Been watching the bull auctions on RFD-TV

[East Caney]

I saw a Hereford bull sale last week and an Angus bull sale this week. I see a lot of bulls come through the ring with a BW epd a point or more lower than the breed average. The auctioneer is yelling "sure shot heifer bull." Then I look at the bottom of the screen and the BW is 90-105 lbs. Is that not a little high to be yelling "heifer bull"?

And, there is some correlation between the epd and the actual weight itself, so how does a bull who's parents give him a low bw epd come out weighing so much? Is that just a weakness in EPDs?

 

[MikeC]

I saw a Hereford bull sale last week and an Angus bull sale this week. I see a lot of bulls come through the ring with a BW epd a point or more lower than the breed average. The auctioneer is yelling "sure shot heifer bull." Then I look at the bottom of the screen and the BW is 90-105 lbs. Is that not a little high to be yelling "heifer bull"?

And, there is some correlation between the epd and the actual weight itself, so how does a bull who's parents give him a low bw epd come out weighing so much? Is that just a weakness in EPDs?

You could feed a cow a lot of extra energy and fat and make the calf weigh dang near as high as you wanted.

I hardly ever pay attention to a bulls' actual BW.

I had one born today that weighed 94 lbs., mostly cause I fed the cows pellets cause I was out of hay. He woulda normally prolly weighed 80-85.

 

[East Caney]

MikeC, I've read a lot on here that talks about the calves growing a lot in the final months of gestation based on what the cow's being fed. So your statement makes good sense.

I understand you don't pay much attention to the birth weights of bulls. How about anyone else? How relevant is the actual birth weight vs. the birth weight EPD? I'd just like to know what some of you others think?

To me (in all my inexperience), I think I put more weight on the EPD, but I'm probably 60/40

 

[IL Rancher]

My neighbor bought an Angus bull from out west a few years back... His EPD was only +3 or so for birthweight (Was not going to be a heifer bull) but his birthweight was pretty high.. 108 or something like that. He had him collected and I used him one year and had 30 some calves out of him.. Didn't have to pull a one, didn't have one over 85-90 pounds which was smaller than the clean up bulls calves who would often hit 100 pounds (1500 pound cows) I wouldn't worry about actual birthweight too much and at least if you see 114 pounds or something like that the person is probably telling the truth because who would li about something like that :lol: Nutrition, what the average weight for that herd at birth is, environment and weather that year all could have a significant impact on calf size one way or the other...

Not saying I would completely ignore actual bw for bull for cows but I would try to weigh in a lot of other factors before making a decision one way or the other. If I was planning on using it for a heifer I would probably be a bit more paranoid and error on the side of caution but that is probably irrational if the EPD for BW was right.

 

[Aero]

i dont know of very many auctioneers who had to pull calves out of those heifer bulls.

 

[cfpinz]

i dont know of very many auctioneers who had to pull calves out of those heifer bulls.

If we lived in an auctioneer's world we'd all be rich, feeders would be the highest they've ever been, and every cow would live 50 years. You can take that to the bank, just ask one. :lol:

cfpinz