For the 70% or more of beef calves born last spring, more than the usual share veered from traditional roads to the feedyard come fall. Backgrounding those calves opened gates to several new revenue paths, though not without risk.
Just like regular maintenance on your vehicle, prevention is the best way to ward off scours in your cow-calf herd. But sometimes the best treatment plans fail, with lasting effects on calf performance. That’s why ranchers should try to get ahead of the problem.
When it comes to growth implants in cattle, animal scientist Robbi Pritchard only worries about three things: getting enough premium if you’re not use them, using them wrong and using them with too little insight.
It looks like weaning weights have gone pretty much nowhere for 15 years. That’s according to a summary of North Dakota State University’s Cow Herd Appraisal of Performance Software (CHAPS) that presents genetic progress as functionally static since 2003. I couldn’t miss that summary, well-publicized and pointed out by just about every contact and source I know.
Weaning and “preg checking” tell us how successful our last two breeding seasons were. While many cow herd operators enjoy calving as a time to see the fruits of their labor, I prefer weaning, when management and genetic selection come together in one package. If you fell short in meeting any challenge like keeping pastures vegetative or replacement heifers without records, those effects are in full view when calves cross the scale at weaning.
Weaning and “preg checking” tell us how successful our last two breeding seasons were. While many cow herd operators enjoy calving as a time to see the fruits of their labor, I prefer weaning, when management and genetic selection come together in one package. If you fell short in meeting any challenge like keeping pastures vegetative or replacement heifers without records , those effeccts are in full view when calves cross the scale at weaning.
Cattle have changed. If your management hasn’t, animal scientist Robbi Pritchard suggests you take a look to be sure it’s still relevant. The South Dakota State University emeritus professor addressed cattle feeders and allied industry at the Feeding Quality Forum in August.
On a 10-degree morning in central Nebraska, Virginia Evert may ask herself why her fitness routine involves bucket feeding heifers rather than working out in a gym.
Manage Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.