Breeding/calving? One or two?

[Double R Ranch]

We are evaluating our breeding/ calving season and are in a heated debate as to weather we should have one breeding/calving season or two. We are getting large enough now that I am thinking it would be easier to spread it out a bit.

We have first year heifers that we would like to wait til they are atleast 16+mts old to give them the extra growth time. However we don't want to wait an extra year to breed them.

When (what time of year) do you all shoot for calving and breeding?

What do you all do?

 

[Farmhand]

We run 2 seasons. Our reasoning is 1) if a cow comes up open unexpectedly or looses a calf, we can move her to the next breeding season without waiting a whole year. 2) means we only have to own 1 bull instead of 2 to cover all our girls because he only breeds half in spring and the other half in fall.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

Currently have one season, but beginning in the fall of 2007, will have 2, "spring" and "fall".

Where I work, they have 2, "spring" and "fall".

Katherine

 

[El_Putzo]

We run 2 seasons for the same reasons as Farmhand. It also makes it so that you get a paycheck more than once a year. Keeps us from having all of our eggs in one basket so to speak.

Calving seasons for us run:
Spring - 2/15 to 5/15
Fall - 8/15 to 11/15

 

[CowCop]

~

One calving season.

And it just started.

A little late this year, but its a good thing.
Better weather for sure~!!

 

[Double R Ranch]

~

One calving season.

And it just started.

A little late this year, but its a good thing.
Better weather for sure~!!

Feel free not to answer but we are curious if you have a larger herd? We did fine with a smaller herd and one season.

Double R

 

[CowCop]

Feel free not to answer but we are curious if you have a larger herd? We did fine with a smaller herd and one season.

I will always answer questions, I don't have the hangups that others do about size of their herds and acres. Details are part of the education all of us are trying to gain. Being able to compare size and management helps tremendously.

For THIS area it is considered a big herd, however it is itty bitty compared to other regions.

We have 50 cows, 6 heifers PLUS another 10-20 "boarders"
who sometimes use our bull as well. On 663 pristine acres.
And we are growing as well.

How big was your cow herd when you were small ?
How many now ? Acres ?

 

[endebt]

We have two calving seasons. one is Feb to 1st week in Apr. The second is Sept to 1st week of Nov. We expect our cows to calve in 45 days. It has helped every time. The ones that calve late had better have a good reason or they are on the trailer.

 

[norriscathy]

We have two breeding seasons for the same reasons as the other posts. Since we keep our own replacement heifers it also allows us to breed them at around 18-20 months which is a BIG plus for cutting down on calving problems and re breeding for that second calf.Everything just seems to fit with two seasons. We work cows every six months and get two paychecks a year. You also don't have to wait a full year to see if a cow caught or not. You can get rid of her before she eats another six months of groceries!

Norris

 

[Double R Ranch]

You have a much bigger opperation than we do at this point. We are growing, but in my opinion not fast enough. We are currently running 20+ on 80 acres. We are looking to move fairly soon and are looking for atleast 1000 acres. Where we are living now just won't support what we want. Just waiting it out. City is close.
When we had under 10 calving at a time it was not a big deal to have them spread out but it was still an issue to have the previous years calves big enough by breeding season.

 

[Double R Ranch]

We have two calving seasons. one is Feb to 1st week in Apr. The second is Sept to 1st week of Nov. We expect our cows to calve in 45 days. It has helped every time. The ones that calve late had better have a good reason or they are on the trailer.

That is exactly the seasons we are looking at. How do you work out your vac. program around that program.
Our vet has us on a:
Vac breeding cows and bulls prior to breeding
vac. whole herd 2 times durring the year (every 6 months)
and all calves are vac. at 8 weeks and 12 weeks
The problems we are having is that they are being born several a week for 3 months.

How do you all work that.

Double R

 

[randiliana]

We have 2 calving seasons. We used to have only one, but then BSE came along, and we couldn't justify sending our good young cows down the road for less than $200. So we started breeding for fall too. Now, it comes in handy to have a few calves to sell in the spring.

 

[msscamp]

One calving season - usually starts mid-March, but this year it started mid-February because the bulls went out a month early. Oh, well! :lol: :lol: 60-90 day breeding season starting the latter part of May. The herd was cut back to around 50 head 6 years ago due to the retirement of my folks, but even when we were running more we still only had 1 calving season - it just started mid-February.

 

[SEC]

I have noticed a lot of people have written having their heifers bigger for less calving problems.

Have you had calving problems?
Is the added cost worth it?
Why not sell the calves and buy bred heifers/cows?

In a regular routine with Jan/Feb calving when the bull goes out the heifers will be at minimum 13 months maximum 15 months. Why wouldn't they be big enough then?

Heifer calves can be grown out reasonably without excess fat. It's well worth it as if they hit grass in decent shape they will come in the fall in good shape. Our heifers are in reasonable flesh when we wean, without creep feed and they keep that way all summer.

 

[ENNOT]

We are going to have 2 calving season this year. We recently bought 14 head last November and bred them to start calving in September. We will see how it goes, but it seems like a good way to keep cash flow and get more use out of the bulls. Our biggest problem will be to keep the fall calvers from getting too fat since we run on irrigated circles.

 

[randiliana]

I have noticed a lot of people have written having their heifers bigger for less calving problems.

Have you had calving problems?
Is the added cost worth it?
Why not sell the calves and buy bred heifers/cows?

Bigger heifers usually equal less calving problems because they are more developed, and have more room inside them.

The added cost is well worth it.

And the biggest reason to keep your own calves is genetics. You know what you are keeping. You aren't buying someone else's problems. Most of the time a heifer is sold for a reason. Could be that they needed money or that the animal just didn't fit for what ever reason. Or it could be that she didn't grow as well, or that her mother had problems such as bad feet, bad udder, temprament, vaginal prolapse, or any other number of reasons. There are good cattle feeders out there that can take a small calf in the fall, feed her out well, breed her and then sell her to you the next fall as a bred heifer. Some of them will probably make a good cow, but a lot will not cut it. It is hard enough getting good cows when you know what you are starting out with let alone when you start out with stock you know nothing about.

Now having said that, our whole herd started out as "trader cattle" some of them had 5 brands on them by the time they were 2 years old!! It has taken us about 10 years to get to where we have very few cows that don't pull their own weight. And, we had one year where we culled 15/20 heifers that we bought the fall before. They either didn't raise much of a calf, or came up dry....

 

[SEC]

How else would you know that your genetics and breeding plans actually work?