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How do you feed bulls for a sale

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Hopeful Rancher

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Taking angus bulls to a sale, that sift very well and good conditioned cattle do well.=. What should I feed and for How long
 
I dont like to see over-fat bulls. I would feed them long stemed hay and a protien/mineral supplement. It will take a little longer than a grained bull, but will be better when they go to chasing cows at breeding time. Atleast in my world. :D
 
ask BRG....I think hes got that down to a science....His cattle are fed to perfection for a sale.
 
I feed a pound of corn per hundred pounds of body weight up to 9#s maximum. 7#s of dried distillers 1/2# of soybeen meal, 4oz. of mineral and enough silage that they clean it all up each day so the silage bounces around a couple hundred pounds depending on their appetite. Seams it was around 50#s per hd. per day all totaled last spring. The also get free choice hay which they don't consume much.Knowone wants a fat bull until you try and sell them one that is'nt for all the guys who buy that way there's 99 who buy what looks good and fat sells. I try not to get them fat which I normally don't have a problem as I don't get to pushing them until this time of year.
 
leanin' H said:
I dont like to see over-fat bulls. I would feed them long stemed hay and a protien/mineral supplement. It will take a little longer than a grained bull, but will be better when they go to chasing cows at breeding time. Atleast in my world. :D
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Yep-- mine get good mainly grass with some alfalfa hay-in feeders so get all they can eat- and about 2 lbs a day each of Hi-En 14 pellets... The pellets are mainly for gentling them down by walking around thru them with buckets to fill the trough... In other years I've substituted whatever cheap grain (oats/barley) I had for the pellets- just don't have any grain this year...
The yearling weights won't be the 1200-1400lbers that some think look so good-- but will be around 1000 lbs and ready to go to work...
 
cowman52 said:
How many and when is the sale? That will determine nearly all of your options.
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The sale already happened this year. I maid the mistake of only taking one bull, I didn't think the others were good enough to see town.

The bull was 18 months of age,

I started feeding him grain 3 months before the sale. I got him up to about 1 Lb per hundred weight with about 2 months left. Not much grain in my area so I was feeding him Cobb, Got free choice hay. One of the mistakes I think I might have made was that for the first 2 months I feed him oat hay.

He is a nice bull, I would say a rancher type bull. He did seem to struggle to put on weight.

Reading articles I see one that said show steers should be feed grain 5 months before an event. I dont know if I want to afford that.

But dang it I dont want to get crushed at bull sale with a bull that should have done better.

I want to give my bulls a fair shake at these sales
 
Up here it seems,they feed them as much barley as they can possible eat.And when they are finished as fats,there ready for the bull sale.It's the buyers problem,when the bull falls apart.
 
We get a Timothy/alfalfa hay blend down here, I have had good luck using it as 1/4th by volume, in 50 lbs of a 10 percent base feed, 5gal beet pulp wet, and corn to add what fT you need. You can feed a lot of this, never had a problem, they tend to get full before they eat too much. 5 gallon bucket x2 a day, wet. You will get a lot of fullness, enough fat to sell, and not enough cost to kill any profit. Bulls tend to flesh fairly quick, buyers will see full without the fat.
 
Denny said:
I feed a pound of corn per hundred pounds of body weight up to 9#s maximum. 7#s of dried distillers 1/2# of soybeen meal, 4oz. of mineral and enough silage that they clean it all up each day so the silage bounces around a couple hundred pounds depending on their appetite. Seams it was around 50#s per hd. per day all totaled last spring. The also get free choice hay which they don't consume much.Knowone wants a fat bull until you try and sell them one that is'nt for all the guys who buy that way there's 99 who buy what looks good and fat sells. I try not to get them fat which I normally don't have a problem as I don't get to pushing them until this time of year.
Click to expand...

I agree. Everyone says they don't want a fat bull........then watch what
they buy. "Feed's the breed." :p
 
We get a Timothy/alfalfa hay blend down here, I have had good luck using it as 1/4th by volume, in 50 lbs of a 10 percent base feed, 5gal beet pulp wet, and corn to add what fT you need. You can feed a lot of this, never had a problem, they tend to get full before they eat too much. 5 gallon bucket x2 a day, wet. You will get a lot of fullness, enough fat to sell, and not enough cost to kill any profit. Bulls tend to flesh fairly quick, buyers will see full without the fat.
 

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