Capacity

[ABrauny]

I was nosing around on the 5barx website and I ran across a post where someone commented about someones cattle having nice sprung ribs, but not deep like a tub of guts. Now as I understand it capacity has the dimensions of how deep the heart girth is(top to bottom), how well sprung the ribs are, and how wide the ribs are side to side. Am I wrong?

 

[novatech]

I have always believed that capacity was the volume of food an animal could hold, length X width X height. This would connotate to more gut therefore better, more efficient foraging ability. Girth had more to do with heart and/or lung.

 

[Nite Hawk]

Think you are right, but not everyone likes deep bodied cattle.
I think you will find people who like deep
bodied cattle ( capacity ) especially in the dairy cattle, as they have to have the ability to eat a mountian of feed to produce a whole "whack" of milk, and have room to carry a calf on top of everything. Now there are some cattle who have a "pot belly" instead of capacity and it is frowned on in the show circles, as it doesn't look nice and indicates low muscle tone (and usually a big appetite)!.
Pesonally I like a deeper bodied animal both in beef and dairy, as it often seems ( but not always,- but in general) the deeper bodied animals tend to have a deeper more muscled "twist" also, in the rear end, in beef cattle, than "shotgun" bodied cattle.
That said, the trend in this area in the Limo breed seems to be towards the "shotgun" bodies, with the double muscled rear end.
To each his own I guess...
Nite Hawk

 

[ABrauny]

So how do we differentiate between an animal just being pot bellied from an animal having true capacity?

 

[ALACOWMAN]

just a quick reach and copy,, the red heifers in the 2nd pictures are what i think of as capacity....pot gut cattle,, will look out of proportion...... like a beer gut, on a skinny man and are easily recognized :cowboy: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=79599#p954402

 

[ABrauny]

just a quick reach and copy,, the red heifers in the 2nd pictures are what i think of as capacity....pot gut cattle,, will look out of proportion...... like a beer gut, on a skinny man and are easily recognized :cowboy: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=79599#p954402

Makes sense to me.

 

[TexasBred]

just a quick reach and copy,, the red heifers in the 2nd pictures are what i think of as capacity....pot gut cattle,, will look out of proportion...... like a beer gut, on a skinny man and are easily recognized :cowboy: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=79599#p954402

:cry2: And all this time I thought I had "Capacity". :frowns:

 

[ALACOWMAN]

just a quick reach and copy,, the red heifers in the 2nd pictures are what i think of as capacity....pot gut cattle,, will look out of proportion...... like a beer gut, on a skinny man and are easily recognized :cowboy: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=79599#p954402

:cry2: And all this time I thought I had "Capacity". :frowns:

:cowboy:

 

[bigbull338]

thw same goes for beef cattle as well.if they dont have much capacity,they will spend more time eating.thus less time time chewing their cuds.capacity also allows them to gain weigh quicker.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

thw same goes for beef cattle as well.if they dont have much capacity,they will spend more time eating.thus less time time chewing their cuds.capacity also allows them to gain weigh quicker.

:?:

 

[Limomike]

I have always believed that capacity was the volume of food an animal could hold, length X width X height. This would connotate to more gut therefore better, more efficient foraging ability. Girth had more to do with heart and/or lung.

pretty much right on.. Volume is what area it takes up, and capacity is what can be held in that volume. Kinda like if you had a box that was 10x10x10cf on the outside, it doesnt mean it will hold 1000cf on the inside.

 

[bigbull338]

thw same goes for beef cattle as well.if they dont have much capacity,they will spend more time eating.thus less time time chewing their cuds.capacity also allows them to gain weigh quicker.

:?:

i was going from the dairymen point of view on capacity.if a cow dont have it she cant eat enough to produce lots of milk.an its the same for the beef cow,the more she can eat the more milk she should produce for her calf.

 

[Limomike]

thw same goes for beef cattle as well.if they dont have much capacity,they will spend more time eating.thus less time time chewing their cuds.capacity also allows them to gain weigh quicker.

:?:

i was going from the dairymen point of view on capacity.if a cow dont have it she cant eat enough to produce lots of milk.an its the same for the beef cow,the more she can eat the more milk she should produce for her calf.

Yep.. big bag... big calf.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

what threw me was the ""less"" capacity the more time she'll spend eating...like the portly folks, that have the gastric bypass to lose weight... they push back from the table a little earlier than usual