11 Month Old Bull too young?

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Douglas

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I a considering purchasing a young bull that was born last June. He is at least 500 lbs. now. Would he be too young to breed 25 cows by May?
 
Douglas":2rqhjvbn said:
I a considering purchasing a young bull that was born last June. He is at least 500 lbs. now. Would he be too young to breed 25 cows by May?

Yes, yes, and yes. Even if he gained 4 lbs/day for the next 150 days, he would only be up to 1100 lbs. 25 cows is too many to stick with a yearling anyway. Most bulls that are used as a yearling are really 15 months old when they are turned in with cows the first time. To breed 25 cows, you really need at a minimum an 18 month old bull, but a 2 year old would be even better.

A yearling bull shouldn't breed anymore than 15 or so cows in his first year. Put him with too many cows and you will get your cows spread out in their calving, and it could stunt the bull's growth if he is left with them for too long.

You need an older bull, you are asking for disaster if you do this.
 
An 11 month old bull usually can settle a cow, but he is too young to use as the risk of open cows is just too big. If he can't quite reach with ease the risk of injury to the bull is also too high.

I have personaly used an 11 month old as a clean up sire on a handfull of cows, but that was out of desperation rather than good stockmanship skills. A young bull that has to work at a young age may temporarily be slowed down as far as growth goes, but they almost all get over it again with rest and good nutrition.

I have no qualms using a 14-15 month old bull on 25-30 cows and do that almost every year, but I still advise all my customers to use yearling bulls on no more cows than their own age in months at the start of the breeding season.
 
Douglas":277dhyxl said:
I a considering purchasing a young bull that was born last June. He is at least 500 lbs. now. Would he be too young to breed 25 cows by May?

Yes! Where are you getting 11 month's with a bull that was born last June? :???:
 
Along with Knersie,

I've always seen/heard/practiced the old saying only use a first time breeder (read yearling bull) on the amount of cows he is months old. I normally go one further and only let yearlings breed 6 or 8 just to see what they will produce - to prove themselves.
 
Another rule of thumb is that if he is a decent quality bull, he should weigh 100#/month of age. He is 7 months old, should weight at least 700# if bull quality.
Douglas, since you are asking this question, I would guess you are not experienced enough to feed him to gain 4#/day. That is asking a lot of the feeder and the animal.
Yes, he would/could breed your cows. But, are you willing to have open cows & cows bred spread out over many months? And are you willing to put out that much $$ to raise him properly?
 

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