Best of the best

[CowpokeJ]

I'm running Charolais bulls right now on rainbow cattle. I am in the process of uprgrading as my rainbows get ss. Now, I look at all these breeds and each one has the best milkers, the best rog, the best hardiness, etc...you know the drill. I need some experience to help me wade through all of the breeds, Without having to buy a female from each breed and see which one crosses the best on my bulls. Right now, the majority of my calves go to the auction. The Charolais are getting the job done as far as putting on pounds for the sale. I would like to shorten my time from birth to sale weight(4-6 wt). It seems like the hybrid vigor works pretty well. The white charolais type cattle don't have as good of calves. So I need somebodys been there done that story so I can shorten my road to "profitabilty", elusive in the cattle business. I live close to Houston.

 

[oscar p]

solid colored, BEEFMASTER COWS with your CHAROLAIS BULLS. Will get the job done.

 

[Hill Creek Farm]

Rainbow cattle, what are they? Must be a new breed. :cboy:

 

[Frankie]

I'm running Charolais bulls right now on rainbow cattle. I am in the process of uprgrading as my rainbows get ss. Now, I look at all these breeds and each one has the best milkers, the best rog, the best hardiness, etc...you know the drill. I need some experience to help me wade through all of the breeds, Without having to buy a female from each breed and see which one crosses the best on my bulls. Right now, the majority of my calves go to the auction. The Charolais are getting the job done as far as putting on pounds for the sale. I would like to shorten my time from birth to sale weight(4-6 wt). It seems like the hybrid vigor works pretty well. The white charolais type cattle don't have as good of calves. So I need somebodys been there done that story so I can shorten my road to "profitabilty", elusive in the cattle business. I live close to Houston.

Haven't been there, done that, but a good Angus bull will turn your calf crop black. A group of solid colored calves sell better than a mixed group. Angus cross heifers make good replacements and their calves will probably be black unless you breed them to a Charolais bull. The Angus Assn has the AngusSource program that identifies calves sired by a registered Angus bull, as opposed to generic black calves. Good luck....

 

[KenB]

Rainbow cattle, what are they? Must be a new breed. :cboy:

An old and very common breed.

:lol: It must have something to do with the new political correctness now days.

They used to be called Okies ( the mixed color cattle that is ;-) )

 

[Brandonm2]

"Okies"??? We were more politically incorrect than that. We used the term "mongrel" or "duke's mixture" where I am from if it was so crossed up that we couldn't guess the parent breeds by looking at it.

 

[Tod Dague]

It is good to have some Brahman in your cow herd. I would go with Beef master, Brangus, or Brayford. Listed in order of preference.

 

[CowpokeJ]

I run some Beefmaster cross now that seem to have really nice calves. I called them rainbows because I run commercial cattle and have a couple of each cross. Identifiable as to cross but not fancy.

 

[Aero]

Rainbow cattle, what are they? Must be a new breed. :cboy:

An old and very common breed.

the infamous "Commercial" breed. (The most populous breed in the world.)

 

[Pooog1]

I know the Salers cattle has a bad rep. but we have had very good luck with them. We have Salers females and breed them to Charolais bulls. We have been doing this for over 15 years with very good results. The Salers females are very good mothers, have a great udder attachment along with plenty of milk, and are very easy calving. (its not only the bull that needs to be taken into consideration) We use almost all red females and this gives us very nicely colored gold calves. They sell very well and have for years. You can see some pictures of our calves and a 14 year old cow we have on this forum.

http://cattletoday.com/forum/about24027

I have more pictures of other cows and calves if you'd like to see them.

 

[mtnman]

frankie, your inexperience is showing.

In a "Rainbow herd", by using black, you can get greys, brindles, rat tails, curlies.

Not real uniform, but it works in the 2nd generation.

If he uses a red bull, then he won't get the price premium for the few "guaranteed" black calves he gets, but they will be more uniform in color.

mtnman

 

[CowpokeJ]

I know the Salers cattle has a bad rep. but we have had very good luck with them. We have Salers females and breed them to Charolais bulls. We have been doing this for over 15 years with very good results. The Salers females are very good mothers, have a great udder attachment along with plenty of milk, and are very easy calving. (its not only the bull that needs to be taken into consideration) We use almost all red females and this gives us very nicely colored gold calves. They sell very well and have for years. You can see some pictures of our calves and a 14 year old cow we have on this forum.

http://cattletoday.com/forum/about24027

I have more pictures of other cows and calves if you'd like to see them.

Nice looking calves, I'll have to take some pictures of my calves. Mr. Mtn, I'm getting pretty good uniformity with the white bulls. We went out yesterday evening to take a peek and you can tell all the calves are charolais cross. For the most part, they are the same gold as Pooog's.

 

[CowpokeJ]

Has anybody tried Gerts, Gelby's, Braunvieh on Charolais bulls? I like Oscars and Pooogs choices. I'm trying to get the most weight with the least amount of time on teat. The whites are throwing good bone, so I'm happy with that. Everyone I've talked to has metioned the Beefs as really excellent milkers.

 

[Pooog1]

Has anybody tried Gerts, Gelby's, Braunvieh on Charolais bulls? I like Oscars and Pooogs choices. I'm trying to get the most weight with the least amount of time on teat. The whites are throwing good bone, so I'm happy with that. Everyone I've talked to has metioned the Beefs as really excellent milkers.

From my experience, you could run into some problems with calving if your not careful with some of these breeds together. We calve in Feb, March, and April and most of our calves are averaging around the 650-700lb mark. We had a set of twins off of one cow that was 15 last year and they weighed almost 1000lbs combined (bull and heifer). This pulled the cow down quite a bit and we did sell her last fall as well but she did a good job, was even a show heifer in her day. We always sell the second week in October. We had one steer calf last year that was quite discounted and sold like a yearling(1.01lb) because he was over 875lbs. He was born in February, but this cow always has a whopper of a calf. Anyway you could do well with any of these crosses. I know that each breed has their good and bad traits! Good luck! I personally think the most important think with selling calves is to have uniformity within your cattle.

 

[Proverbs 12:10]

Get you some cheap longhorn cows and put the charolais bull on them. You'll get cream colored calves, hardiness, good maternal, efficient foragers, lots of beef, and NO HORNS if the bull is homogenous polled.

 

[Beefy]

Beefmaster x charolais cross calves sure are growthy. other good choices for your area would be brangus and tigerstripes if you can find sane ones. i wouldnt probably stay away from heifers though, just to be on the safe side.

 

[Rustler9]

yep, they'll make you money

 

[CowpokeJ]

Beefmaster x charolais cross calves sure are growthy. other good choices for your area would be brangus and tigerstripes if you can find sane ones. i wouldnt probably stay away from heifers though, just to be on the safe side.

Beefmasters seem to be the central idea, and that's the way I was kinda leanin. I've been bidding on the two internet sales, Harrod Farms and 4B, on livecattlesales.com. Haven't got n e bought right yet...

 

[CowpokeJ]

Get you some cheap longhorn cows and put the charolais bull on them. You'll get cream colored calves, hardiness, good maternal, efficient foragers, lots of beef, and NO HORNS if the bull is homogenous polled.

Yeah, but aren't you going to take a hit at the sale cause you are going to get some spots, I've got two longhorn cross now, and the babies look like charolais cross with longhorn spots. The babies picked up most of the charolais traits.

 

[Stocker Steve]

What crosses give you brindles, and why do they get discounted so bad? I don't see many come through the sales barn and they are usually sold as singles...