Bull got in with heifers

[Bovine Part Time]

My bull got in with two of my heifers that are about a year old. He was only in one day but don't want too take any chances of them being bred , would like to give them a shot of Lute. Do I need a RX from a vet to buy it or can it bought over counter . Were can you buy it ?

 

[backhoeboogie]

You can buy it several places but an RX is required. The last I got was from Valley Vet. Jeffers on line may have it.

 

[TCRanch]

Valley Vet, Jeffers, AtoZ, . . most of them have it but yes, RX. There's also Lutalyse hi-con, which is 2cc IM or SQ instead of 5cc IM with "regular" Lute.
https://www.valleyvet.com/ct_detail.htm ... EA1B9CEE59

 

[snoopdog]

How many heat cycles have they had and how big/what kind ?

 

[Fire Sweep Ranch]

If you can watch them, and see if they cycle in three weeks, that is the cheapest and easiest. Put an estrotect patch on them. No heat in 3 weeks, then lute.

 

[farmerjan]

With regular lute make sure you wait at least10 days to 2 weeks after the bull got in before you give the shot. Given too soon it might not work. My vet has always said 10 days post breeding minimum. There has to be a CL for the lute to "dissolve". Are you sure they were in heat or did the bull just go visiting? I would do as suggested and put a heat patch on them, wait to see if they come in heat in 3 weeks. Are you sure they are even cycling? They should be but some breeds don't cycle young.

Yes it is vet Rx but if you have a good relationship with a vet, then just tell him and ours will just sell us a bottle, or even 2 shots. It's 5 cc per shot for the regular. And Lute is not that expensive either.

 

[JMJ Farms]

Unless there's a reason you don't want them need to that particular bull, why not just let them calve if they are indeed bred? If they are already a year old.

 

[bse]

my experience they dont just visit, wait 10 to 14 days spend the 4 dollars give em a shot, no worries. for me calving at 19 to
21 months would be to young if i could avoid it

 

[TCRanch]

Unless there's a reason you don't want them need to that particular bull, why not just let them calve if they are indeed bred? If they are already a year old.

Just my personal experience but getting bred as 12 months vs 15 can make a huge difference - and not in a good way, even if they've been pelvic measured & it happens to be a calving ease bull. Got the t-shirt! There's also the possibility the OP has a defined calving season & this could throw it (and the heifer) off.

 

[farmerjan]

Agree with both bse and TCRanch. But we had a bull that would go visiting and then go back "home. Maybe he was checking out the possibility of a new girlfriend? I agree to not want a heifer calving at 18-20 months. But we calve a little older than some and it works for us. Like them to be 27-30 at first calving... then they keep on keeping on from there in 99% of those heifers. We use an easy calving bull, they pop them out, MOTHER them, and go from there. And we do have defined calving seasons for our cows, but the lines do get blurred a bit when we buy cattle.

 

[BigBear]

Unless there's a reason you don't want them need to that particular bull, why not just let them calve if they are indeed bred? If they are already a year old.

Just my personal experience but getting bred as 12 months vs 15 can make a huge difference - and not in a good way, even if they've been pelvic measured & it happens to be a calving ease bull. Got the t-shirt! There's also the possibility the OP has a defined calving season & this could throw it (and the heifer) off.

On subject but off topic, I have a neighbor that has about 250 brood cows and he mentioned to me in the past that as long as they are 800 lbs at breeding, he doesn't care how young they get bred. Seems to defy conventional wisdom but he is highly successful and has a fantastic herd. All registered black angus, cow/calf/feedlot. Does it all in house. I would be interested in hearing everyone's comments.

 

[bse]

neighbors bull got in with my yrling heifers last thursday, pop said ahhh i didnt see him breed anything, i said im sure he didnt visit and go back home( he did go back) they get a shot anyway, so yesterday bull is back, i see him breedn my heifer, deffinetly a shot for them all in 2 weeks. great neighbor so im not crazy mad, few shots all is good.

Around here early breeedn would just throw me all out of whack, I really dont believe that the heifer calving at 20 months really reaches her potential, always behind. I dont think the calf will reach its potential, hard enough on a heifer anyway, maybe sacraficing 150lb for the 3 months is worth it to some, dont know,

JMO no articles to back it up, i have seen the early bred heifers just stay behind, it does happen that they are bred early.

 

[TCRanch]

Unless there's a reason you don't want them need to that particular bull, why not just let them calve if they are indeed bred? If they are already a year old.

Just my personal experience but getting bred as 12 months vs 15 can make a huge difference - and not in a good way, even if they've been pelvic measured & it happens to be a calving ease bull. Got the t-shirt! There's also the possibility the OP has a defined calving season & this could throw it (and the heifer) off.

On subject but off topic, I have a neighbor that has about 250 brood cows and he mentioned to me in the past that as long as they are 800 lbs at breeding, he doesn't care how young they get bred. Seems to defy conventional wisdom but he is highly successful and has a fantastic herd. All registered black angus, cow/calf/feedlot. Does it all in house. I would be interested in hearing everyone's comments.

How many does he have to pull? How many calves &/or heifers does he lose? How many of those heifers breed back & are they stunted? "Successful" is subjective. If it's working for him, that's great. Personally I wouldn't risk my heifers.

 

[TCRanch]

neighbors bull got in with my yrling heifers last thursday, pop said ahhh i didnt see him breed anything, i said im sure he didnt visit and go back home( he did go back) they get a shot anyway, so yesterday bull is back, i see him breedn my heifer, deffinetly a shot for them all in 2 weeks. great neighbor so im not crazy mad, few shots all is good.

