Culling and replacing

[Ky hills]

We have been culling fairly heavy and are about to kick it into overdrive and almost completely flip the herd especially the spring calvers, very soon,
Thinking about bringing in a group of heifers, if everything works out.
Haven't totally decided what route to go yet, I like Brahman influenced cattle but, will wait till we move further south to expand that goal. My wife likes Herefords, but we are both warming to the idea of CharolaisX.
I'm thinking that if we go with CharX females, that a larger framed Angus or black Simmental would work good with those kind of cows, Maybe a large framed Hereford.
If we go with Hereford females, I think again a large framed Angus or black Simmental bull,
Whichever direction we go if we have heifers they will likely be bred to a ce Angus bull, for the first calf.

 

[bird dog]

Char/Angus females are great animals. Char/ Brangus is even better for us hot weather ranchers. Just about any bull would work but the calf buyers prefer a black nose and hooves if the calf is white yellow or red. The only problem with that cross is keeping them a modest size.

 

[wbvs58]

I don't think you can go wrong with a predominantly Charolais herd. From my readings on here you have been jumping all over the place with your cattle and it has been reflected in the prices you have been getting, just your recent post "stockyards" you got some good prices for a couple but did not do too well with the rest. Also if you stick to the one line of even good quality cattle the people at the salebarn are more likely to give you top billing rather than sell yours at the end of the day.
I don't mean to be critical of your operation, these are the impressions I get from reading from afar.
Good Charolais cattle will always attract attention no matter what the coat colour, they might get a small discount in areas where black is king but they make up for it with good weights. The light coat of Charolais handle the heat well in hot areas of Australia, it is only necessary to add a bit of ear in the ticky coastal area.

Ken

 

[Caustic Burno]

I like the Char/Hereford cross bred to a black bull you get a black or yellow baldie.
Both ring the bell here.
This girl is over 20.

 

[kenny thomas]

I like the Char/Hereford cross bred to a black bull you get a black or yellow baldie.
Both ring the bell here.
This girl is over 20.
View attachment 51108

The best cow i own looks just like her.

 

[Ky hills]

I don't think you can go wrong with a predominantly Charolais herd. From my readings on here you have been jumping all over the place with your cattle and it has been reflected in the prices you have been getting, just your recent post "stockyards" you got some good prices for a couple but did not do too well with the rest. Also if you stick to the one line of even good quality cattle the people at the salebarn are more likely to give you top billing rather than sell yours at the end of the day.
I don't mean to be critical of your operation, these are the impressions I get from reading from afar.
Good Charolais cattle will always attract attention no matter what the coat colour, they might get a small discount in areas where black is king but they make up for it with good weights. The light coat of Charolais handle the heat well in hot areas of Australia, it is only necessary to add a bit of ear in the ticky coastal area.

Ken

You are correct in that I've been jumping all over the place. For several years now I've tried several different breed bulls to try and get some more size and growth. Problem is we've had a bad run and haven't gotten many calves if any from some of those bulls due to injuries. Our base herd is commercial black presumably Angus type cows and Hereford. We have 3 kind of off the wall cows 2 of which are belted Galloways that are going to be sold and a Longhorn Brahman cross and a couple Jerseys for nurse cows, but aside from that it's the Hereford or Angus based.
The bull I've used the most has been a big part of the uniformity problem 3/4 Angus 1/4 Hereford, heterozygous black the Hereford blood in him comes from a line that throws a lot of white so we get red and black calves that can be anywhere from solid black or red to pure Hereford looking with a lot of white legs.
Another thing I've done to my detriment was when I was selling bred heifers I was also trying to build cow numbers so I kept some of the heifers that didn't make the cut for the sale. Most of those were bought through the stockyards to start with.
We have some cows that are as good as anybody else's and some that are just plain not very good and anywhere in between. We are going to be culling cows that don't wean off calves over 500#.
There are a lot of factors here that affect sale prices. Uniform groups of like size and color along with enough frame and the right amount of condition are the main factors.
I don't believe quality has any bearing on sale order.
They sold cattle and all day long similar in every way to ours.
I used to have around 40 head of registered Charolais and I AI bred to sone of the popular bulls of the day. We consistently weaned off calves 700-800+. My heaviest was a bull at 900.
The market demand for them crashed and I phased them out. I then experimented with some commercial and registered Angus. I liked them, but never have been able to get the weaning weights even close to the Charolais.
At that point I was more involved in raising dairy calves and just maintained a few cows, then got into buying steers and then heifers to breed and resell so a lot of time I've just kept only a few cows along until the last few years we've been trying to build up to an all cow calf.

 

[kenny thomas]

If you were weaning 700-800 lb and now maybe 500lb the Charolais may be more profitable.

 

[Ky hills]

If you were weaning 700-800 lb and now maybe 500lb the Charolais may be more profitable.

That's what I've been thinking. I'm definitely looking to add some growth and size, Charolais or Simmental likely.
That was around 30 years ago that I had Charolais and the cows were heavy milkers that could raise those big calves to their potential.
The Simmental calves we have in the ground now are just night and day difference between them and the other calves.
Our current better cows consistently wean off 500-600+ pound calves with no creep. Some others will wean calves in the 400's and a few can't get their calves to 400. Definitely want to weed out the lower end ones.

