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creep feed

We creep feed every calf from about 45 days right up until 205 days. We have done this for years, and never had a case of overeating. The secret is to find a creep feed with an Intake Modifier. Right now we are currentl feeding Purina's Impact Starter. (This is a complete ration), in addition to a chemical which limits intake it also contains a built in roughage. I don't know if it would cost the same in your area but it runs about 13.00 cwt here and I would expect calves to eat about 5 or 6 lbs until they are 4 months old then they will really crank up to around 15 lbs a day. This being said the group of spring calves we weaned last week off first calf heifers averaged 708 on a 6.5 frame. Note: none of those calves were just rollie pollie fat. We are very pleased with the results.
 
Angus Breeder said:
We creep feed every calf from about 45 days right up until 205 days. We have done this for years, and never had a case of overeating. The secret is to find a creep feed with an Intake Modifier. Right now we are currentl feeding Purina's Impact Starter. (This is a complete ration), in addition to a chemical which limits intake it also contains a built in roughage. I don't know if it would cost the same in your area but it runs about 13.00 cwt here and I would expect calves to eat about 5 or 6 lbs until they are 4 months old then they will really crank up to around 15 lbs a day. This being said the group of spring calves we weaned last week off first calf heifers averaged 708 on a 6.5 frame. Note: none of those calves were just rollie pollie fat. We are very pleased with the results.
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I dont creep feed I also think any seedstock guy who does is doing his customer's a great in justice kick the crutches out from under your cows see who really raises a calf.Were raiseing cattle not hogs.I would'nt feed over 10#s of grain to bull calves after weaning till yearling.If they can't gain on a modest Ration cut their nuts out then finish them as what they really are "STEERS"

Like most seedstock producers "FEEDS THE BREED" when those cattle hit the real world they start singing the old Patsy Cline song "I Fall To Pieces"

My calves won't have inflated weaning weights but they will be actual. milk and grass.
 
Not creep feeding , but also not doin his customers a favor. Friend of mine bought a bull a couple years ago. Beautiful big black brangus creature when they brought him home. About a week later she called me and asked me to come look at him, somethin was wrong. I went over and the bull I'd seen the week before was no where in sight, in it's place stood a sick lookin, snotty nosed, runny eyed, loosin weight bull. She'd paid somewhere in the neighbor hood of $2000 for him. I'd never seen anything go downhill so fast in all my life. She called the vet out immediately, started him on antibiotics.
Come to find out the breeder, who raises and sells bulls like this all the time, feeds his bulls "hot mash". I'm not real sure whats in it, but it's cooked feed, more like sloppin hogs if ya ask me. puts the weight on the animals really well, but in the cooking process it kills any and all organisms. So when these bulls are bought and put on pasture, they have no immune systems whatsoever. That in my book is a poor supplyer of stock. Her bull got ok, but had a terrible time there for a while and alot of $'s spent gettin him that way after all that they paid for him to start with.
 
In order to get a bull ready for a sale one needs to put some weight on him. I like mine to be in body condition between 7 and 8. I start about 3 months out by feeding them to a body condition 8 and then spend the last 3 to 4 weeks cooling them off and feeding mostly hay or grass with a little cottonseed. This gets them in good shape to sell and eases them on to a ration seminal to what they will get when turned out on cows.
I expect the bulls to lose weight over the breeding season so they need to be in good flesh and eating like a cow when turned out.
It is important to have the bulls in good shape in order to get a good price for them but they can't just fall apart when the buyer puts them in the pasture.
I also boost his vaccinations as well as give a shot for shipping fever and worming about a month before the sale.
 
Lilly, hot feed or cooked feed used to be very popular. It makes grain much more digestable. It doesn't kill microbes or the imune system of cattle.

What you saw with that bull was shipping fever. Basically pneumonia from stress of moving and feed change.

FH has many times refered to rumen upset, taking a bull from boiled feed to pasture with no adjustment is just begging for trouble.

Both parties on that one were at fault, but the bull seller was moreso. He should have either adjusted the bull before delivery or explained exactly how to care for the bull. Your friend should have found out how he was fed before she bought him.

The bull should have been introdued to pasture, or hay and his grain slowly tapered off over the course of a week.

One thing a big feed bucket does is blur the really good doing cattle from the dogs. Enough feed the top cattle don't just explode, they have limits as to the amount of gain, but the poorer ones will look pretty good with enough feed.

Bull buyers are responsible for this too. They all say they don't want a fat bull, but my granddad used to say fat is a pretty color. Try to sell a lean bull most think he is a poor doer. Every bull buyer I have ever met gravitates to the biggest fattest bull in the pen, no matter the age or average fat cover in that pen.
 
