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Hey Mike..."Angus" ain't to swift!!!!

TimH

Well-known member
Mike,
My new bull isn't real smart. I've got him in a pen with another Char bull.Just the two of them. "Angus" weighs about 1400 lbs. give or take. The other one weighs 2500, give or take.
Angus usually has his head in the feeder, but whenever he doesn't, he is torturing the other bull. The old fella will put up with it for a while and, when he has had enough, he will send young "Angus" flying with a little toss of his head. :lol:
I can see the pen from my kitchen window. Pretty good entertainment during my afternoon "beverage" break.
I wish I could post a video!!!! :D
 

Mike

Well-known member
All the bulls I sell are accompanied with a passing grade in an "I.Q." test.

Just wait until you turn them in with cows in the same pasture. Seen a lot of broken legs that happen while one is mounted.

Seriously, never turn an older bull in the pasture with several young ones. I did it one time and they ganged up on him and had him down with his tongue hanging out. It was a nightmare getting him out.
 

Shelly

Well-known member
I think it's an Angus thing. Ours did the same when he was about two and penned up with the mature hereford we have. Only these two had been together for awhile when I got the priviledge of watching the same thing play out here. The angus would go into the shed and wait till the hereford dozed off standing up, then come barreling out and butt the hereford in the side, then bounce back to the shed all impressed with himself. Then he'd wait till that old bull dozed off again and come barreling out again, butt the hereford and away he'd go back to the shed. I sat and watched this happen four times in a row. Hereford finally had enough, pretended to doze off again, waiting for that annoying little angus. Sure enough, out he comes again. Hereford cracks open one eye, waits till the last possible moment, spins and nails the angus. Just levels him! Angus got up, slunk back to the shed and sulked. His fun and games were over for the day. The Boss said so.
 

DOC HARRIS

Well-known member
There are times when it is fascinating to observe the reactions and responses of 'testosterone' influenced males - both animals and humans. We watch with interest and sometimes are amazed at the innate intelligence which they display. BUT - if you will give some thought to the situation in an unbiased manner, and realize that you have a considerable amount of time, hope, dreams and - MONEY invested in your herd bull(s), and that in a split moment a great deal of your future can go tumbling down the tubes with an injured bull - perhaps a little time devoted to management of herd bulls and how and when they should or should not be penned together would be advisable.

We observe our younger generation of human males come into sexual maturity and wonder what has happened to our society and self-discipline! I could go into a lo-o-o-ng monologue on that subject - touching on Dr. Benjamin Spock and the DISASTROUS AND DESTRUCTIVE consequences that he and his subversive book(s) on 'how to raise your sweet little children' and how you must not thwart their little egos and how you must let them 'do their little things' without hurting their little 'self esteems'! - - - - But I won't do that! I won't rant and rave about how the entire morals and attitudes of the entire WORLD have been influenced by that Son of - - - -NO - NO I won't get off the subject of Bulls! I promised Ruthie I would not get started!

Suffice it to say - - regarding Bull Management - - discipline and management is just as important with bulls as it is with children, and for the same reasons - to properly direct them into doing the correct procedures that they are meant to do, not necessarily everything that they WANT to do. Just as with children - bulls must not be allowed to function with "unrestrained self-expression". Sometimes human's do the discipline - sometimes Bulls do it!

It should go without repeating that bulls need sufficient nutrition, minerals, roughage, water and exercise in order to maintain their optimum breeding condition, but a confrontation with another - or more than another bull - can wipe out your plans in a heartbeat! Sometimes placing bulls in large groups or in groups of different ages can cause problems, but once they establish their pecking order they will probably get along okay. If they are put together in a large pasture or trap it can preclude their fighting. Dr. Blezinger says that when two or more bulls are used in the same pasture at the same time, social interactions can affect breeding performance. Social rank is related to age and seniority in the herd. I feel that we must do everything possible to keep peace among the Breeders - both male and female - for their sakes and our's also.

Perhaps with a change of attitude, the actions of the entire world may be altered!

DOC HARRIS
 

TimH

Well-known member
Mike said:
All the bulls I sell are accompanied with a passing grade in an "I.Q." test.

Just wait until you turn them in with cows in the same pasture. Seen a lot of broken legs that happen while one is mounted.

Seriously, never turn an older bull in the pasture with several young ones. I did it one time and they ganged up on him and had him down with his tongue hanging out. It was a nightmare getting him out.

