Calving 2026

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Another newborn today.
Bull calf at 280 days, sired by our own bred limxpiedmontese bull, out of limx heifer.
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Heifer is a daughter of the recently calved black cow.
Sire of the calf:
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There are gonna be three more heifers calving soon from this bull. One is on 281st day, second is due on the 4th of February and the last one on 24th of February. This one is ready to pop any minute.
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lithuanian farmer said:
Another newborn today.
Bull calf at 280 days, sired by our own bred limxpiedmontese bull, out of limx heifer.
View attachment 64873
Heifer is a daughter of the recently calved black cow.
Sire of the calf:
View attachment 64874
There are gonna be three more heifers calving soon from this bull. One is on 281st day, second is due on the 4th of February and the last one on 24th of February. This one is ready to pop any minute.
View attachment 64875
Click to expand...

I admire your cattle... Compared to what the average cattle are in the States, they are a huge improvement, IMO. My wife says we should come see them, but I think we will be content with pictures.
 
What are you noticing in terms of gestation length : BW across all the breeds involved? Do you think gestation length is highly heritable? In Australia they actually have an EPD for gestation length.
 
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Bum Steer said:
What are you noticing in terms of gestation length : BW across all the breeds involved? Do you think gestation length is highly heritable? In Australia they actually have an EPD for gestation length.
Click to expand...
Yup, gestation length is quite different with each breed. There are some individuals within each breed of shorter of longer gestation, but already have some expectations for different breed calves for their gestations. My current knowledge about gestation lengths of different breeds: belgian blues have generally shorter gestation than 285; limousines can go way over, like 300 or so; blonde d'aquitaine have longer gestation as well; parthenaise are pretty much around 285, especially pure ones; traditional charolais have slightly longer gestation, while culard type and some more modern type, polled have shorter gestation; angus have shorter gestation; piedmontese for us are quite okay, but one friend has pure ones and it is not uncommom to reach 300 days with pure calves; simmentals can go abit over average; VRB are +- 285 days, and can go over just a day or two; salers have longer gestation. Haven't had more calves of other breeds, so can't say much about others. Of course, it's my experience with european bulls.
And yes, daughters of longer gestation breeds often have longer gestation themselves.
 
Not sure if anyone will find it helpfull, but maybe educational.
Common issue we are dealing with this year. Very cold weather, higher humidity and windchill. Almost all calves have a part of ears frozen.
This one is the most severe. Four days old calf. She is inside currently, so ears are warm, but you can clearly see how much ears she's gonna loose.
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Try to dry out and warm up every single newborns ears, but it still freezes after that. Started sewing ear warmers as there is no other way it seems to deal with it.
 
Latest calf. Very pleased with heifers, which calved recently. All extremely quiet and easy to work.
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Pitty that not a heifer, but as long it's alive and living it's all that matters.

Lost the calf with the most frozen ears. Mom was nasty just calved, so left the calf with her mom outside for the first day. The coat was put on though. Moved calf to the shed in the evening. Appearantly she didn't nurse that day. Tubed her with colostrum next day, but she had frost bitten ears, nose, tail and legs. Mom was finally good enough to try to feed the calf from her, but calf wasn't nursing. The calf was on antibiotics and NSAIDS at that point. Moved her inside the house on the third days evening. She had abit of a boost of energy when she spent some time in the warmth and actually drank electrolytes from the bottle. She started getting weaker the next day. Tube fed her, gave IV, but she was just getting worse. Dad looked at her legs with thermal vision and one back leg was showing warmth, while other leg's lowest part was black. So even if she did survived now, she could have had a very short life after that. Very devastated and looking back now some things could have been done differently, but always trying to think about the best outcome.
 
75% belgian blue heifer from sexed straw. Unassisted, born at 282 days, fifth calf for the cow.
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Gonna have around -22°F for two nights, so gonna need to make sure that newborns have full bellies of colostrum and are warm and dry.
Have three more cows now, so hopefully they will hold their legs crossed for a couple more days 😅
 
lithuanian farmer said:
Lost the calf with the most frozen ears. Mom was nasty just calved, so left the calf with her mom outside for the first day. The coat was put on though. Moved calf to the shed in the evening. Appearantly she didn't nurse that day. Tubed her with colostrum next day, but she had frost bitten ears, nose, tail and legs. Mom was finally good enough to try to feed the calf from her, but calf wasn't nursing. The calf was on antibiotics and NSAIDS at that point. Moved her inside the house on the third days evening. She had abit of a boost of energy when she spent some time in the warmth and actually drank electrolytes from the bottle. She started getting weaker the next day. Tube fed her, gave IV, but she was just getting worse. Dad looked at her legs with thermal vision and one back leg was showing warmth, while other leg's lowest part was black. So even if she did survived now, she could have had a very short life after that. Very devastated and looking back now some things could have been done differently, but always trying to think about the best outcome.
Click to expand...

I'm kind of surprised the calf lived as long as it did. With that kind of frostbite I would have thought the body temp would be so low that it would have died immediately.
I'm tried warming calves and it sure seems like it's hard to find a reliable way to do it. A few start to get active and as soon as they do, they get a spot of blood from the nostril and they die. Others do just fine and don't even have frostbite. Tough to lose one to the cold. Are these unusual temps for you?
 
Travlr said:
I'm kind of surprised the calf lived as long as it did. With that kind of frostbite I would have thought the body temp would be so low that it would have died immediately.
I'm tried warming calves and it sure seems like it's hard to find a reliable way to do it. A few start to get active and as soon as they do, they get a spot of blood from the nostril and they die. Others do just fine and don't even have frostbite. Tough to lose one to the cold. Are these unusual temps for you?
Click to expand...
It's not, but it's been a couple years since we had colder winter and such temps for longer than a day or so. Everybody had forgotten how it used to be before.
It was around 15° F at that time with a windchill at the day time and around 5°F in the night. She was a very bright calf, but her mom being a jerk on the first day was the biggest issue. She is on the cull list now. Might get to have a calf, max two, but will plan her calving in spring, when won't need to deal with her character closely. And that's only because that she is a very young cow and has good genetics.
The coat was probably the main thing keeping calf alive as it was warm under it.
 
At those temperatures do you have trouble with chapped or frostbit teats from the calves nursing in cold weather?
 

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