Jason said:
Lilly, hot feed or cooked feed used to be very popular. It makes grain much more digestable. It doesn't kill microbes or the imune system of cattle.

What you saw with that bull was shipping fever. Basically pneumonia from stress of moving and feed change.

FH has many times refered to rumen upset, taking a bull from boiled feed to pasture with no adjustment is just begging for trouble.

Both parties on that one were at fault, but the bull seller was moreso. He should have either adjusted the bull before delivery or explained exactly how to care for the bull. Your friend should have found out how he was fed before she bought him.

The bull should have been introdued to pasture, or hay and his grain slowly tapered off over the course of a week.

One thing a big feed bucket does is blur the really good doing cattle from the dogs. Enough feed the top cattle don't just explode, they have limits as to the amount of gain, but the poorer ones will look pretty good with enough feed.

Bull buyers are responsible for this too. They all say they don't want a fat bull, but my granddad used to say fat is a pretty color. Try to sell a lean bull most think he is a poor doer. Every bull buyer I have ever met gravitates to the biggest fattest bull in the pen, no matter the age or average fat cover in that pen.
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You said that right. If a bull ain't in good flesh he won't sell.
 
I don't understand how you can say we are doing our customers an injustice by creep feeding our calves! For starters you have no idea of how we are developing those calves from 205 days until 365 days. It seems startling that you would pass judgement based on one peice of information. (Do you make all your assumptions without knowing all of the FACTS) We sent, in round figures around 100 yearling bulls weighing around 1250 - 1400 into commercial programs last year alone. I have personally seen 80% of those bulls after they had covered cows for at least 30 days, and they looked great. In addition to that I never had a complaint on condition or feet/legs.(Not One) I might also add that these bulls are running on nothing but fescue in the breeding pasture. After reading the facts of what we are sending into the "real world" I hope you can see as to why I take offense to someone who is completly ignorant of our program passing judgement. One last thing, if we are going to make improvements to the beef business, then we need to evaluate yearling bulls by ultrasound to determine if we are still moving in the same direction we want to. There is only one wasy to clearly identify the full genetic potential of any given animal, and that is to manage that animal to acheive his/her maximum genetic potential. So you will excuse me if I feel the days of "X" number of cattle running on the open range to calve all year long or in an extremely long season and as long as they put a healthy looking calf on the ground are numbered.

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:
 
I creep feed in one pasture that I run the young cows on. It is not the best of pastures.
The other place I don't creep feed but it has wonderfull grass and clover most of the year. I think it is important to develope seed stock bulls by providing feed that will develope them to the max.
After weaning they all stay on some sort of feed till sold. I like to keep my bulls in good shape.
 
If you have an animal that ate nothing but cooked mash from the day he was weaned, you cannot convince me his immune system isn't at risk. Cookin does kill germs and microorgnisms, why else do you think you boil baby bottles??? We cook our food and it kills germs, so why would anyone think cookin feed for cattle would be any different? It may not kill everything, but it takes out a lot. The vet didnt say it was shipping fever. He said more to the affect, he's been exposed to pasture, that he's never seen before and he's picking up things that he has no immunity to. The bull also was so infected with liver flukes it was just awful, which shows the man didnt have a good vaccination program. I agree she should have found out before buying him, what his feed ration had been. (bad on her part) But producers out there selling that kinda crap need to be reported and put out of business if you ask me.
 
Lilly: it don't take but one or two bad bulls to put a seedstock guy back in the cowcalf business.
Always stand behind what you sell and consider what your product is used for.
 
the_jersey_lilly_2000 said:
If you have an animal that ate nothing but cooked mash from the day he was weaned, you cannot convince me his immune system isn't at risk. Cookin does kill germs and microorgnisms, why else do you think you boil baby bottles??? We cook our food and it kills germs, so why would anyone think cookin feed for cattle would be any different? It may not kill everything, but it takes out a lot. The vet didnt say it was shipping fever. He said more to the affect, he's been exposed to pasture, that he's never seen before and he's picking up things that he has no immunity to. The bull also was so infected with liver flukes it was just awful, which shows the man didnt have a good vaccination program. I agree she should have found out before buying him, what his feed ration had been. (bad on her part) But producers out there selling that kinda crap need to be reported and put out of business if you ask me.
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I know baby bottles are boiled to sterilize them, cattle feed is not boiled to sterilize it. The heat isn't high enough or long enough. It is boiled to release nutrients not digestable otherwise, and to soften the starch making the grain less likely to founder an animal, plus making the fines stick so no bloat occurs.

The fact the bull had liver flukes shows the feed was masking another problem the bull had. However, liver flukes are very common in parts of Texas, so the bull could have picked those up right after he was treated.

The vet might not have said it was shipping fever, but he responded to antibiotics, and he had a snotty nose, he had a respiratory infection.