Around here early breeedn would just throw me all out of whack, I really dont believe that the heifer calving at 20 months really reaches her potential, always behind. I dont think the calf will reach its potential, hard enough on a heifer anyway, maybe sacraficing 150lb for the 3 months is worth it to some, dont know,

JMO no articles to back it up, i have seen the early bred heifers just stay behind, it does happen that they are bred early.

One of my heifers had an oops baby this year, despite Lute & preg checked by my vet (it happens!). Hard pull but she & her enormous calf are doing fine except she hasn't bred back.

 

[JMJ Farms]

Reading the OP I took "about a year old" to mean about a year old. Plus 9 months equals 21 months at calving. Not ideal I agree. "About a year old" could mean 9 months or 14 months. I shouldn't have assumed that it literally meant 'one year old'. I usually try to breed at 15 months so as to have calves born at 24 months old. Just don't want any confusion and to clearly state I don't advocate heifers calving at 18 months old. Defined calving season would be an issue as well.

FWIW, I've read that you want heifers to calve as close to two years old as possible without being over two years old due to the fact that at two years of age a heifers pelvic bones fuse into place and don't have the ability to "open any extra" afterwards. Now common sense tells me that this "fusing" doesn't happen precisely on the day she turns two years old. Which brings me to my question. Is this a guideline? Or does she really need to calve before two years old?

I've calves them at 20 months and at dang near 3 years old (heifers that I bought off a farm with an infertile bull). Had no major issues with either and from personal experience the older heifers have performed much better but I have a limited number in that category on which to base this conclusion.

 

[TCRanch]

JMJ, the following is quoted by Lucky P from an older thread.

The pelvic bones - and in particular, the pubic symphysis(the ventral suture where the pelvic bones come together), fuse/ossify at around 27 months of age. So...if you can manage to get a heifer bred to calve before 27 months, there's a little more 'wiggle room' available for a little larger calf or less likelihood of dystocia, due to the extra amount of 'give' available - and once the unfused pelvis is 'stretched out' by delivery of a calf, it doesn't quite 'go back to its previous size' - pelvic area remains a bit larger from then on. But, after 27 months of age, those bones will have fused, and there's just less space available. So...if you've got an older, fatter heifer with fused pelvic bones, you may encounter increased incidence of dystocia.

 

[JMJ Farms]

Thank you TC. Very informative. Never heard 27 months. Always heard two years. Makes more sense now. Thanks again. Hubby about recouperated?

 

[BigBear]

Just my personal experience but getting bred as 12 months vs 15 can make a huge difference - and not in a good way, even if they've been pelvic measured & it happens to be a calving ease bull. Got the t-shirt! There's also the possibility the OP has a defined calving season & this could throw it (and the heifer) off.

On subject but off topic, I have a neighbor that has about 250 brood cows and he mentioned to me in the past that as long as they are 800 lbs at breeding, he doesn't care how young they get bred. Seems to defy conventional wisdom but he is highly successful and has a fantastic herd. All registered black angus, cow/calf/feedlot. Does it all in house. I would be interested in hearing everyone's comments.

How many does he have to pull? How many calves &/or heifers does he lose? How many of those heifers breed back & are they stunted? "Successful" is subjective. If it's working for him, that's great. Personally I wouldn't risk my heifers.

I wholeheartedly agree on the successful part. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I don't know all the specifics of his business but he's said if he has to pull a calf or "one looks at me a way I don't like" he culls. He did loose several calves this winter but they were unassisted and born live. We had a hard stretch in late January/early February. This approach seems to work for him but I was shocked to hear that

 

[BigBear]

JMJ, the following is quoted by Lucky P from an older thread.

The pelvic bones - and in particular, the pubic symphysis(the ventral suture where the pelvic bones come together), fuse/ossify at around 27 months of age. So...if you can manage to get a heifer bred to calve before 27 months, there's a little more 'wiggle room' available for a little larger calf or less likelihood of dystocia, due to the extra amount of 'give' available - and once the unfused pelvis is 'stretched out' by delivery of a calf, it doesn't quite 'go back to its previous size' - pelvic area remains a bit larger from then on. But, after 27 months of age, those bones will have fused, and there's just less space available. So...if you've got an older, fatter heifer with fused pelvic bones, you may encounter increased incidence of dystocia.

I agree, great information. Thanks TC

 

[TCRanch]

Now I'm on a roll. Following is a copy/paste from one of my threads a couple years ago about why I always have my heifers pelvic measured. And BigBear, keep in mind these heifers were 10/11 months old at the time, wouldn't be bred until 15 months so still a low of growing (referencing your neighbors' 800 lb gauge). Big heifers & big butts don't always equal a big pelvic measurement:

Sometimes small things come in big packages. Vet was out yesterday to BANGS, pelvic measure & administer the 5 way VL5 on our replacement heifers.
Rear end #1 is almost 11 months old, weighs appx 720 lbs, scored a solid 160 & comes from a lineage of easy, early calving.
Rear end #2 is almost 10 months old, weighs appx 665 lbs, scored a pitiful 121 but is from a 1st calf heifer from the same lineage as #1. Obviously she didn't make the cut.
Rear end #3 is 11 months old, appx 710 lbs & also scored 121. What????!!! Vet measured a 2nd time because even he was surprised. Her lineage is awesome: always has the highest scores of the replacement heifers and generally the first to calve, great bags, raises great calves . . . the whole package and I've retained every heifer. Until now. And what's really puzzling is last year her sister scored 170 & they have the same sire.

So my $.02: pelvic measurements are absolutely worth it! I would have kept that third heifer without giving it a 2nd thought and ended up with a train wreck.