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End of an Era

G

Grassfarmer

Well-known member
Joined
Aug 21, 2005
Messages
998
Location
Central Alberta, Canada
The end of an era on my place today as I shipped the last of my granny cows. I bought 4 older cows back in 2001 to form the nucleus of my new Luing herd. I selected on looks and was a little surprised when I discovered two were 14 and two 15 when I bought them! With no preferential treatment they went on to produce 23 natural calves between them plus another 6 by ET out of my favorite. Two were shipped open at 16 and 22 years old, the other two shipped when they turned in their first poor calf – at 21 and 23 respectively. Testament to the inherent longevity and fertility of the Luing breed.

Pictured below the one I shipped today. My old favorite at 23 years old rearing her last calf - took this picture on November 1st.

DSC03607.jpg
 
flyingS said:
What kind of production requirements did these cows meet? That's really something. I don't think I have seen a cow over 16 or 17 and she darn sure wasn't producing very well.
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We have had several Horned Herefords live past twenty and still produce.
We dont have any now but they were goodones.
 
Grassfarmer said:
The end of an era on my place today as I shipped the last of my granny cows. I bought 4 older cows back in 2001 to form the nucleus of my new Luing herd. I selected on looks and was a little surprised when I discovered two were 14 and two 15 when I bought them! With no preferential treatment they went on to produce 23 natural calves between them plus another 6 by ET out of my favorite. Two were shipped open at 16 and 22 years old, the other two shipped when they turned in their first poor calf – at 21 and 23 respectively. Testament to the inherent longevity and fertility of the Luing breed.

Pictured below the one I shipped today. My old favorite at 23 years old rearing her last calf - took this picture on November 1st.

DSC03607.jpg
Click to expand...

Looks like she was a very good cow and very productive. How long do you keep your bulls
 
flyingS said:
What kind of production requirements did these cows meet? That's really something. I don't think I have seen a cow over 16 or 17 and she darn sure wasn't producing very well.
Click to expand...
The two we shipped this fall turned in heifer calves last fall at -30lbs and +20lbs to my heifer average respectively. This year one came in at -20lbs and this one was probably -100lbs but I haven't weighed her. She was born late and something appears wrong with the cows udder (ie dispensing water versus milk :???:) as the calf never grew.

JayH said:
Looks like she was a very good cow and very productive. How long do you keep your bulls
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I expect my bulls to last until 7 or 8 at least but I have been shipping them at or before that as our gene pool is limited and we run out of places to use them.

PureCountry said:
Even at 23, she looks great GF. They really are something special those Luings.

What would be the oldest daughters out of those 4 original cows? How old is Bear now?
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The oldest daughter will be 8 in the spring - unfortunately there is quite a gap after that as they left me very few heifer calves. We do have 5 bred heifers off them this year largely due to the ET work. (The 8 year old was the yellow (or red) cow pictured in my guess the weight thread a while back)
I shipped the Bear bull this fall - he was 7, sound as anything but I'd used him all I could and have a (hopefully) better son to replace him with.
 
Sorry Big Swede I missed your post earlier. Am just running out the door but here is a bit of history on the breed.

http://www.luingcattle.com/aboutbreed.html

and a little Canadian perspective

http://www.luingcattle.com/history.html
 
hypocritexposer too said:
Faster horses said:
How could you ship her out? She owed you nothing.
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AND yours owed you something????


http://ranchers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=40939&start=0


:roll: :roll: :roll: :evil:
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What's your point besides being mean (dispersing a herd is very stressful especially if it is being done strictly for financial needs or health reasons). I know a lot of beef and dairy producers that have retired their best cow that was the foundation to their herd to be a pasture ornament and sucked it up. Just because you are a business person does not mean you should be callous. But judging by what GF said about her udder she needed to be culled alot earlier or been given the medical attention she needed. I would be interested to know just how many quarters his old gals actually have working.
 
Just so you know, our 17 year old cow we didn't sell. She can die
right here on the place. She's bred and she looks great, so it will
be a year or two. But that's OUR choice. We sell our culls just like
everyone else, but there are exceptions and here is one:

026.jpg


I'm sorry if I upset anyone with my comment. I just see too many cows go to town that shouldn't. I will say Grass Farmers cow was in good shape and not frail, sick or crippled.

