in this great weather, but our time will come.

The littlest cowboy rides the range. Sorta. :wink: Gathering up a few bred heifers.

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The cow in the distance was calving as I fed cake to the rest. Not too concerned.

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A new pair.

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A few pairs wondering what I am up to.

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The herd that is just starting to calve. I wish we had old grass in all our pastures like this one has. They are lucky cows. :) There is enough green coming up that they are not interested in cake any more.

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I wish this calf was a black baldy, but a live one is the first concern.

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I was lucky enough to stumble across this one just after he was born.

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Soapweed

Well-known member
Nice pictures, Tap. Your son is lucky growing up in the wide open spaces, with perfect opportunity to become a top hand. Your cattle and range conditions look to be in great shape. Keep the pictures coming. :wink:
 

Shortgrass

Well-known member
I like your pics too, Tap. Would enjoy a visit to your neck of the woods. I have gone NW of Rapid lots, and like it. I always figured NE was much like our country, just flat & dry. You've got lots of texture to the land. Lots of protection. Good well managed cattle.
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
Fat cows and sassy calves. We aren't starting here for a few weeks but hope my baldies look as good as yours. Looks like that little cowboy is in pretty good hands on that white pony.
 

Ranchy

Well-known member
Things are lookin' good in your country............. :D

Today, we are having snow to go with the huge amount of wind we've had lately........... :(
 

Tap

Well-known member
Shortgrass said:
I like your pics too, Tap. Would enjoy a visit to your neck of the woods. I have gone NW of Rapid lots, and like it. I always figured NE was much like our country, just flat & dry. You've got lots of texture to the land. Lots of protection. Good well managed cattle.

Did you mean that SD is like your area Shortgrass? This area is flat, to rolly, to rough areas, but is is dry a lot of the time. 13 in. rainfall is our average. That means 5-20 in. range sometimes.

We bought all the baldy cows NR. And a lot of the black ones in that herd too. Just a few of them are homeraised cows, but I do like most of the cows we purchased.
 

Shortgrass

Well-known member
I meant it is different than I thought it would be. Your pictures show it different. Rougher, deeper draws, gullies. Rain is about the same I suppose. We are pretty flat here. I describe it as about 100 yards between sage or soapweeds. All there is between sage or soapweeds is 100 yards.
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
Well I'd give you a cow order I think-did you run some Hereford bulls on your baldy cows. we've just got a few A"I calves off the kids 4H cattle so far but Ty's got some nice baldy heifers on the ground. Whereabouts are you located exactly you never know when a guy might stop by lol.
 

Cal

Well-known member
Real good pictures! Just for the sake of discussion, the cow in the second picture probably has one ruined back quarter anyway....keep or cull?
 

Jinglebob

Well-known member
Cal said:
Real good pictures! Just for the sake of discussion, the cow in the second picture probably has one ruined back quarter anyway....keep or cull?

My 2 cents worth.

I doubt she has a ruined quarter. I've got cows with bigger quarters than that, until the calf gets big enough to take all the milk. They don't have ruined quarters.

And even if she did and she raised a respectable calf, I wouldn't sell her. As long as she is no problem and raises good calves, I see no reason to cull one.
 

tlakota

Well-known member
i totally agree...ive got a few cows like that but much worse...and thought about culling them a couple years ago...they were broken mouth back then and i still have them....as long as they breed and raise good calves theres no reason to cull them....and my guess in about a month or so that calf will have it all sucked down.
 

tlakota

Well-known member
i totally agree...ive got a few cows like that but much worse...and thought about culling them a couple years ago...they were broken mouth back then and i still have them....as long as they breed and raise good calves theres no reason to cull them....and my guess in about a month or so that calf will have it all sucked down.
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
On our place as long as the calf gets sucking on his own they get to stay. I have a bunch of semen off a bigger BW South Devon bull we breed those kind of cows to and just feed out all the calves. A calf born on the grass in 70 defree weather has usually got a lot more try when it comes to getting going on his own.
 

Cal

Well-known member
Something that we've discovered from years of calving out during cold weather, and running more cows than I care to think about through to milk and get some extra colostrum ahead, is that it's pretty surprising how many misshapen bags actually do have at least one quarter with little to nothing in it...(hell, some good looking bags will even surprise you with a dissapointingly small amount). Later on that quarter won't appear as large as when the cow calved, but doubtful it's really producing. The bad thing about one bad back quarter is if the other one goes, especially on older cows, all that's left is the front teats....and they won't usually wean much of a calf. Everyone has something that's pretty high on their list of dislikes, and I geuss a bad udder on a cow is pretty high on mine. One look at our little pasture full of this years culls we've been throwing in during calving will varify. :wink:
 

Tap

Well-known member
That is a tough question to answer Cal. We get rid of a few cows each year with bad bags, but not all of them that have a bad quarter. If we have to help a cow out, she gets a tag and goes down the road. If I see a cow that I think the calf might not be able to nurse on the next year, we try to get rid of them too. We kind of go by what kind of calf they raise too.

Last year I grafted a calf on a cow that looked to have a good bag, but 2 quarters were shot. You never know for sure. I think it is good to get rid of anything like that because the heifer calf she raises may have the same problems.
 
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