• If you are having problems logging in please use the Contact Us in the lower right hand corner of the forum page for assistance.

Hereford Xblack

Help Support Ranchers.net:

R

redheeler

Member
Joined
Dec 23, 2009
Messages
21
Reaction score
4
Got a question for you commercial guys with mostly angus based cows, has there been any move generally anybody has heard of back toward Hereford bulls? I have been thinking of doing this rather than continuing with pure black in order to get some hybrid vigor in the calves and get some black baldy replacement calves but in my area people literally ran from Herefords about 40 years ago and it is practically taboo in my area anymore to think about anything exept all black in this area, I know their were some big disappointments in the Hereford breed back then and I am old enough to remember when all the cow herds around here were red whiteface. Has anybody here had some good luck with this cross or breed in more recent times? :roll:
 
You should move this post into Ranch talk from Bull session. This is where we fight. :D well Political bull as well. :lol: :lol:

Lots of people use Hereford bulls on black cows and the other way around.
A couple of breeders post on this site that raise some good Hereford bulls.
 
Done with the same care you'd use to pick a black bull, they are pretty good cattle.
 
The area where i live was, and still is, based on angus/hereford cross cattle. They are good mothers, will travel chasing grass and will trail a ways for water. Folks have tried changing things up over the years. I have watched neighbors run everything from saler to chianina. But what works here is a angus/hereford cow bred back to mostly angus bulls. Some red angus as well. We have only run them for 135 years though, so it may just be a fad. :D :wink:
 
I see more Herf bulls running with black cows now then I have in quite a number of years. Blackbaldys are hard to beat.
 
"That first cross is dynamite", as an older Hereford breeder told me, "it's downhill from there. I know, because I tried keeping the heifers and breeding them." He did that for more than one generation which caused the comment.

Some of our customers that bought black Angus cows bred them in 2012 to all Hereford bulls. This fall (2013) their steer calves weighed 640#. March calvers, and a lot of young cows in the herd. No problems calving them and no problems selling them. That cross is hard to beat. They didn't keep any for replacements as they know the same "older Hereford breeder" as I mentioned. :D

Good luck. If we were crossbreeding, we'd use Hereford bulls on Black Angus cows. FWIW (Yet, some of my favorite cattle are red, so I have to say we'd also use Hereford bulls on Red Angus cows.)

Welcome to ranchers, redheeler!
 
The first cross is great but if the objective is not to keep replacements or sell them as replacements or breds then why not use a simmy bull or a char bull if it is just gonna be a terminal cross anyway.

The baldy female is the best part of the cross, you can breed her so many different ways. We have used about half Hereford bulls for a few years now and have quite a few baldies, great cows. Only bad thing is you have to get away from them for awhile to get the cows blackened up again in order to use Hereford bulls again.
 
badroute said:
The first cross is great but if the objective is not to keep replacements or sell them as replacements or breds then why not use a simmy bull or a char bull if it is just gonna be a terminal cross anyway.

The baldy female is the best part of the cross, you can breed her so many different ways. We have used about half Hereford bulls for a few years now and have quite a few baldies, great cows. Only bad thing is you have to get away from them for awhile to get the cows blackened up again in order to use Hereford bulls again.
Click to expand...

For replacements use a black Galloway. Get the hybrid vigor, with a true outcross. The females make very efficient hardy momma cows. No Angus influence in Galloway.
 
badroute said:
The first cross is great but if the objective is not to keep replacements or sell them as replacements or breds then why not use a simmy bull or a char bull if it is just gonna be a terminal cross anyway.

The baldy female is the best part of the cross, you can breed her so many different ways. We have used about half Hereford bulls for a few years now and have quite a few baldies, great cows. Only bad thing is you have to get away from them for awhile to get the cows blackened up again in order to use Hereford bulls again.
Click to expand...


:nod:
 
I bought some Herefords a couple years ago to run with my mostly Angus cows mainly to get replacements, and the steers sired by the Herefords are always in the big sort of the calves. All my other bulls are SimAngus and the Hereford sired calves have rivaled or out weighed them and are much more feed efficient. From my experience with buying a few Herefords you are gonna have to pay up to get a Hereford that will give you what you want. Especially true if you are going to save alot of replacements because the effects the Herefords will either reward you or haunt you for along time.
 
Faster horses said:
"That first cross is dynamite", as an older Hereford breeder told me, "it's downhill from there. I know, because I tried keeping the heifers and breeding them." He did that for more than one generation which caused the comment.

