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Question for Hereford Breeders

When I first came home from the Corp in 1971 and was trying to get a start I bought some old Herford cows at the local sale barn. Very laid back and easy to gat along with but constant eye problems and udder problems ( that might have been why they were at the sale to start with) calves did OK but nothing of note.

Then a neighbor who owned a junk yard had bought a few calves to keep the weeds and grass out of his cars. I was able to buy 4 black baldie first calf hiefers with calves on the ground for $180 a pair ( love to do that today) and they became fixtures even though I kept buying prue Angus to expand the herd ( understand 45 is a big herd for me )

For what ever reason I cannot think of a single herferd in the area any more and have not seen one at either of the local sales in ages.

I used to think the white face was the reason for the bad eyes but I don't have a problem with the Charlois so there must be more to it than that.
 
PPRM,

I will preface my comments as I am a longtime Hereford man that grew up raising commercial horned hereford cattle. My family crossbed them with Angus and then bred the Bwf cows to Charolais as strictly a terminal cross. We have long since gotten rid of the Charolais and have gone to a two breed rotation of Hereford and Angus for a lot of reasons. We have also been retaining ownership or finsishing all our own cattle for nearly
20 years.

Herefords are playing a bigger role on our place every day. In fact I have gone into the business of raising and selling polled Hereford bulls.

One of the biggest advantages of the Hereford breed that hasn't been talked about much is the advantage in feed efficiency. This has been documented many many times. The most recent data I have is through the Genetic Outreach Program at Royal Beef Feedyard in Scott City KS.

Cost of gain -- Hereford and Hereford X .475-----------Yard Ave .553
ADG------------Hereford and Herford X 3.59-------------Yard Ave. 3.29
Feed Conversion--eford and Herford X 4.85-------------Yard Ave 6.16

Bottom line is the Hereford and Hereford Engish cross steers fed for 15% less than the yard averagre, gained better than the yard average and did this all on 21% less feed.

I hear this alot from various feedyards when they start feeding Hereford cross cattle. "THEY WON'T EAT", yet when they weigh the cattle they are amazed at how much they are gaining.

If you figure that 60% of the cost of raising cattle is feed, who wouldn't like to decrease their feed bill by almost 1/4?

There are lots of other advantages too. Doscility is very undervalued in this industry. Dark cutters are associated with wild cattle, Also it is well known that more nervous cattle are slower performing cattle. Longevity of the bull is also very underated. It is not uncommon for many Hereford bulls to be breeding cows at 8 or ten years of age. Whats it worth to get an extra year or two on that $3000 bull on a per calf basis?

Another thing is the marketability of the baldy calf. He fits into the beef industry like no other. He fits into more branded beef programs than any other cross you can have. Wether your selling feeder cattle or fed cattle, it is nice to have more options.

As far as the Horned/Polled debate, there are alot of good cattle that have horns and lots that don't. There seems to be a few people in the breed that still want to live in the old age, and continue this debate. I am amazed that people would waste their time arguing horned vesrsus polled when they both have a lot ot offer. The fact of the matter is that the polled cattle I see have gained tremendously versus the horned in fact the trend in SD is that more and more people are looking for polled bulls that horned. In fact many traditional horned breeders are useing and selling polled bulls. There wouldn't be the market for them if they weren't working for the commercial cattle industry. This is ranch country.

As far as the traditional Hereford problems that I hear, one important thing to remember is that the Hereford breed I think registers less than 1/2 of what they did in the 1970's (maybe less). Considering the cull rate, wouldn't it make sense that those cattle that did have the bad udders, bad feet, bad eyes and prolapse be the first to go?

I would put my Hereford cows up against any Angus herd in the country
as far as feet and legs and udder quality. I simply don't have time dealling with problem cattle and neither do my customers. I can't remeber the last time I had a cancer eyed cow and it has been over ten years since I have had a vaginal prolapse. If you are haveing problems with these things, obviously the seedstock supplier hasn't paid enough attention to eliminateing these problems. These are genetic problems and they can be eliminated if one really wants to.


Juan brought up a good point on the fertility of the Hereford cow. There is more money given up in the beef industry in feed efficiency and fertility than what could ever be gained by reaching for carcass traits. The Hereford breed is tops in both and we are working extremly hard at improving the carcass traits of an already documented tender great tasting end product.

Sorry this is a little long, but I thought these issues needed to be addressed.

SMN
 
We no longer use Herefords but I enjoyed reading your post SMN Herefords. If we were ever to cross breed again, we would use a Hereford bull.

I have to tell this story. It is one of the reasons my husband says good things about Hereford bulls. This would have been in the later 70's. (EON's ago~ :wink: )

Anyway, we had a pasture that ran 50 head of Hereford cows. We put 1 polled hereford bull with them and 1 Angus bull. We never saw the Hereford bull breed a cow. Yet every year we would get 41 Hereford calves out of those 50 cows.

That was a real good bull for the times. We really liked him. Called him Barney and he came from the Dingwall Ranch at Drummond, Mt. They had excellent cattle and were excellent people.
 
I agree with the dispostion thing totally. Our Angus crossbreds were getting faster and faster and when we brought a Hereford bull back in it really improved in one generation and we don't hav eany EXT blood in our Angus.

As far as carcass quality goes Herefords are second to Angus of the major breeds for marbling. They will not yield with an exotic cross but when you consider the increased maintenance of an exotic cross cow there is no comparison in cowherd effieciency.
 
SMN,

I enjoyed your post, if it was too long, I wouldn't be asking for more, LOL. Actually you did well in getting your mesage accross, your Breed organization would do well to look at that.


