I disagree also w/ the 25/1 ratio. A friend of mine has 42 black Angus cows. I'm not sure of the split but he has them split into 2 groups. A bulls first season he splits Herd into 3 groups. But anyway he has 2 calving seasons, and the bull has 2 mating seasons. He has told me the numbers but I cant remember them. Its hard for me to tell his success ratio cause if after 14 months after the bull has been with them and she does'nt drop or show thats going to drop he sells her and buys another. I cant go into detail cause at the time when he explained it to me I could careless.
You don't have to agree with our management, that's okay. But, if you were to break down the numbers that you posted from your neighbor there, the ratio would be 1:21 essentially. So, perhaps there is some knowledge behind this. And apparently you leave your bull in year-round and calves are produced willy nilly, if at all. 98% has been the lowest conception rate we've had and we have a 30-60 day calving period for the entire herd.
No wonder the poor thing's ding dong broke - that's a lot of work!
I'm wondering about the coyote thing. You said earlier that you thought coyotes were getting the calves and then talked about this electric fence that stops them from entering the pasture. I think something else is going on here. A mountain lion drags its kill off, hides it and comes back for it later. If it was a mountain lion, you wouldn't see the calf there - but you would see tracks or drag marks. (In my experience.)