fleckvieh

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Anonymous

which is better for crossbreeding fleckvieh simm or just a plain simm if planning to sell steers and keep heifers. if you have braunvieh and branguexherford cattle.

what is the diffrence between regular simm and fleckvieh and wich is the larger of the breed.
 
For what very little its worth: I have Flecks and "regular" Simmentals on both sides of my little ranchito and, strictly from scoping out the neighbors cattle for quite a few years, if I got into Simmies I would go with the Flecks. (One of my neighbors has an interest in the Great Guns Fleckvieh operation over in Schulenberg, Tx. and they have some pretty impressive bulls.) To me, the Flecks just seem to be stockier and more growthy steers and the retained heifers do just fine.

Flecks are a strain of Simmental that traces back mostly to Germany & Austria and their easiest distinguishing characteristic to observe is their color --- predominantly solid red body with a white face, often with ring eyes, or some people call them goggle eyes. Arnold Ziffle
 
fleck influenced simmies will do better in a cross breeding program because their genes are more pure than simmies who dont have a lot of fleck infuence thus compounding youre HV , their genes are more pure because they havnt been basturdized by breeders chasing fads , like color . fleck means from switzerland , not germany or austria and the cattles most distiguishing color trait is large spoted not red
 
Dad used to have a herd of registered Simmental cattle, before he got bit by the aircraft re-building bug and sold his herd. I guess you could call them "regular".
Currnetly, I've got both 'regular' and Fleckveih type bulls.
The Fleckveih bulls that I've seen around this area and in the Simmental magazine tend to be real meat wagons. Not a lot of leg, but very double muscled and extremely thick. The one I've got here is dark red and goggled with very little white on his body and legs, and has real old country lines, Neff right on the papers. He tends to throw calves with moderate birth-weight, thick backed, and 'short' marked like he is. They're a little shorter in the neck than the 'regular' styled bulls' calves are.
One thing to note that I'm very pleased about is that due to his genetics, when crossed to black baldies I haven't gotten any 'smoky' calves by him.
The calves from that cross are all black baldies. This is one reason that the simmental breed has shifted away from the 'blondes', as they are a genetic colour diluter and can sire those off colour babies(that the buyers just love to hate).
Anyway, they do seem to gain like there's no tomorrow.
The only thing I can fault the Fleck bull about is that he is so massive (2300 lbs on a 6.5 Frame) that he is a pretty slow mover and gets a bit sore on his front feet. He made a fair bunch of calves when we turned him out on the home place, but now that we're into the time frame where we get calves sired by the bulls when they're kicked out into the big community pasture, I've seen a marked decrease of his offspring (and his calves are distinct enough from the other bulls that they're very easy to differentiate). Even driving the cattle to the pasture (and we don't break any land speed records) was almost more than that bull could handle...he was almost a 1/8 of a mile behind the rest of the drag...tongue lolling, panting and puffing along, a real pain as he kept hitting the bush every chance he got (and it was a cool day when we moved them). Made me wonder how many days it took him to recover from a five mile stroll up the road and get back to work making calves.
So in the long run, it's up to the individual to decide what's going to work well for their operation. If you have less acerage for the bull to cover, then it wouldn't be a problem. But if you're like us, with a lot of ground for the bulls to travel to service the cows, the trimmer 'regular' simmie might pan out in the long run (as I noticed those boys covering cows the next day, same as the Char bulls).
I'd love to hear thoughts from others with either 'type' and their experiences.
Take care.
 
We also have some of each type.. but our herd is predominately "purebred", as opposed to Fleck cattle which are considered "Fullblood".

We do have a few odd Fleck heifers in the mix, and they are very good cows. Shorter and stockier than the Simmentals I'm used to (the old blond cows were the first Simmentals we had) and I do have to watch what I breed them to, as they will be the first ones to have calving problems. But they have great calves.

Someone else mentioned the spots. You will occassionally get spotted calves out of Fleck, where most of the modern Simmentals now are solid colored.

In our area, Fleck cattle generally sell higher than a "purebred", and in my opinion, not worth the extra $$$. But if you're going to use them in a cross breeding program, you would have to re-evaluate.. based on what type of cattle you're going to use them on, and what kind of calf crop you're looking for. If you have a lot of leggy, smaller boned cattle, a Fleck bull might very well be a good choice. Just keep an eye on the EPD's.
 
I have been a Simmental breeder since 1989. We started with a herd of mixed black Angus cows and bred them artificially to Simmental bulls (Some of the bulls were full fleckvieh). We were very impressed by the dramatic increase in weaning weights on those first calves. We registered our heifers from this endeavor as halfblood Simmentals and then bred them back to purebred (or fleckvieh) Simmental bulls, registered their heifers as three-quarter bloods and then bred those back again to purebred or fleckvieh Simmental bulls to get a 7/8 Simmental female which is considered a purebred by the American Simmental Association. Around 1995 we started using some black Simmental genetics thru AI as this was the way the breed was heading. What we have seen from our 15 years experience with the breed is that the Fleckvieh's generally have heavier muscle, larger birthweights and much greater milk production than the newer model Simmentals. The newer style Simmentals do have some excellent traits that should be looked at in a crossbreeding program though. Many are homozygous for the black and polled trait. They are not bastardized cattle as an earlier uneducated responder noted. They are excellent cattle and mate exceptionally well with Hereford or Angus cross cattle. Much work has been done with carcass genetics in the Simmental breed over the past ten years and contrary to much popular belief, the newer Simmental strains are fast approaching the marbling ability and choice grading ability of Angus. To sum it all up, I would have to give the newer Simmental genetics a strong look when selecting my next herd bull. They have made drastic improvement in lowering their mature size, getting their milking traits down to a more manageable level and improved average calving ease to the point that you can use many Simmental bulls on virgin heifers with minimum calving difficulty but with that extra growth spurt common to the breed.
 
I found this picture on the Shoal Lake, Manitoba, Canada website...its got a picture of a Fleckvich pair..... Must be a popular breed in Shoal Lake LOL! Everything about Canada is big...their lakes are big, long, wide prairies, huge mountains, and widespread cities and large cattle LOL!

http://www.town.shoal-lake.mb.ca/agriculture.html
 
I don't know, Oregonian, that cow sure looks young. Not too big yet, mind you I just culled a cow a couple of weeks ago that came up open, and she was 1915 lbs. Dad had some of the bigger cows in his purebred Simmie herd that I've seen for a while, some of those old girls were ton cows.
The biggest cow in this area that I've seen was in our auction about five years ago. She was a purebred Limo, and weighed 2098 lbs. When I first saw her coming into the ring, I thought she was a bull, until second glance made me drop my jaw. What a moose!
Anyway, take care and by the way, you sure do live in a pretty state...made a road trip to Eugene fifteen years ago, and by God there's some great scenery down there.
 
We try to breed simmental to every thing in our club calf operation. But I still have pure breds left a pure fleck and regular the fleck is my most productive cow but also cost a lot to keep ( she about 2000 lbs) She has produced most of out mostly heifers that I kept without hesition and two bulls. I have had no calving problems of any sort and she always settles the first time. The other regular simmental Is smaller but still a great cow this year she threw the best heifer on the farm. But she calved hard she was pushing for 6 hours befor the vet could finnaly make it. Both cows were bred to the same bull the flecks' calf was a 103lb bull no help needed it is gray and white. The regular had a 89lb heifer that had to be jacked out but she was fine and a black as coal.
 

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