How old do you keep them?

[aplusmnt]

Beefy's 20 year old Brangus got me wondering just how rare is it to have 20 year olds in the pasture.

Caustic mentioned he had one I think that produced like 20 calves in her life time.

Is this a Brangus trait? What is the Average oldest age of cows you have kept? What breeds will last the longest?

What is the average age most hit the road.

Based on your breed and experiance if you bought a 10 year old cow how many calves would you be expecting her to give you before you had to cull her? And what breed are you referring to?

 

[dun]

I expect a cow to last till at least 14-15. If a cow is dtill a solid performer at 10 I don;t hesitate to buy her. Because we've added so many heifers the past 2 years our average age is 7 now. By solid I'm not referring to her teeth. Solid as in udder is still not too bad, feet and legs are still very good, and is structurally correct.

dun

 

[Joy in Texas]

My thought is Brahamas start slow and have a longer calving span. . back in the 80's we had 10-15 Brahma cows that calved until they were 20. The father -in-law decided to cull them not because they couldn't have a calf .Their teeth were down to nothing and he didn't want to mess with feeding them everyday. He bought them as pregnant heifers and they had a calf every year.
I bought a 14 yr old,a 12 yr old and 3, 8 yr old beefmasters this year. All brought a calf with them and all but one has had a calf. I am waiting on the 14 yr old due anyday. Well she's 15 this month. All of the others are already bred back. The 12 yr old bred back in 30 days. I think it has more to do with the nutrition and health of the cow. Since they wear their teeth down and can no longer eat grass and what not. They will have to fed properly. I'm keeping my 15 yr old as long as she produces. So I won't know for awhile.

 

[Limomike]

I have four older cows in my herd that are 14-16 yr olds, and still producing good calves, as well as good milk producers.
I will be replacing them sometime this year though because two have been pulled down alot since the last calves they had.

 

[bigbull338]

My thought is Brahamas start slow and have a longer calving span. . back in the 80's we had 10-15 Brahma cows that calved until they were 20. The father -in-law decided to cull them not because they couldn't have a calf .Their teeth were down to nothing and he didn't want to mess with feeding them everyday. He bought them as pregnant heifers and they had a calf every year.
I bought a 14 yr old,a 12 yr old and 3, 8 yr old beefmasters this year. All brought a calf with them and all but one has had a calf. I am waiting on the 14 yr old due anyday. Well she's 15 this month. All of the others are already bred back. The 12 yr old bred back in 30 days. I think it has more to do with the nutrition and health of the cow. Since they wear their teeth down and can no longer eat grass and what not. They will have to fed properly. I'm keeping my 15 yr old as long as she produces. So I won't know for awhile.

sitting here talking bout old cows.an i turned down 6 reg cows because they was long age cows.2 3yr 1 6yr 1 8yr 1 10yr 1 11 yr.didnt feel i could come out on them.

 

[aplusmnt]

My thought is Brahamas start slow and have a longer calving span. . back in the 80's we had 10-15 Brahma cows that calved until they were 20. The father -in-law decided to cull them not because they couldn't have a calf .Their teeth were down to nothing and he didn't want to mess with feeding them everyday. He bought them as pregnant heifers and they had a calf every year.
I bought a 14 yr old,a 12 yr old and 3, 8 yr old beefmasters this year. All brought a calf with them and all but one has had a calf. I am waiting on the 14 yr old due anyday. Well she's 15 this month. All of the others are already bred back. The 12 yr old bred back in 30 days. I think it has more to do with the nutrition and health of the cow. Since they wear their teeth down and can no longer eat grass and what not. They will have to fed properly. I'm keeping my 15 yr old as long as she produces. So I won't know for awhile.

sitting here talking bout old cows.an i turned down 6 reg cows because they was long age cows.2 3yr 1 6yr 1 8yr 1 10yr 1 11 yr.didnt feel i could come out on them.

How high were they that you could not come out on a 3 year old?

 

[bigbull338]

My thought is Brahamas start slow and have a longer calving span. . back in the 80's we had 10-15 Brahma cows that calved until they were 20. The father -in-law decided to cull them not because they couldn't have a calf .Their teeth were down to nothing and he didn't want to mess with feeding them everyday. He bought them as pregnant heifers and they had a calf every year.
I bought a 14 yr old,a 12 yr old and 3, 8 yr old beefmasters this year. All brought a calf with them and all but one has had a calf. I am waiting on the 14 yr old due anyday. Well she's 15 this month. All of the others are already bred back. The 12 yr old bred back in 30 days. I think it has more to do with the nutrition and health of the cow. Since they wear their teeth down and can no longer eat grass and what not. They will have to fed properly. I'm keeping my 15 yr old as long as she produces. So I won't know for awhile.

sitting here talking bout old cows.an i turned down 6 reg cows because they was long age cows.2 3yr 1 6yr 1 8yr 1 10yr 1 11 yr.didnt feel i could come out on them.