And you should talk about attitude hypocritexposer 2. I must say
I much prefer hypocritexposer's attitude...you're pretty new here to spout off like you did. hypo2...
 
hypocritexposer too said:
hillsdown said:
hypocritexposer too said:
AND yours owed you something????


http://ranchers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=40939&start=0


:roll: :roll: :roll: :evil:
Click to expand...

What's your point besides being mean (dispersing a herd is very stressful especially if it is being done strictly for financial needs or health reasons). I know a lot of beef and dairy producers that have retired their best cow that was the foundation to their herd to be a pasture ornament and sucked it up. Just because you are a business person does not mean you should be callous. But judging by what GF said about her udder she needed to be culled alot earlier or been given the medical attention she needed. I would be interested to know just how many quarters his old gals actually have working.
Click to expand...
No problam with Grassfarmer its the attitude of Faster Horses that hit me wrong ,any good rancher worth his weight ,culls even good cattle that has done thier time.
Click to expand...
I would like to know whom this is first....its not hypo since he KNOWS how to spell problem and he KNOWS FH and what she meant.
Yes I would have a hard time selling those cows and would prob plead and cry to keep them ....yeap I am a sucker but GF did what he felt was best for his place and family.
Hypo2 ease up on FH, you talk about hitting people wrong ...well you have done a great job of that.
And if I am wrong and this is Hypo ...dude take a chill pill you KNOW what FH is going through right now so get a grip and go look at Christmas lights.
 
I said she was dispensing water jokingly :roll: She didn't have mastitis, was still working on all four quarters just that it didn't seem to do the calf as much good as usual. She had actually shown a little limp since it turned colder and I suspect it would develop into arthritis so I didn't want to keep a cow and let her suffer old age.
I'm not much into lawn ornaments anyway - if I was I bet BMR's coyotes would eat less :lol:

Speaking again of old cows have any of you southerners any experience of longhorns growing old? Seem to remember once reading about some of them getting over 30 and still calving.
The guy that bred my cow is a world renowned genetitist and he told me an interesting connection between the Longhorn and the Scottish Highland. These two big horned breeds have quite different horn genes to anything else Bos Taurus. They are actually closer to some of the big horned weird African breeds. They don't follow the normal predicted horned/polled breeding patterns that most breeds follow as they have a double recessive horned gene or something? Skips a generation and then comes back horned. Makes me wonder the origin way, way back of these 2 breeds and whether it's a coincidence that both have great longevity?
 
Grassfarmer,

Would that world renowned geneticist be Dr. Bob Church? I was introduced to Luings by him around 20 years ago. One thing he told me was that when you cross a Luing with a Fleckvieh Simmental you get a good rangable cow that stays in the herd. After looking at some of his Luing Simmy crosses I would agree with him. I was wondering if anyone has done any crossing of the Luings with Tarentaise to produce a smaller version of the Simmy cross.
 
VLS_GUY said:
Grassfarmer,

Would that world renowned geneticist be Dr. Bob Church? I was introduced to Luings by him around 20 years ago. One thing he told me was that when you cross a Luing with a Fleckvieh Simmental you get a good rangable cow that stays in the herd. After looking at some of his Luing Simmy crosses I would agree with him. I was wondering if anyone has done any crossing of the Luings with Tarentaise to produce a smaller version of the Simmy cross.
Click to expand...

Welcome to Ranchers VLS-GUY. Yep, It was Bob Church. The cow that they used more than a luing/simmy x was a 1/2 Luing, 1/4 Simmy, 1/4 horned hereford just because they had a lot of the simmy/hereford cows when the Luings first came in. Many of those cows made it past 20 years old and they were good cows - but big. The simmy x Luing is recognised as a very good cow in Scotland and is easily the most common cross used on Luings. The two breeds are very complimentary. We used to breed and sell "Sim-Luings" in Scotland.

I have never heard of anyone using Luings on Tarentaise but then again Tarentaise are pretty rare around here as far as I know. If you've got the Tarentaise i've got the bulls for them if you want to give it a try :wink: :lol:
 

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