winter is closing in whats your plan for wintering cows

[TSR]

Jason you are wrong about the half lb. soy meal and three lb.corn.Double the soy meal and burn the corn in your stove.

3 pounds of corn isn't enough to upset the balance of the rumen. 5 pounds might be pushing it, 7 is definately where you need to jump to 10 to balance it the other way.

Soymeal has starch same as corn, the TDN is almost equal, but is a far more expensive source of energy than corn.

I know this ration works as I have had a herd in Texas on it for 3 years.

I have really enjoyed this discussion if theres one area I feel I need a little educating on its on feed values,etc.
Several years back I had 5 reg. bulls that I wanted to sell (my best 5 after culling) this was their ration : Two five gallon buckets of shell corn, one in the morning and one in the evening, each top dressed with ~ 3-4 lb of soybean meal. They also had the worst hay that I had that year-round bales free choice. They did fine in my opinion and I sold 4 to a man that had seen them as 4-500 pounders and commented on how well they had done. They probably weighed 11-1200 lbs as long yearlings when they were sold. That was some cheap feeding per lb of gain, at least to me. The trouble was, I hand feeding them those two times a day-that got old especially when I had a full time job.

I always try to digest all Jason says ever since we we began conversing on the Cattle Pages many years ago. Although I might disagree with him politically sometimes, he has a lot of knowledge about cattle. One thing though Jason, here in TN we do have people advertise Bermuda grass hay at 15-20% protein. But they really have to fertilize it.

 

[Jason]

I have learned to ask a lot of questions, and I have had the privledge to travel a bit while delivering cattle.

I don't know it all by a long shot, I have never had experience with Haymakers peanut hay, but I bet there is a place to use it.

That ration on the bulls sounds about right. A 5 gal pail of corn weighs??? maybe 25 pounds? That would put them at 10 pounds corn and just over a pound of soy, great balance even with poor hay. They wouldn't get pushed too hard but they would starve either.

Feeding twice a day is more efficient for the cattle, but I know what you mean about a pain with an off farm job. My off farm job lasted 14 months before I had to quit and return full time here. I miss the cash but you can only do half a job so long before stuff catches up with you.

Some studies show feed conversion increases if feed is available for the cattle to nibble all day long. It is impossible to allow that in a bucket feeding scenario though.

About my politics, I don't have any, all politicians are crooks, none of them can change what is ultimately going to happen, but that's another thread entirely.

 

[alabama]

I think it is harder on a cow with 33F a light wind and misty rain. Now that's cold.
We are weaning calves this weekend. Pulling out some cows to sell in November. We have plenty of hay but will suplement the weaned calves and sale cows with ground ear corn and cotton seed.
The two yearold bulls are almost finshed and ready to sell in November after a cooling down the feed for a month to get them off corn and back on hay with a little cotton seed to keep them in BC 7 to 8.

 

[HAY MAKER]

Finished planting about 3/4 of my winter feed before Rita gave me about 5" of rain...

you must not be living right, Haymaker!

I plant ryegrass, rye, and clover. My young bulls and meat steers get this full time(rotational grazed) as soon as it is grazable with free choice hay. Cows with their summer calves and exposed heifers are time limit rotational grazed one to three hours a day or every other day(depending on rate of growth) and free choice hay. Like Jason said, our best hay is not very good. In late Feb. or early March(when this pasture starts growing good) I wean calves and everything starts rotational grazing full time. Calves hardly care that they were weaned and cows start getting in shape for the next calf. The rest of the year on native summer grass.

LOL,I must not and or MIss Tam has her mojo on me,cause it's been drier than a covered bridge around here,I can;t survive another year like this one,it has been the driest year I have seen period,sure has taken the fun out of it...........................good luck

 

[RobertMac]

Alabama, I can think of one harder...how about 28 and freezing rain...I'm sure you know what I mean. I remember a few years ago when we had about a week of single digit temps...I know I couldn't take the kind of temps they have up north. Us Southern boys better stay down South.

Haymaker, rain from Katrina and Rita is all I've had since mid-July...I guess it was good for me, but not for a lot of others.