Some of our customers that bought black Angus cows bred them in 2012 to all Hereford bulls. This fall (2013) their steer calves weighed 640#. March calvers, and a lot of young cows in the herd. No problems calving them and no problems selling them. That cross is hard to beat. They didn't keep any for replacements as they know the same "older Hereford breeder" as I mentioned. :D

Good luck. If we were crossbreeding, we'd use Hereford bulls on Black Angus cows. FWIW (Yet, some of my favorite cattle are red, so I have to say we'd also use Hereford bulls on Red Angus cows.) As a long time hereford breeder it's up to me to say " we cater to both the red and black commercial people as that 's where our business comes from" . The easy'iest way to add profit there is. As for the statement that they are all a terminal cross is wrong, wrong, wrong. We have a excellent business selling genuine F1 heifers for a good premium every year. Especially the red baldies. Them baldy cows will outlast and out produce most any other's in a range operation. One question. How do you explain the popularity of most all the continentals and so many of the blacks in the 60's & 70's?? 90% were crossbred on the old hereford cow and the bull breed got the credit!!

Welcome to ranchers, redheeler!
Click to expand...
 
In our part of the world you can't beat a black or red baldy F1 mother cow. The Angus cleans up most of the eye, bag and prolapse problems while the Hereford gives a little more hair. If you want to sell pounds throw a Simmy X, Balancer or Charolais bull on them. You can't top them for working cows. Anyhow that's my 2 cents for what it's worth.
 
I am not a Hereford enthusist but in respect for those that are
A third generation Hereford breeder told me the calving ease issue is due to longer gestutation in the breed. For those supporters of Red Sim
I am sure that issue will be skirted around ( Red Sims sure can have a shot if Red Angus in them)
Once one finds a good Red Sim better get one they are few and far between
More quality Herefords around but one has to put the wheels on a truck to find one
Just remember to get that BWF expect little sleep and have help at calving
 
Small scale here, but when I bought my starter herd in '10, they were suppose to be all Angus cows from two different places, bred to two different Angus bulls and a black Simmental.

I then bought a 2 year old L1 registered horned Hereford bull out of the picked over pen for $1500. All his calves have been tiny and out weigh the calves out of those other bulls by a LONG ways at selling time. The first steer sold out of him paid 2/3 of him off.

I bred that Hereford bull back to 3 of his baldy daughters and wasn't totally disappointed with the calves. 2 steers and a heifer. I have the heifer out there now and 1 of the steers as future freezer beef. I'll have horned Herefords on black baldies in the future I bet experimenting without much worry now.

I have a Brangus bull on everything now because I think I'll like the heifers out of him and the baldy heifers. Fun to play around.

(Oh and I feel I picked a bad Hereford bull and can't wait to try a good one!)
 
Happy super bowl sunday! Thanks for all the input. When I was around 10 or so my grandfather had a herd of straight Hereford then got in on the Limousine thing about 1972 or so, One cannot blame them at the time for wanting weaning weights up and eliminating some Hereford specific problems given what a lot of Hereford cows were like at the time. We had the limmies the whole time I was growing up but about the late eighties early ninetys the birth weights on them just kept climbing up till a 90-100+ weight was getting to be the norm so we switched to Angus and had better luck with that. At this point the angus has seemed to run its course with us in several aspects such as no improvement in weaning weights and for sure temperament. over time some of the best cows I have seen or we have bought have invariably been black or red baldies, that Hereford x angus cross over the long run has always been a solid proposition as far as I can tell so I am thinking about getting back to Hereford on the bull end of things after several decades absence :)
 
David Pump at Two Dot still runs commercial Herefords, and he is close to you.

Nothing wrong with keeping the F1's and breeding them. In my opinion, the thought of not using the F1's because they go downhill from there, is nothing more than old time purebreeder mentality.

There are some useful Herefords around the state; you might have to travel a bit to get to them. When you cross, you don't need to spend a tremendous amount of $ to get the top-shelf bulls, either.

I live Bozeman on weekends, so I'm not blowing smoke from a distance.

Badlands
 
I went to Topp's sale yesterday they had a barn burner of a sale $260,000.00 lot 5 topped it.Bet they averaged over $12,000 on 120 bulls give or take.
 
Marc does research on crossbred vigor in f1 and subsequent generations. They find post f1 generations retain crossbred vigor. Peruse the Marc site at your own peril - I can sure lose several hours there.

My own thinking would be to cross angus with something more distant than Herefords, but everybody rides a different horse.
 

Latest posts

Top