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Portable Scale

F

flyingS

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 12, 2009
Messages
781
Location
Northern Sandhills Just East of Soapweed
Do any of you feel like their would be a demand for a Certified Portable Scale? The scale would be legal for trade and available for anyone to rent. The advantage would be in the ability to sell cattle right of the ranch if you do not have a scale in place. If you do not sell privately and would still like to take advantage of the ability to sell cattle off of the ranch there would be the option to consign your cattle on Western Video market. I was looking for thoughts and ideas? What would be a fair fee for the use of the scale? Someone will bring the scale to your ranch and set it up as well as operate it on the day you ship your calves.
 
i think there is one of those floating around this country. sounds like a pretty slick deal, and i haven't heard any complaints about it. i'm not sure what the charge is for using it.
 
The local association around here has a fixed scale at a set of working corrals. It cost .50 cents a head to weigh with the money going to improve the corrals. Works pretty well. I'd bet a portable scale would be the cat's meow! :wink:
 
leanin' H said:
The local association around here has a fixed scale at a set of working corrals. It cost .50 cents a head to weigh with the money going to improve the corrals. Works pretty well. I'd bet a portable scale would be the cat's meow! :wink:
Click to expand...
We have the same thing here.
Many bigger producers have their own scales. Have seen a couple ranchers go in on one together. Not sure what the purchase price would be.
A couple concerns I might have are:
Can you get it when you need it? Many of the calves in our are leave the area from last week in October to Mid November.
How much shrink will the buyer tack on?

If someone had one in the area to rent I would sure consider it.
 
Horseless said:
leanin' H said:
The local association around here has a fixed scale at a set of working corrals. It cost .50 cents a head to weigh with the money going to improve the corrals. Works pretty well. I'd bet a portable scale would be the cat's meow! :wink:
Click to expand...
We have the same thing here.
Many bigger producers have their own scales. Have seen a couple ranchers go in on one together. Not sure what the purchase price would be.
A couple concerns I might have are:
Can you get it when you need it? Many of the calves in our are leave the area from last week in October to Mid November.
How much shrink will the buyer tack on?

If someone had one in the area to rent I would sure consider it.
Click to expand...

We've got a fixed scale at our local assn: Today is work day where we all show up fix needed thing mow the lawn.Our scale is state certified and is located on a sandy piece of ground where fall rains don't prohibit truck travel. Were also located right off a highway. Cost is 65 cents per head to weigh calves kill cows and bull are 2.00 I think. We also put together a sale catalog listing all members calves breeds weights shots delivery dates etc etc. We print and mail out between 350 and 500 a year. Your on your own as far as marketing some use superior most sell private treaty and the shrink is a haggeld over topic between buyer and seller I don't/won't pencil schrink. If they want ranch fresh calves worked and vaccinated to their liking they can pay what the scale reads or I'll sell them elsewhere. We gather sort load haul 10 miles unload then get them across the scale they've schrunk enough by then anyhow. Hold to your guns on shot's shrink etc etc. The more you give into the more the buyers expect. I had a guy last fall so demanding that I flat out asked him what time of day I needed to be there to do chores. Needless to say we did'nt do business.The salebarn was a better option last fall for me so thats the direction we went.I'm lucky I live 2 miles from the scale yards and 5 miles from one of the largest if not the largest livestock market in Minnesota.
 
A few association scales around here- and several private ones....Going rate on everything is $1 per head- often done on the honor system... One of the local feedlots has a portable scale- that he lets you come get- you set up and use- and that is $1 a head also...I think he probably came close to paying for it last year alone in just calves that he bought...
 
If you are taking it right to the ranch You could charge a bit more than a fixed scale-you'll have more upkeep and won't pull it down the road for free. For a short haul to the scale I'm pretty sure the industry standard is around a 3% shrink. Anybody whose bought many cattle understands it-you can't sell water so you can't buy it either. There's a company out of Saskatoon that makes and sells portable scales that work quite well-the only thing is the pen should be solid the first bit I've seen some broken legs from cattle sliding around on the platform. I have a single animal portable scale under a Pearson chute that has weighed quite a few thousand calves-I used to be a ROP weighman with it. My only experience with community scales down south was unloading in the pitch dark in a driving rain storm in Broadus, Montana somebody had locked the gate to the pens so we had to sort 8 bulls in a teeny pen that held six-I couldn't figure out where to put the paperwork so I stuck it in the middle of the toilet paper roll in the outhouse. The owner found his bulls and his documents intact lol.
 
Ya gotta do, what ya gotta do, nr. That was quite a story!

I called some people here that rent the portable scale and she
thought it was $2/head and 2% shrink. The Superior rep here
has the scale and they sell through Superior. They are very pleased
with having the scale brought to them and have used that scale
for the past several years.

Good luck, flying S! Sounds like an interesting venture.
 
I wish I could remember the guys name who we hauled too he was a big good natured old boy-when I shook hands with him one other trip his fingers reached my elbows. That rain trip was quite a deal before we ended up in Sturgis, South Dakota lol.
 
I need a few more people to die before I can write it lol. Those bull hauling trips to the states every spring were fun stuff. We used to hit Leachman's sale on the way home which was an adventure. Trying to get Ty to enter Cheyenne this year so I can bum along.
 
I turned down a couple of trips to the Bucking Horse sale that might of got me and the individuals on the front page. I ended up crossing bulls the same time this contractor was at the border with a load of bucking horses. I ended up sorting them with him in a snowstorm. I got along with Sue Weston the federal vet pretty well but with Sue business is business as far as the paperwork and you better treat it as such. Well this guys papers weren't great so I told him to just flirt with Sue and things would go smoother. That was good entertainment-she straightened him RIGHT out!!!
 
I have used a Nortic scale to weigh video cattle on and they work just fine. You can run about 20 calves at a time across it. The big thing is to make sure the person running it knows how. It will print a ticket for every draft. I think they charged $1 per head but not sure.
 

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