Belgian blue cattle

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An example of a calf out of bluex cow. Sired by double muscled breed bull - Parthenaise. Liveweight/ carcass weight - 66%. Born very small and plain. Looked nothing too exceptional as a calf as well.
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Double muscling has quite a few different gene varriants, which are common for individual breeds. Not all varriants increase trouble at calving. Also noticed that the same varriant can work differently in different breeds. For example, belgian blue and parthenaise can have the same nt821 varriation, but calving easy in not the same. Alot depends what kind of double muscle genes are in a bull and in a cow. You can safely work with double muscling, but you need some general knowledge about it and know the animals you work with.
Belgian blues can be easy calving as well and just like any breed there are some lines safe at calving, average and some cow killers.
 
Two bluex dairy heifers. Same sire, different colour dams. Pictured at around 3months age. One from the husband's cow and one bought from the client.
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Only seen three calves by the new bull this year from dairy cows. All were born very small. Gonna have the first calves from the beef cows by the same bull, so hopefully again will have easy calvings and small calves.
 
what breeds do you use when you're not selecting bb as the sire... still double-muscled or something else?

I saw quite a lot of these calves out of Friesian cows in the UK in the 90's, and much more recently they've been popular to use over dairy in New Zealand, in both cases marketed as an easy calving option. Never used them myself; I have used a handful of straws of the European dairy breeds over the years (montbeliard, abondance, VikingRed and a couple of Brown Swiss bulls from Germany) and in all cases the calves are larger and taller than the average so I'm relatively careful which cows get those pregnancies as they can cause problems.
 
regolith said:
what breeds do you use when you're not selecting bb as the sire... still double-muscled or something else?

I saw quite a lot of these calves out of Friesian cows in the UK in the 90's, and much more recently they've been popular to use over dairy in New Zealand, in both cases marketed as an easy calving option. Never used them myself; I have used a handful of straws of the European dairy breeds over the years (montbeliard, abondance, VikingRed and a couple of Brown Swiss bulls from Germany) and in all cases the calves are larger and taller than the average so I'm relatively careful which cows get those pregnancies as they can cause problems.
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Belgian blues are most often used on dairy cows, which will be culled after that one last calf. Dairy farmers usually use dairy breeds, rarely beef, like limousin, angus, hereford. Most common dairy breeds are holsteins or pretty much any other black and white or red and white breeds, and maybe jerseys. Dairy simmental, normande, montbeliarde, swiss are less common. Not sure why as they are considered more suitable for grazing and quite alot of dairy farmers are still grazing their herds.
My husband has some dairy cows left as his previous plan was to build a dairy farm, but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero. Using belgian blues on mature dairy cows to get some xbred heifers as they make phenomenal sucklers and using less popular dairy breeds on dairy heifers to get some more fleshy offspring for selling or get some heifers, which will produce good calves when crossed with beef breeds.
All european cattle have higher birth weights I guess, which is considered normal and average here. Jerseys have one of the smallest calves and here they are born at around 60-70lbs. Holsteins can weigh 90+lbs. Beef calves are on average around 80-110lbs. A big range, but anything in that range is considered normal depending from the breed.
 
lithuanian farmer said:
Belgian blues are most often used on dairy cows, which will be culled after that one last calf. Dairy farmers usually use dairy breeds, rarely beef, like limousin, angus, hereford. Most common dairy breeds are holsteins or pretty much any other black and white or red and white breeds, and maybe jerseys. Dairy simmental, normande, montbeliarde, swiss are less common. Not sure why as they are considered more suitable for grazing and quite alot of dairy farmers are still grazing their herds.
My husband has some dairy cows left as his previous plan was to build a dairy farm, but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero. Using belgian blues on mature dairy cows to get some xbred heifers as they make phenomenal sucklers and using less popular dairy breeds on dairy heifers to get some more fleshy offspring for selling or get some heifers, which will produce good calves when crossed with beef breeds.
All european cattle have higher birth weights I guess, which is considered normal and average here. Jerseys have one of the smallest calves and here they are born at around 60-70lbs. Holsteins can weigh 90+lbs. Beef calves are on average around 80-110lbs. A big range, but anything in that range is considered normal depending from the breed.
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Not sure what you know of dairy in the States, but I have three dairies within 50 miles and they all run about 6,000 cows which never see grass in their entire life. They live on silage and a dairy mix of grain when they are lactating. And these are pretty small dairies from what I understand.
 