 

[ClinchValley86]

What's the difference in cow size between the charolais you had back in the day vs your cows now?

 

[Ky hills]

The Charolais cows were from 1400-1800. I've had Hereford and registered Angus cows from 1500-2000 and most still couldn't get over 500 pound calves.
Sold off most of the biggest cows by now. Current cows are probably 1200-1400, with some of those capable of weaning 500-600 pounds.

 

[Brute 23]

I don't think "breeds" are your problem. Those are huge cows.

 

[Warren Allison]

I don't know where you would find commercial or unregistered red Charolais...all we have bought this past year were registered, but that was what I was searching for. Bred to black bulls, you get black calves. One client is breeding his to a homo for black and polled Black Hereford, and another is using either a black Simm or a Simm-Angus...can't remember which. I think one set of 3-n-1's I bought was just $3500..not all that much higher than commercial cow/calf at the time.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

LOL - well, you know what I would recommend!
Glad you posted that info. I "thought" you had some powerful cows/calves years ago - but everything I've seen or you talked about past few years were ---- not so nice.

 

[Travlr]

The Charolais cows were from 1400-1800. I've had Hereford and registered Angus cows from 1500-2000 and most still couldn't get over 500 pound calves.
Sold off most of the biggest cows by now. Current cows are probably 1200-1400, with some of those capable of weaning 500-600 pounds.

Most of the people I see getting light (500) weaning weights are stuck on using CE/LBW bulls... on fully mature cows that should be putting 90# calves on the ground.

And have you considered a homo-black Limousine for both growth and to put some meat on the calves?

 

[Ky hills]

LOL - well, you know what I would recommend!
Glad you posted that info. I "thought" you had some powerful cows/calves years ago - but everything I've seen or you talked about past few years were ---- not so nice.

Yes, and after this years fall calves by a Simmental it's gonna be hard for me to see calves by something else.
And yes, years ago I had some pretty good cows. We've got some good cows but it's been hard to build on.
A lot folks like to post only the successes and that's fine, but I try to get all around and bounce ideas and learn.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Simmental & Charolais can improve most everyones' WW, but "generally" a Simmental replacement will make a better COW (milking ability, temperament, and marbling trait for her steers). Charolais may still put more #'s on the ground, I'm not sure.

 

[Ky hills]

Most of the people I see getting light (500) weaning weights are stuck on using CE/LBW bulls... on fully mature cows that should be putting 90# calves on the ground.

And have you considered a homo-black Limousine for both growth and to put some meat on the calves?

You're right that is a lot of it. When I was selling bred heifers, that's the kind of bulls I had to have and so with just a few cows I just put those heifer bulls with them. The last AI heifer bull we used was picked because he had 90+ pound birthweight. Then I brought in some non CE Hereford bulls after we stopped the heifer program. Was kind of dabbling in registered Angus and Herefords at the time. One of the Hereford bulls was good sized and good growth, so used him extensively and a crossbred grandson that was mostly Angus. Turns out apparently a percentage of the daughters from both those bulls lacked milking ability. I had hoped that the Angus in the crossbred bull would cure the milk issue because his mother and grandmother were good milkers, but it didn't. No rhyme or reason that I figure some milk great, and others not enough or none at all. We've culled heavy the last few years trying to get rid of that. In the process there's still a few light milkers that are leaving within the next month.
A few years ago I used a red Limousin. I went to look specifically at black ones, but when I saw them a red stood out as the best bull of that group.
He had good calves but I didn't keep any daughters, for concern of lack of milk.
Everybody thought I was crazy for bringing in a Limousin because of their disposition, but that bull was the calmest bull I've ever had.

 

[Ky hills]

Here's probably a CT first, somebody crazy enough to show their worst cows. These are 3 cows on the definite cull list,
In order starting with worst. The first cow is a second calf SimAngus that had a dink of a first calf that stayed puny all the time. It was a lack of milk issue, we pulled her second calf off and put it on a nurse cow.
The Hereford looking cow has had 3 calving years and had twins her second year, but buzzards got one of them. She would have not been able to raised both.
She milks but not much, and is skittish.
The next BWF is one that does a moderate job with a calf she can wean maybe a 450 calf, but is one that goes haywire when trying to work them in a barn. Wall climber, I think she has some Limousin in her.

 

[Warren Allison]

Here's probably a CT first, somebody crazy enough to show their worst cows. These are 3 cows on the definite cull list,
In order starting with worst. The first cow is a second calf SimAngus that had a dink of a first calf that stayed puny all the time. It was a lack of milk issue, we pulled her second calf off and put it on a nurse cow.
The Hereford looking cow has had 3 calving years and had twins her second year, but buzzards got one of them. She would have not been able to raised both.
She milks but not much, and is skittish.
The next BWF is one that does a moderate job with a calf she can wean maybe a 450 calf, but is one that goes haywire when trying to work them in a barn. Wall climber, I think she has some Limousin in her.
View attachment 51132View attachment 51133View attachment 51134

Are they bred now, or open?

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Looking at the pictures, you have to be impressed with the first - your "worse". Must be she keeps great BC because of lack of milking. Strange that combo (Sim/Ang) has lack of milk? The last one shows NO sign of muscling, but has fat pockets.