I am merely pointing out the bull got sick from the feed change, not some wierd immuno deficiency. I agree the seller should change his habits, but maybe he has never had another problem. The best thing to do would be to contact the seller and tell him the problem. If it was a re-curring problem, he would be culled from selling bulls all on his own. If it was a blip, everyone has something happen when selling bulls.

Blanket statements don't usually cover as much as we think. Like creep feed, in some situations it works well. I know if I used it, the genetics I have in my calves would be better expressed. However I choose not to compare weaning weights against those who manage differently.
 
Jason: You hit on a good point about contacting the seller.
If I had sold this bull I would very much wanted to here from the buyer. The seller may not know he has a problem unless you tell him.
If someone buys one of my bulls and has trouble, I just hope that they call as soon as the find the trouble. That will give me a chance to visit them and get them another bull or correct the trouble with the one they bought. It will also give me the knowledge I need to change any practices I am using to raise young bulls. A good bull producer is always happy to here from his customers, good or bad. I often call my customers within a few days of the purchase to thank them if I don't get to see them after the sale. And I call them again two months later to see if they are happy with the bull. I have not had to replace one yet. I did have one customer clamed 3 months later that his vet said the bull was sterile. I had the bull retested at the University vet school and he was fine except that he had had his rump bred off him. This guy clamed that he had keep the bull up for 3 months on rye grass pasture feeding him corn every day and then had him tested before turning him out on cows. The poor bull looked like he had been on a large heard for 3 months working his butt off. Come to find out this bull buyer had tried to pull this before. I have not seen him since.
 
Jersey Lilly,

Stop trying to blame the seedstock breeders for shortfalls with the consumer. It's not the seedstock producers fault a customer was to ignorant to care for the purchased animal. Common sense tells us that a yearling bull cannot be turned out and expected to preform the same as a cow. I do not care what the breed or the management philosophy the bull was raised under. I feel that anyone turning a young bull out and not helping him along or taking the proper precautions should be the ones reported. There is no single more important animal in the herd that the bull. That being said why don't people take every effort to manage him to his fullest potential. A little foresight and common sense goes a long ways.
 
Angus Breeder said:
Jersey Lilly,

Stop trying to blame the seedstock breeders for shortfalls with the consumer. It's not the seedstock producers fault a customer was to ignorant to care for the purchased animal. Common sense tells us that a yearling bull cannot be turned out and expected to preform the same as a cow. I do not care what the breed or the management philosophy the bull was raised under. I feel that anyone turning a young bull out and not helping him along or taking the proper precautions should be the ones reported. There is no single more important animal in the herd that the bull. That being said why don't people take every effort to manage him to his fullest potential. A little foresight and common sense goes a long ways.
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A yearling bull needs to be cared for but if a rancher buys a two year old he should be able to turn him out for 3 to 4 months at a time in the breding season. A lot of people don't have any way to feed a bull while he is working. Thats one reason they pay more for two year olds.
 
Here is what we do. We buy yearlings from breeders who take the bulls OFF feed, the same way they put them on...SLOWLY...so as to change the rumen microbes to digest more fiber. We turn them out with the cows on native pasture or crested wheat for 45 days MAX. Get them in and put them in another pasture with free-choice hay. You saw the picture of the heifer bull I posted, that is just how he got treated. Looks like he did pretty well.

A fellow in W. Mt., Phil Wirth, who tests stud bulls on his herd, told us that the bulls that don't fall apart after the first breeding season will be the ones that leave a mark in your herd. We are breeding for easy-doing cows. I want to know that the bulls we buy, can do it on their own without a lot of extra feed. We have found some breeders who strive for that, and that is where we buy our bulls.

We cannot take an overfed really FAT bull in our country and turn him out with cows and expect him to hold together. We can't supplement him while he is out there either. We can care for him BEFORE he is turned out and AFTER he is done. He has to do it on his own in the meantime. Any bull that can't cut the mustard and looks poor after breeding goes down the road.
 
Well said FH. You are the custermer that the bull breader must bred for.
as a breder I strive to give youwhat you want and at the same time put a well fleshed bull in the sale ring. It thake time and planing.

BTW FH when are you going to post the pics of you and the crew? It looks like we may heve a fair crop of pecans this year.
 
I'm going through the archives to find a decent picture to put on here.

:wink:

I'll look foreward to some of those great pecans!
You can't imagine how much better the ones Mike sent
were over what we have available. Ours are like
dried pecans. :???:

We have found out that my husband MAY have Celiac disease, so he is on a no-wheat diet. It is interesting. But he can eat nuts and loves 'em. So we will appreciate good nuts more than ever.

(BTW, he is feeling better on this diet, so hopefully it will do the trick. Much better than taking a bunch of medicine.)
 

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