lithuanian farmer said:
Belgian blues are most often used on dairy cows, which will be culled after that one last calf. Dairy farmers usually use dairy breeds, rarely beef, like limousin, angus, hereford. Most common dairy breeds are holsteins or pretty much any other black and white or red and white breeds, and maybe jerseys. Dairy simmental, normande, montbeliarde, swiss are less common. Not sure why as they are considered more suitable for grazing and quite alot of dairy farmers are still grazing their herds.
My husband has some dairy cows left as his previous plan was to build a dairy farm, but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero. Using belgian blues on mature dairy cows to get some xbred heifers as they make phenomenal sucklers and using less popular dairy breeds on dairy heifers to get some more fleshy offspring for selling or get some heifers, which will produce good calves when crossed with beef breeds.
All european cattle have higher birth weights I guess, which is considered normal and average here. Jerseys have one of the smallest calves and here they are born at around 60-70lbs. Holsteins can weigh 90+lbs. Beef calves are on average around 80-110lbs. A big range, but anything in that range is considered normal depending from the breed.
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That's a shame about dairy but to be fair, it's a big part of the reason why British farmers have ended up in New Zealand over the last few decades. Dairying in NZ had methods that allowed young farmers to start at the bottom, progress to herd-owning share-milkers and then buy their own farm. It's become much harder to do that in recent years but presumably still possible.
Using beef over dairy is very common here. Angus and black white-face calves sell well, everything else struggles a bit to make the same money but Charolais, Belgian Blue, Murray Grey sired calves are common also Speckle Park was very popular for a while. I use Gelbvieh over Jersey but I don't try to sell them, they go direct to meat off the farm so their reddish blond coats aren't judged.

I used a few straws of a Normande bull as well. Got one young cow about 4 years old fully white/brown speckles appearance and a 2 yr old this year who is a tall brindle. Neither are particularly good milkers, but the last time I had a vet in for vaccinations she saw the speckled one and declared that the prettiest cow she ever saw. I don't think I'll be going back to that breed but it will be interesting to see how they mature - some slow maturing breeds can make excellent old cows.
 
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Some of the dairies I tested have used different ones of the "grazing breeds"... I had one that had some real good milking Montbeliarde crosses that stayed "fat" and milked exceptionally well. Have some that have also used the Normande and I think they all did well.
With the push for "black" to go on the feedlots and all that for CAB, most that use some beef will use black angus, black limi, and black simmental. There are a bunch of black half and quarter breed "beef cows" around... and if you keep breeding them back black, they milk good and do an okay job of raising some calves.
 
There's a whole lot of black cows in this county that have pretty little refined Jersey heads and necks. They raise good black calves.

Lithuanian farmer, please explain politics? "but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero "
 
TexasJerseyMilker said:
There's a whole lot of black cows in this county that have pretty little refined Jersey heads and necks. They raise good black calves.

Lithuanian farmer, please explain politics? "but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero "
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EU green initiatives make dairies almost impossible
 
TexasJerseyMilker said:
There's a whole lot of black cows in this county that have pretty little refined Jersey heads and necks. They raise good black calves.

Lithuanian farmer, please explain politics? "but with current politics it will be almost impossible to start dairy farm from zero "
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High requirements, constant fluctuations of the price of the milk and often very low. Sometimes it can be as low as 0,12€ for a litre. Sometimes even less at certain times if you produce smaller amount of milk.
 

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