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How much calving ease, if you please

Northern Rancher said:
as for checking at night-only whores and thieves work in the dark.
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Changing the name of the operation to Ladies of the Night and The Thieves They Hang With Black Angus. What a person doesn't learn about themselves at ranchers.net. :P :) :oops:
 
I think the 'ideal' calf size is anything they can have by themselves most of the time. We calve largley in march up here so you better be prepared to be checking every couple hours most nights.
We get lots of calves 110 - 120 lbs and most of them plop right out and take off. We haven't had a dummy yet this year, so far. (Lots of other troubles though :? )I've had to pull the odd one, like today I had a little heifer with an upside down head back deal going on, and I don't care how small the calf is it's not coming.
Seems to me herd health, weather and feed can be just as big of factors as calf size. Having said that, I still try to be reasonably careful with heifer bull selection. Nice to have those ones be 100 lbs or less for our heifers. This year we used a blonde, a blonde / red angus, and a red angus and they seem to have done the job... but this coming year no more angus.
I think calving on green grass is the best way to minimize human intervention and I'm seriously considering moving calving up to apr. / may and holding them to yearlings.
 
Right on Silver, good post. Make the move on timing and I'm sure your profit will go up as well. That is what happened here. We pick our Heifers at birth. If the cow is sound (feet. bag, disposition etc...) the calf gets a pink tag, if there were any problems (too big, stupid, slow to get up or cow problems) the calf gets a purple tag. Never keep a purple tag heifer. After several years of this management I have time to pontificate on here instead of living in the calving pasture.
 
per said:
Right on Silver, good post. Make the move on timing and I'm sure your profit will go up as well. That is what happened here. We pick our Heifers at birth. If the cow is sound (feet. bag, disposition etc...) the calf gets a pink tag, if there were any problems (too big, stupid, slow to get up or cow problems) the calf gets a purple tag. Never keep a purple tag heifer. After several years of this management I have time to pontificate on here instead of living in the calving pasture.
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That's smart to tag differently for problem heifer calves. I also notch a cow's eartag if for any reason I have to catch her. That way I'm reminded in the fall who took extra time, and can cull that way. It's funny how if you give one a second chance it comes back to bite you EVERY time :lol: .
 
I've got my own indicator of when a heifer needs help. If she has been trying for an hour and can't get the head out and I decide to help her, when I reach around the calf's foot with my thumb and middle finger and can't quite touch I know why she couldn't get him out. I don't know if that made sense or not but that is my guide. I've never really weighed those that I have to help but I would guess them at 90# or so.

I only helped 1 out of 65 syncronized AI'd heifers this year and was done in 2 weeks. Sure makes calving heifers easy when the hardest part of the whole process is tagging them and vaccinating.

I feel sorry for you CattleArmy. I've heard of wrecks like that before and that would be pure hell.
 
We pick our Heifers at birth.
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I don't pick at birth but I eliminate some. Instead of trusting a tag I notch the ear though. If I touch them for any reason other than to tag,weigh,vaccinate and brand before weaning they get a notch(bull calves too). Plus I bag score every cow so I know how that was when I actually pick my heifers(March as 11 month old calves)

As far as calving ease, I try to get all my bulls with a +1.0-+2.5 at birth along with positive on both birth and maternal calving ease. I give them every chance to have them, the last calf I pulled I waited 4 hours after I could see both feet.
 
I don't like to help a heifer ever. This year, I had one with a leg back, nothing to do but help her. I know you can get bulls that calve easily, and still give you a nice product. A calf that is easily born is usually has more vigor, will suck quicker, and momma will breed back sooner. I like calving ease-maternal trait bulls for the cows too. I bet they will wean you more pounds than many of the "performance bulls". I too check last thing before bed(10:00-10:30), and again when I get up (4:30-5:00).
 
Oldtimer said:
Put me in the group that prefers ease, simplicity, and are just getting lazier as I get older...
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Doesn't sound lazy to me, sounds like your working "smarter" not "harder".:)
In my experience the easier a heifer or cow calves the better she takes care of her calf and the faster she breeds back.

On my Charolais cattle I like a 70 lb. calf on heifers (heifers will average 1100 lbs. at calving) and 75-80 lbs. on cows. I suppose I'm losing 50 lbs. weaning weight but it's better than a calving nightmare.

