Hauling to pasture

[uplandnut]

I rented a pasture for the summer that's about 10 miles away from me. The plan is to haul them there next weekend. I just have 16 foot bumper trailer and was running over the possible ways of hauling the pairs up to it. There is an old cow yard at the pasture to keep everything contained until they are all up there. Just trying to decide if I take all the cows first and then bring the calves in a separate load, calves first then cows, or take the pairs up as pairs.
Just looking for suggestions as what as worked well for others.
thanks

 

[FungusProudKY31]

If you can move them all in one day and have the corral, load them how they get on the trailer and not let them out until they are all back together.

 

[chaded]

Here with my facilities it would probably be best to load the calves first and then cows. I have a holding area with a corral (corral leads to trailer) so all would go in and moms would get split back off to holding area and calves on trailer. The cows will be easier to come back and run through the corral and trailer whereas the calves would be like herding cats without their moms.

That's how I would do it here if i had to do it but im known to make things harder then they are and sometimes the cattle have other ideas......so everything is subject to change. Lol.

 

[Dave]

Helped haul a bunch 30+ miles on Wednesday. There was 2 pot loads and 5 goose neck trailer loads of cows. That was 2 trips. Cows got to wait in the corral. Then 4 goose neck loads of calves. They all stayed in the corral together for about an hours to get mothered up before turning out to pasture. It worked.

 

[callmefence]

We jockey cattle around quite a bit.

I use a 24' so I've got 2 gates. I fill the front 2 thirds with cows and the back with calves. I don't worry much about them being matched right. The calves know the cows mom or not and will stick with until mom gets there.
Calves that have never loaded tend to load better with cows in the trailer.
If you have water tight pens at both locations doesn't matter to much.

 

[Rydero]

We generally haul to pastures with no facilities where we take freestanding panels to catch them in the fall. We haul pairs in a trailer with dividers. Calves in the front compartment, cows in the back two. We're needling/doing anything that we need to with the cattle on the way out so we like to keep them matched if we can't finish that day for some reason. A couple people stay behind and sort pairs for the next load.

 

[gcreekrch]

We generally haul to pastures with no facilities where we take freestanding panels to catch them in the fall. We haul pairs in a trailer with dividers. Calves in the front compartment, cows in the back two. We're needling/doing anything that we need to with the cattle on the way out so we like to keep them matched if we can't finish that day for some reason. A couple people stay behind and sort pairs for the next load.

Besides that, if a truck breaks down you still have pairs together.

 

[Till-Hill]

I too only have a 16' bumper trailer. I sort out 4 matching pairs. Put 3 cows in front and 1 calm gentle cow and 4 calves in the back. Hauling 10 miles and usually a 1 man show I can't afford screwing around watching a cow tear up a fence because her calf isn't with her.

 

[JW IN VA]

IMO hauling pairs would be best. Next would be take the calves and a quiet cow. The calves will stay with her. Your cows will be more satisfied separated from their calves at home than somewhere strange.