There are differences in each breed. If Feed Efficiency is a big advantage, what has the breed done to identify the top individuals for this trait? As a matter of fact, can I get a catalog that identifies the top individuals for longevity , docility, and Feed efficiency?

As far as the Prolapse deal, when I started , I was buying hiefers and older cows that were bred. I found very quickly it doesn't take long to identify the cows prone to this. I don't have those issues anymore.Are there individuals the breed has identified that tend to contribute to these problems???

I was just curious when I started this thread, but as I get into it, I do realize with the predominant balck hided cows I have, it might be easier to get a Bull than collect cows, though cows are often a buy.

On feeding calves, the Herefords I buy seem to take awhile to finish, but maybe I need to check the wieghts and there lies the answer?

FH reminded me that a bull I have now was a real herder as a yearling, as a three year old, he hardly makes a fuss, but sure as heck gets them bred. I do find older bulls tend to get onerier outside of breeding season, but will say the majority of older Herefords I have been around handle easy,


Thanks again for the reply
 
Story is told that on the way home from their wedding ceremony, Northern Rancher and his wife were riding along peacefully in their horse drawn carriage when the horse suddenly shied at a darting gopher and started dancing all over the road. NR took the whip and laid it across the horse's back until it settled down.

"That was once", he growled at the horse.

The new missus was a little perturbed by the rough ride and even more so by the way her husband took care of it, but she just bit her tongue in silence.

Wasn't too long and the horse, being a bit skittish, swerved madly to avoid a pothole in the road. Again, NR picked up the whip and laid a beating on the frightened horse.

"That was twice", he muttered at the horse through gritting teeth. Again, Mrs. NR kept silence inspite of the anger boiling up inside her.

Wasn't too long until a jackrabbit shot across the road in front of them and the frightened horse almost jumped out of its harness. The carriage careened all over the road, badly bouncing the hapless occupants around on their seats and off the walls.

At this, Northern Rancher pulled his rifle out of its boot and shot the horse dead in its tracks.

That was too much for the shaken Mrs. NR. She started hollering at Mr. and hitting him with her purse until she had exhausted her anger at him for being so extreme in his actions.

When she had collapsed in a tired heap beside him, he looked at her sternly and said, "That was once . . ."
 
PPRM: "If Feed Efficiency is a big advantage, what has the breed done to identify the top individuals for this trait? As a matter of fact, can I get a catalog that identifies the top individuals for longevity , docility, and Feed efficiency? "

I as a Hereford breeder would love one too, but it really isn't possible at this time. Feed efficiency is a trait that is really hard to measure on an individual basis unless one wants to individually feed cattle, which is expensive and time consuming.

The association is certainly tracking and collecting data on groups of Hereford and Hereford cross cattle, they are finding very good results. As a general rule, selecting cattle that are the fastest gainers within their contemporary groups will also tend to be the more efficient. In addition, the association has unergone a big push to collect cow weights at weaning. This data will be used for futre analysis.

As far as docility within the Herford breed, population genetics suggest you won't go wrong unless you select the wildest cattle in the pen. Most breeders have gotten rid of the wild ones.

Longevity is also another thing that the AHA is working on. The Hereford breed implimented a whole herd reporting program for all their TPR data a few years ago. Each breeder must report performance data on all their cows and all their calves. That includes dam information and culling information. The AHA has been keeping track of this data and once there is enough data and the computer geeks figure a way to put numerical numbers to this data, I believe we will see a longevity epd. At this point, I believe the best thing to do is to try to buy bulls out of cows that have raised several calfs and their sires have also serviced cows for many years.

PPRM, Thanks for your interest in Hereford cattle. I think with the growth of the CHB and Ridgefield's PHB program, there is tremendous demand for Hereford and Herford British cross baldy cattle.


Faster Horses, great story. I have hear many similar stories of hereford and Angus bulls in the same pasture. Nothing agaisnt Angus, but as a general rule, the libido of a Hereford bull is hard to beat.

WB, your right on with the maintenance cost of the exotic females. I will post that dat once I find it again. It makes one wonder why have exotic in the cowherd at all.

Northern Rancher, I wish more people had that philosphy 50 years ago, and we wouldn't be talking about that issue today.

Thanks,

SMN

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PPRM: Sorry for the delay but have been busy. My comments on carcass refer to hereford x continental crosses - the feeders up here state that they are consistent good feeding cattle that yield well with very acceptable quality grades. SMN did an excellent job on covering feed efficiency and the polled/horned issue. The hereford breed took a hard hit from the exotics and the blacks. The Hereford breeders have for the most part taken a hard line on culling and herd improvement and are producing a much better animal than in the past!
 
Hereford taste good.As far as docile some of the meanest cows i've ever had were hereford.If you want good bulls that can help your angus check out Carmichael Herefords.
 
Gee, don't I pick a good time to have company, go the Christmas Bazaar, and be too busy to check in here :) . I'd say everyone has done a good job and I agree with most. Temperment, mothering ability, fertility, feed efficiency, survivablilty etc are all the reasons that Herefords are a good choice. Yes some do have problems but so do "some" of ALL breeds! If there is a perfect breed I've yet to see it :wink:
Stop in sometime on your way by and see what our cows are like. As you can see from my pictures and from knowing what this country is like - our cows don't get babied.
 
Nicky said " If there is a perfect breed I've yet to see it "
Boy did she leave a opening. Big enough to drive a Mack truck thru. But in those Famous words of Faster Horses :gag: :gag: :gag: :gag: :gag: :gag: :cowboy:
 

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