I had a similar experience to CattleArmy's. I bought 90 head black black baldies 1st calvers, supposed to have been AI'd to Rainmaker but I think the clean up bulls got most of them. Out of 90 head I pulled 30, had 2 C-Sections, and all the other related problems that go with calving difficulty. :?
 
Heard a theory the other day that was interesting.

A guy about 20 miles from me who has been using Char bulls forever, bought himself 5 new low birthweight EPD'ed Angus bulls last year and turned them loose with the cows.

When he started calving this past January, the calves started hitting the ground at 60 lbs. unassisted, he got lax on his daily and nightly checks and thought he was in high cotton. That was short-lived.

After about 1/4 of his calves were born the trouble started. He started getting mal-presentations of all sorts. Heads turned back, breech births, front legs back, you name it.

Out of 150 cows to calve, he lost a total of 9 calves from abnormal presentations.................. 6%........No heifers, all older cows.

His theory is.......when calves are smaller at the tail end of gestation (when they are the most active in-utero), they have more room to move around in the womb and become a statistic.

Those bulls have been sold and he will go back to having 85 lb. calves this year. I don't mind at all........
 
Interesting theory but I don't know if I buy it though. Doesn't the uterus stretch to make room for the calf no matter how big it is? I can't believe there is enough room for a 60 pounder to be swimming laps in there.
 
It's amazing on cows with a smaller calf can push out even some malpresentations-we had a heifer with a leg back-get in the muskkeg on us and had her calf unnassisted.
 
Big Swede said:
Interesting theory but I don't know if I buy it though. Doesn't the uterus stretch to make room for the calf no matter how big it is? I can't believe there is enough room for a 60 pounder to be swimming laps in there.
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Not talking about swimming laps. All they have to do is get the head turned back or put one front leg back.

I can't argue for his theory, but then again I can't argue against it.

I just know that he has never lost 6% of a calf crop from grown cows with the larger calves.
 
One thing to remember, hybrid vigor works in the womb also! :shock: :?

nortexsook, it's "Lasater" method...after 70 years of range calving, they have cleaned out the calving problem genetics. That's why I use their bulls/genetics...best move I've ever made!! :D

Like Red Robin, I use the same bull on heifers that I use on cows...usually my future herdsire.

I check in the morning when I get around to it and in the afternoon before dark. I only go out at night if I have one in the process at my afternoon check...usually to see what color tag to bring in the morning.
 
Got a question along the lines of this thread.

The old folks that I have known in this country (all but 1 or 2 are gone now, with their wealth of information :( ) used to say that you had shorter or longer gestations depending on how many growing moons were in the gestation period. The less growing moons, the shorter gestation.
Has anyone else ever heard this?
 
gcreekrch said:
Got a question along the lines of this thread.

The old folks that I have known in this country (all but 1 or 2 are gone now, with their wealth of information :( ) used to say that you had shorter or longer gestations depending on how many growing moons were in the gestation period. The less growing moons, the shorter gestation.
Has anyone else ever heard this?
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My friends wife, Three Horses swears by it. :wink:
 
I've never bought into the moon phase thing. Sounds like voodoo to me but who knows. I know the almanac gives advice about where the blood is in animals at certain moon phases but I'm too skeptical for all that stuff.

I know some people who follow it religiously. They won't even brand or plant if the moon is wrong.
 
The "old folks" didn't have computers to tell them what to think...most of these "sayings" came about by observing Nature!! :shock: :o :shock:

Guess I need to change my Albrecht quote to include "or computers". :wink: 8)
 
Big Muddy rancher said:
gcreekrch said:
Got a question along the lines of this thread.

The old folks that I have known in this country (all but 1 or 2 are gone now, with their wealth of information :( ) used to say that you had shorter or longer gestations depending on how many growing moons were in the gestation period. The less growing moons, the shorter gestation.
Has anyone else ever heard this?
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My friends wife, Three Horses swears by it. :wink:
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What have you and Soap been into? You're both kind of cheeky the last couple of days. :D :roll:

I don't pay much attention the moon stuff either, when a calf falls out the gestation's over. Just wondered if any others out there had heard of it.
Have to say though if it wasn't for the old folks we wouldn't be where we are today.
Did you know that after birthing, a cow is decaffinated? 8)
 

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