How high were they that you could not come out on a 3 year old?

reg cows bred $935 a hd.an they dont fitt what im looking for.im going into the seedstock end of the beefmasters.raising bulls an top end heifers.an i dont think i could come out at all on them.

 

[Joy in Texas]

I paid 750-800 for my cows. And that was with calves on them plus being heavy bred. I myself Big bull would have bought them. All of these cows were from the lasater orignal bunch. And I wanted that blood line. Even though I lost one of the cows to milk fever. I saved the calf and I have her calf from the year before. So the way I look at it I am way ahead of the game. All of the heifers I have will be my seedstock. Plus I already have half beefmaster heifers.
I will baby these old cows until they quit producing. A man ask me last night if I thought 940.00 was to high for 8 yr old reg.beefmasters heavy bred. I said no. I would buy them. I'm not scared of an older cow. and I'm like aplusmnt....why would you think you could come out on a 3 yr old? Heck I don't see a problem with the 6 or 8 yr old myself. well,I guess its what you are looking for. As for me I have a good bloodine even though I Got through older cows.

 

[holly heifer]

We keep them around until they start to have problems,
weight issues from lack of teeth, poor milk output, hip problems
ect. Each cow is different, some age well others are done
at 9 or 10. Average age of our cows is 7 to 10. We have
14 heifers to calve this spring. :shock:

 

[ALACOWMAN]

got a old braford that will be sixteen this spring had some eye trouble this fall. but has cleared up. the brahman can produce longer. but it usually something like bad teats that put them out of service early.

 

[warpaint]

Here's one of my oldest. Coming 13 in April. Bought her last year with a heifer at side and has had another heifer since. I've already been offered 500 more than I gave for her. Think I'll hang on to her for awhile.

 

[Rustler9]

Got a Longhorn that will be nineteen next month. Raising a big heifer right now and is bred back. We have several teen agers in our herd and they're still producing well. I see no need to send them down the road.

 

[Jake]

we've got a lot of old cows. I know we had one red holstein cow way back when that was 20 when she died and had 22 calves in 18 years. She was bought as a bred heifer. We still have quite a few cows now that are probably 18 or so and producing like 5 year olds. Hard to beat cows like that. Lot of heifers in the herd out of those cows.

 

[Beefy]

weve got 22 head of 14/15s. they are the oldest cows now. i expect most of those to give me 2 or 3 more good calves at least.

 

[skidboots]

Next time I need cattle, I guess I'll send JOY IN TEXAS to buy em! Even down here in the Brush Country, and with the drought, I don't see 3in one for $750 to $800....more like $900 to 1150. Guess these buyers aren't as sharp.
And you watch the prices this spring on replacement cattle. Wowee!

 

[Workinonit Farm]

What is the Average oldest age of cows you have kept?

The oldest one I currently have is 13, she's an Angus (black).

What is the average age most hit the road.

Where I work, the average age they off-load them is 9.

Based on your breed and experiance if you bought a 10 year old cow how many calves would you be expecting her to give you before you had to cull her? And what breed are you referring to?

I have bought 3 ten-year-old cows from where I work. Last year I sold one of them at the age of 16. She'd given me 4 calves. Another one I sold when she was 13 after pulling a 140 lb calf out of her (they both survived) but she was never the same again, she'd given me 3 calves. The third I still have in the herd and she is the 13 yo I mentioned above. This year's calf will be my 3rd one from her. These 3 cows are Angus (black)

Katherine

 

[llcupit]

My oldest are a couple 10 year olds. They have done a good job raising their calves each year. Sold one last year that was 19 due to the fact she had trouble maintaining body condition. These are all Black Angus.

 

[Caustic Burno]

This gets back to being a grass farmer. Good grass= good teeth
= good nutrents=good BCS it is all about grass and staying away from heavy milkers which =hard keepers.

 

[llcupit]

Caustic Burno

This gets back to being a grass farmer. Good grass= good teeth
= good nutrents=good BCS it is all about grass and staying away from heavy milkers which =hard keepers.

Couldn't agree more her teeth had worn out due to many acres of bahia grass. :lol:

 

[Victoria]

Up until last fall we had about 18 cows over the age of 10. The oldest being 17 or is it 18... We had to ship out a bunch because we needed to make room for some young purebreds. So most of the very old went (except the oldest, she's highland, not worth shipping). They always get something to sleep on when the ground is cold but still our weather can stiffen joints.
I'd expect a good cow to last to at least 15 though, that used to be kind of the average age we'd ship if you didn't include the very young that got shipped for temperament. Of course a lot of our older cows had Charolais in them, the Red Angus seem to last longer.