Our bulls each go out with beteween 25 and 35 cows. Never more than 1 bull in each pasture.
I realize that this doesn't work for most larger operations, but most of our pastures are only a 1/4 section or less and can only support that number of pairs.
The older bull is such a gentle soul. He seems to know that "Angus Young" is little more than a calf and is no meaner than he needs to be with him.
Maybe I'll take some pics and post them tomorrow. :)
 

Manitoba_Rancher

Well-known member
We ve got 20 bulls in one pen ranging in age from yearling to 11 years old. They have there pecking order set out and its a 3 year old limo that is the boss. After a few broken planks they settled down pretty good!! Course I left three cows in the pen to keep them inline.... :wink:
 

Manitoba_Rancher

Well-known member
Yeah I bet there will be...I ve got a couple of yearlings coming in a truck this afternoon from Alberta ... hope to get them settled in today. Its raining pretty good here this morning!!! After two nights of hard frosts the grass and alfalfa looks kinda sick.
 

katrina

Well-known member
We always run a yearling or two with our older bulls.. It keeps them honest. But we do put certian dispositions together.. We have seen people put only one bull in and have a slew of open cows... We had one that just layed aroung the pasture never did that we know of breed a cow and he was fine...Guess he was gay..... We are useually get our cows bred in the first cycle and are all but done calving in three weeks... Cow conditioning and a good mineral is a must......
 

Shelly

Well-known member
Big Muddy rancher said:
Shelly you missed a couple of days. Angus is the name of Tims new char bull. :?

We run 14 or 15 bulls in one pasture. We breed in about 6 quarters.


I realized my mistake last night a few hours after posting. I remember reading that he named his Char bull Angus.

We usually run one bull per pasture with about 30 cows. This year, though, we seem to have a couple of extra bulls here so we put the baby bull with the old bull in one pasture, and we have two bulls here with the cows we haven't got moved. They're looked at a couple of times a day to make sure both are okay because they tend to fight over the cows, but when these last cows go to pasture, only one bull will be going with them and the other will be sold.
 

IL Rancher

Well-known member
We had one of those bulls who never got anything bred. Didn't even had a clue that it was going on. Actually took him in to get collected as insurance incase he got hurt before we found out what was wrong and he would jump on anything and everything that tehy put infront of him but as soon as people got near him he stopped. Turend out he didn't like being watched and his pasture was right by a main road. The cars took him off his game or something, I don't know. Pain in the butt and a wasted breeding year since he was the only bull in that group. Now we run multiple bulls just in case. Or at the very least rotate them.
 

Hanta Yo

Well-known member
Here's our happy happy :heart: bulls in this pasture, it's about 120 acres, they range from 4 yrs old to 2. It's funny, they pretty much hang together, once in awhile I will see a bull fight, will get a couple of them literally lift the bull they are fighting with way off the ground! They get over it. I just hate having to bring them up in the corrals, because they get into each other's face and start fighting, NOT GOOD for the corrals :? :? :!:

bullsinpasture.jpg
 

Kato

Well-known member
For the first part of the breeding season we put 5 Limo bulls in with 150 cows, and two Charolais bulls in with the 50 replacement quality cows. These are all two years old and up, not yearlings. They go in one at a time, with the biggest most aggressive bull going first, then every day another one is added. When a new bull comes in, the others have the 'edge' off, and fights are minimal. After we figure the replacement heifers are bred, the heifer bull goes out to help out the big boys.

Our bulls like to do their fighting in the winter, so they can take out a few corrals in the process. :shock: :wink: It's more fun, I guess. :?

They are in a 20 acre pasture, so the cows aren't spread out far, and they are still being fed hay, so the bulls don't have to travel to keep up with the cows.

After about six or seven weeks, it's time to go to the summer pastures. They get split up into groups then, according to how big the pastures are. It seems to work pretty well.
 

Faster horses

Well-known member
We put bulls out according to age and I can't remember the last time we have had a bull injured.

The younger bulls go with the 2's and 3's; the older bulls with the cows.
Makes it simple and it works!!! Kind of the way we do things around here.

Mr. FH says, "drink a lot of water and walk slow." :wink: :lol2: :lol2: :lol2:
 

Denny

Well-known member
I will have 5 pastures this summer

1. 75 cows 1 7 year old bull

2.34 cows AI 30 hd. 1 2 year old bull

3.30 pairs 1 yearling bull

4.30 heifers AI all 1 cleanup bull 2 year old

5 10 to 15 fall calvers and a few light yearlings no bull.

Last year I ran my old bull with 75 cows 59 calved in the first 45 days 2 opens and as of now there are 4 left to calve of which 3 of those calved in june last year.

I have ran 1 yearling on 40 lots of times it has worked out fine.I do have a handful of late calvers every year and it's not always the same cows.A late live calf is worth money in the spring.I took some 500# weaned steers to Aberdeen SD 2 weeks ago they brought $1.30 per lb so those late calves made money.
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
I sometimes will turn a new bull out a week or so early with the whole herd just to see what he's made of-we usually do our A'I' deal then just turn out all the bulls with all the cows-hard to intensively graze with a bunch of little bull groups. Our bulls winter out with the cows-we'll pregtest and cull then. You get a pretty good idea of a bulls fleshing ability when he's running out licking snow-if he falls to pieces his daughters will too. Our bulls are looking lean and mean but they'll be shiny puppies when they go back out in late August.
 
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