4 month old Bull

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simskop

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What do you think of this bull calve. He was born the first week of April, so that make him about 4 months old. Best I can guess, he weighs 500-525 range. He is out of a Red Simmental bull. Cow has Simmental in her but not purebred. I bought the cow 4 years ago, she calves at the end of my spring calving, but seems to raise the biggest calve. No creep feed, only fescue and mothers milk.
I thought I might keep him around as a backup, or just to see how he will turn out.
 
That is quite some sack for a 4 month old, he has probably suckled his sire as well.
 
Well lets say it was April Fools Day!

Birth weight of 100 poiunds.

All of April, all of May, all of June, all of July and then 10 days in August.

Without looking at the calendar to see what months have 31 days - I am going to go 30 days all months - so this calf is now 130 days old - plus or minus a couple days.

If it gained 3.5 pounds per day from birth it would weigh 455 plus the birth weight.

Mister I would say yu have some dandy genetics over there in your place.

Pretty well developed calf for that age.

But I refer you back to my opening line - are you trying to pull the wool over our eyes?

Something does not seem quite kosher here (appropriate comment as I am sitting in Israel at present)

:lol:

Bez+
 
Terminal calves are designed to be terminal. Unless you breed him back to his half sister then you have no hope of reproducing him.
I do not think this bull could make any genetic improvement on your herd, which should be your goal, if you have one.
Breeding for a bull should be planned for the outcome. Then only one in ten might make the grade.
 
Like I said I am guessing at the weight, but I don't think I can be that fare off, maybe I am 25 lbs over, but there is no way he is lighter then 475 lbs. The first year I had the cow, she weaned a very large calf. I don't know exactly what it weighed, because it sold with 5 other calves, but they averaged 667 lb right off the cows. These cows where bred when I bought them. The calves were 7 to 8 months old when I sold them. The next year, she had a bull calf that got caught up in some brush in the creek. I had two friends out there hunting, they saw it, and pulled it up to level ground. It was too late, been there down hill to long. When they called me to tell me what happened they thought it was a 4 or 5 month old calve, when in fact it was only 2 months old. Last year she had a heifer in April. I never pulled her out of the cow herd last year. The cow weaned her off herself and I just let her run with the cows till the end of March I brought her and a couple of others to my house. She at this moment is 16 months old, and has to weigh around 1050 to 1100 lbs.
All that being said, I think I just have one freak cow with explosive growth genetics. I am keeping the heifer for sure. The bull calve seemed like it was on track to have the high weaning weight and yearling weight that most people require to consider a bull for a herd bull? I didn't weigh him at birth, but I don't think he was around 90 lbs. I did have a couple closer to 100 lbs, born 1 or 2 months before this guy, that he now out weighs.
 
TNMasterBeefProducer":3fy8ijmj said:
Bez+":3fy8ijmj said:
Well lets say it was April Fools Day!

Birth weight of 100 poiunds.

All of April, all of May, all of June, all of July and then 10 days in August.

Without looking at the calendar to see what months have 31 days - I am going to go 30 days all months - so this calf is now 130 days old - plus or minus a couple days.

If it gained 3.5 pounds per day from birth it would weigh 455 plus the birth weight.

Mister I would say yu have some dandy genetics over there in your place.

Pretty well developed calf for that age.

But I refer you back to my opening line - are you trying to pull the wool over our eyes?

Something does not seem quite kosher here (appropriate comment as I am sitting in Israel at present)

:lol:

Bez+
Click to expand...

Either that or an even more likely scenario would be his records are wrong.
Click to expand...

Sorry I am not pulling anyone's leg, and no chance I am wrong about the particulars. I probably will band him. I just bought a new Homozygous Black Simmental bull. I only have 20 mother cows, and really don't need a second bull other then to just how he would turn out.
 
I forgot to say, we have had a really good year here in southwest Missouri. It has rained steady all year long. Record rain falls but they are spaced out nicely, and the day I took those pictures, was the hottest day of the year at a little over 100 degrees. It has already cooled down considerably by this weekend.
 
Consider these "given" facts:

To "keep him around as a backup, or just to see how he will turn out" is a poor business decision. He will cost you money in feed, space, hay, and effort for not a profitable benefit. He is a crossbred bull with questionable genetics, questionable ancestory, and questionable future (one which has no verifiable background statistics to justify your retaining him.) It is inadvisable to retain a bull calf (particularly one which has no better phenotype than this one, and NO EPD's to reflect his potential as a herd bull), which you DON'T need, without KNOWING everything possible about his potential.

You said that you just bought a Homozygous Black Simmental bull, and that you have only 20 cows. My suggestion to you would be to really determine what kind of beef operation you want to engage in, and focus on that target, instead of playing "Button, button, who's got the button" with unknown Genetics, and perhaps sell this "unknown" commodity and several of your lesser quality cows, and buy some cows which will compliment your new bull! That way, you will have a reasonably good expectation of realizing a PROFIT from your beef cattle operation - as long as you have a practical goal in mind, and focus on the realities of practical decisions.

Sell this calf.

Welcome to the CattleToday Forum!

DOC HARRIS
 
I don't think he's herd bull material, especially as I am not into composite bulls. However, I don't consider it out of the question for the calf to be near 500 pounds at this age, especially if he had a whopper birthweight. Some of those old time Simmentals had 150# or heavier calves.

I've owned a herdsire before who weaned at an actual 740# at 188 days, 70# BW and no creep. I have total confidence in the integrity of the breeder. If a bull calf weans below 600#, he gets emasculated in their operation. Selection pressure like that does work.

It has been a great year for rain in this area, but even a great year makes my old lease just passable. However, I do have a bull calf born on Good Friday that I will be surprised if he doesn't weigh 500 or above now. His dam is a heavy milker, and in prime production age at nearly 8. The calf weighed 100# at birth, and I'll let you judge his development shortly if all goes as planned, as the pics have been developed and are ready for pickup.
 

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