Later Feeding=Better Night Calving???

[Big Swede]

Hey Grassfarmer, you do realize you can post on here more than once a year don't you? :wink: Just kidding, how long have you been calving on grass and would you ever go back to winter calving? Anything you have learned or would do differently if you were just now making the switch now? Northern Rancher, per, Pure Country, rancherfred, John SD and all of you other grass calvers feel free to respond if you would.

 

[George]

Around here it seems that the people raising show calves try to calve in the winter to get a jump on the compitition.

I just try to calve mid april thru may and I check the cows just before bed and then first thing in the morning. I see them several times during the day and rairly have a calf born at night.

My cows are on grass by this time or if a little feeding is still needed they are on round bales with 24 hour availability.

 

[jodywy]

Around here it seems that the people raising show calves try to calve in the winter to get a jump on the compitition.

I just try to calve mid april thru may and I check the cows just before bed and then first thing in the morning. I see them several times during the day and rairly have a calf born at night.

My cows are on grass by this time or if a little feeding is still needed they are on round bales with 24 hour availability.

april still 2 feet of snow whit pools of melt, rain and sleat. march can get cold -20 ot more, but snow is dry.

 

[Northern Rancher]

When we used to pen calve we fed in the late afternoon because it took me all day to get that Massey tractor I had to start. I kept track of it for a few years and there were quite a few more daytime calves. Now out on the grass we sleep nights and stay calm. This last weekend brought back memories of -40 calving years ago-ohh to be that young tough and stupid again lol.

 

[per]

Big Swede, I would never go back to winter calving. The recent weather is a good reminder for that. Spring calving, 1st of April to mid May, has its fair share of issues but is still preferable to winter.

The pluses are... Longer days, shorter nights, usually warmer, when it gets cold it warms up in a few days or less, grass is starting to come along, usually get to quit feeding somewhere in the first cycle, winter husbandry on non lactating cows is easier and cheaper.

The reason I calve as early as April 1 is that here it is about the end of winter and I am trying to squeeze it in before putting the crop in. Otherwise it would be 3 weeks later. The calves are still capable of being fattened on grass with our resources by Sept the following year. June might take that enterprise away.

The negatives... could be scours. Our first case in several years of this management has yet to appear though. The key might be that they are moved from a smaller paddock to wide open spaces within a day of birth and the first and second calvers go to different paddocks than the older cows. There is always a Big wet snow event sometime during this period. I think it is a reminder of why we don't calve in the snow. My winter sheds and facilities can come in handy for these few days.

I'm sure there are a few more negatives but none come to mind right now. Overall it is just less work and takes less money.

 

[burnt]

We had a few March calves last spring because of an unintended bull breakout the previous summer. By fall, there was an easy 75 -100 pound differential between those calves and the ones that came when they "should have" in Mid-April to end of May.

Makes it look kind of tempting to move breeding up a month around here should we actually rebuild and have another breeding season.

 

[Grassfarmer]

Big Swede,
We have developed a system that works really well on our place, under our conditions but I don't know how it would suit others. Our permanent snow cover usually goes by the first week of April so we start calving between the 15th and 20th. Cows move off their winter feed ground just as soon as the ground dries up and they start grazing banked (deferred) grass grown the previous summer. We are on tame pasture, on a planned grazing system. We put maybe 100 cows onto a 10-15 acre field once we start calving. After about a week or ten days there will be 30 calves on the ground so we move the pregnant cows out onto the next field. The calved cows will stay on the original field until it is all eaten - usually another week before they get moved to another banked pasture. This system is way easier than moving fresh calved cows, it keeps calving cows on fresh uncontaminated grass. Most neighbours of mine say they couldn't calve in April because their corrals are too muddy, they have to calve while it's still frozen. I ask them why they need to calve in corrals? We get no scours with this system and as I said we have got our assist rate at less than 1%. Yes we can still get blizzards in late April, or May but at least we know it isn't going to set in for a month of -40C weather like it can earlier in the winter. I would go later but like Per we direct market grass-fed beef and would struggle to get them big enough by the next fall to properly fatten. I also want my calves up and running well with their mothers by the time we hit the fast grass growth and daily pasture moves period around May 20th.

 

[per]

I like that variation Grassfarmer, it will get some consideration this winter before calving. I also move onto banked grass and sometimes fall seeded rye (new set of issues involved here).

 

[NMRANCHER]

Does feeding late afternoon/early evening truly help with night calving? I've decided to give it a try, and am starting to feed the cows later in the day, but wanted to know if anyone else thinks this helps, I've heard mixed reviews .

We started feeding the first calvers at about 4;30 to 5;00pm and most of them calved during the daylight hours. the 1-2% that had to wait till nightfall it was a good bet to grab the surgical kit on your way to check them. Maybe 25% of the time their was a problem.