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Developing Replacement Heifers

S

Sundancer

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 23, 2007
Messages
307
Location
SE Iowa
I am saving some heifers and I have little experience with developing them and getting them ready to breed. The heifers are already weighing about 700 pounds and are being fed corn silage and good quality hay free choice. I will pasture breed them by turning bulls in May 1. I would like to know how I should handle these heifers and what I need to do to them (vet wise). Thanks for the help.
 
You are probably over feeding them a bit. Corn silage will put on the pounds but they need to grow and mature. If they are going to grass to be bred they are better a little "Greener" as opposed to "soggy". Get them off the grain well before going to grass to let the rumen change to a forage based diet.

Check with your vet to see what vaccinations are used successfully in your area.
Good luck
 
No more than 10 lbs per head per day on the corn silage. When the Feburary cold snap is over back off on the corn silage and go all grass and clover hay. Free choice hay, mineral, good water and they will do fine.
 
I don't know if you are familiar with the Gudmunsen Sandhills Lab in Nebraska. It is a working ranch research facility that UNL runs. Recently they have concluded through 3 years of research that they couldn't prove any difference in conception rates between heifers developed to 60 or 65% of mature body weight and those developed, in some cases as low as 50% of mature body weight. In short, unless your mature cow size is well in excess of 1400 lbs you need to save yourself some money and get your calves off the high price feed. You could be roughing them through till spring gaining around a pound a day and you wouldn't be seeing any significant reduction in conception rate.

As near as I could discern they were looking at the 50-55% of mature body weight for a breeding weight. If you are not comfortable with them that light, then go a little heavier. However, as the other poster said, you have them on a much richer feed than they need. In fact you could be doing damage to their future milk production if you get them too fat. Cattle that are excessively fat will lay down fat deposits in their mammary glands and it will hurt their milk production.
 
We are doing something a little different this year. In the past we have always fed them a TMR with corn, added protein and hay. Lat year we did a trial run and it worked out great so we are going full speed ahead now. The heifers are in a 100 acre pasture that was not grazed last summer except by a few horses. We also put out free choice hay (millet straw we purchased from a neighbor) The only other thing they get is a liquid protein called Lumix. They will eat as much or little of it you want. We have them on a 3/4 to 1 lbs a day. They are growing nice and are cycling pretty well too. This cheapened up our feed by close to 1/2 the cost and plus we are training the heifers to scrounge around for feed as when they grow up they will never be fed hay, as they will always winter graze. The heifers we did the trial run with last year, currently way the same as the grain fed heifers, plus they had a better conception rate as well.
 
You beat me to the trial BRG. I had plans of doing that this year but I had so much cheatgrass in my hay that grinding is the only option. Beings I am feeding ground hay I have just fed the way I always have, but I hope to do bale feeders and loomix next year.

This year poor ground hay, 4# ddg and free choice mineral. Ration of 3% of bodyweight.
Titervac 5 PHM and 7way presponse at pre-weaning
Bangs vaccination and Ivomec
Titervac 5 HS and vibro-lepto6 pre breeding
 
Doug,

We still grind the millet hay. The only reason being, we have had some bad experiences with long stem hay in bale feeders with eye injuries. Since we already have a pile of it ground for the bull calves, we just feed that to them too.

BRG
 
In my experience to teach heifers to scrounge and prepare them for a career as a hardy, "efficient", reproductive momma cow, the more pressure you put on them, the better(within reason of course). The cream rises to the top quicker, making it easier to see which heifers will do it with less inputs, and which ones will not. If you want to advance your genetics in that direction, then increase the pressure and be VERY strict in culling those who do not grow out with good flesh, and most importantly, conceive in the 1st cycle.

It's all a matter of acheiving a goal really. Know what kind of momma cow you're trying to develop, then plan for your heifer's development accordingly, always keeping that goal as your focus. I'm not advocating you or anyone else go to a low-cost, low-input cowherd. Just giving an example to illustrate my point - have a goal, then you can plan.

We are a grass-based operation, in a very cold climate. We feed ZERO grain, other than as a treat to coax them home and such. Our yearling bulls, replacements and feeders are wintered on good hay and a vitamin/mineral mixture. They bale graze the hay, and have some old straw bales to pick through as well. It's worked well. Even with our cold snaps or windy blizzards, as long as their tummies are full, they pull through comfortably. Good luck.
 
PureCountry said:
In my experience to teach heifers to scrounge and prepare them for a career as a hardy, "efficient", reproductive momma cow, the more pressure you put on them, the better(within reason of course). The cream rises to the top quicker, making it easier to see which heifers will do it with less inputs, and which ones will not. If you want to advance your genetics in that direction, then increase the pressure and be VERY strict in culling those who do not grow out with good flesh, and most importantly, conceive in the 1st cycle.

It's all a matter of acheiving a goal really. Know what kind of momma cow you're trying to develop, then plan for your heifer's development accordingly, always keeping that goal as your focus. I'm not advocating you or anyone else go to a low-cost, low-input cowherd. Just giving an example to illustrate my point - have a goal, then you can plan.

We are a grass-based operation, in a very cold climate. We feed ZERO grain, other than as a treat to coax them home and such. Our yearling bulls, replacements and feeders are wintered on good hay and a vitamin/mineral mixture. They bale graze the hay, and have some old straw bales to pick through as well. It's worked well. Even with our cold snaps or windy blizzards, as long as their tummies are full, they pull through comfortably. Good luck.
Click to expand...

AMEN purecountry--my heifers get some supplement (stress tub) when I first wean them for about 3 weeks- then they go back on grass- and I winter them right with the old cows...I figure they are going to have to start living the real life sometime- so it might as well be now...

I think throwing them back in with the old cows- and getting involved right away in the pecking order- they socialize with those cows better- and stick with the old cows, rather than act like a bunch of crazy teenagers when turned out on grass.....I put about 50 head the middle of summer down on the community pasture with several other owners- both cows and heifers- and in the fall when I gather all I have to do is usually find My herd as they all stay right together without having to ride the whole pasture...Once and awhile there is an odd one or two that wander off- but usually they stick with their herdmates.....
 
And those one or two that like to beat to their own drum are just showing us which ones to cull - right? I love analyzing animal behavior like that. When we move cows from one paddock to another in calving(june-july) the cow that takes off for the bush instead of moving with the herd gets a flag in her file titled "knothead". When it comes to deciding between her calf and some other for a replacement, bad habits like that make me send her calf to the feeder pen.
 
Glove them and/or do a complete pelvic size exam and throw out the ones who have abnormally small reproductive tracts before you get a lot of money tied up in them.

You'll be glad you did when they start calving.
 

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