Inbred calf

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JCcattle

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Curious to hear thots on this! Had a major oops as my half Brown Swiss half Simangus heifer was still on her mother in pasture and the thing showed up bred when we preg checked the beef herd! Vet said she'd be ok when asked if we should abort the calf as she wasn't even a year old PLUS the bull that had the privilege was her own father :deadhorse: so calving season come and she calved before she even reached 16 months old. Pulled him with calf puller and had to bottle feed him a day or 2 til he was strong enough to stand and then help him several times sucking from his mother-sister and now a month and a bit later he's a happy healthy calf that loves attn. Years back we had a bull that threw extra fertile heifers that bred young before we could pull the bull (again, their father), but didn't know about it at pregchecking.. then wed keep the nice looking ones and suddenly in spring they'd gear up to calve. Not one of those calves ever made it tho.. any thots? I'd post this in the breeding forum but for some reason my browser doesn't let me go there! :roll:
 
We have several calves this year sired by their half brother and one out of a cow sired by her son. They're all doing just fine.
 
Age of the heifer at breeding and her condition has more to do with it than whether she is bred back to her own sire.
If the heifer's sire is not a low BW CE bull then I wouldn't use him, but wouldn't use him on any heifer either.
Sire to daughter heifer breeding is done a lot with no problems as long as that sire has a history of making small light calves that grow off good.

One of my neighbors has had but one (the same) bull on 15-20 cows/heifers since 2006 and has never had to assist in calving. He has never brought in any new breeding stock or bought any heifers or cows either..line breeding all along with the same bull.
He's having other problems, but calving isn't one of them.
 
Makes sense. The bull is one we use mostly for cows tho we've used him on heifers too in his younger years. So I wonder if his slowness at the start was a result of inbreeding or from the pull? I've had a lot harder with calves being fine..
 
Most likely the calf's slow start was from the pull. Have had one family that the females are all very fertile at a young age and have to be careful to get the bulls out before the calves get too old and it lessens the chance of a heifer getting bred too young. Also helps to keep our calving windows tighter.

This year certainly doesn't seem to be working right though. Have several that must've gotten bred the day the bull went out , and from the two places that it is hard to get the bulls out because of having to move the whole group through 2 other pastures to a barn yard to get them contained. So, usually the bulls in those 2 places are in for close to 6 months and we pull them when we are going to preg check and move cows around. The other places we try to keep to 90 days and a couple I have it down to 75 days. Funny thing is the vet checked most of these as being maybe a month less than the others and it is nearly 2 months and still nothing except getting bigger and bigger around. Oh well, maybe they got caught by an elephant passing through on the last Ringling Bros circus tour....
 
All my best calves are from half sibling or closer matings this year.. none of them had any problems, though they were all mature cows.

I've had a couple "uh oh" calves around here with calves bred by their sire, most of the time I found it kinda stunted the cow's growth and affected their production in the long run.. I"m not a fan of heifers coming into heat before 205 days.. if they come into heat reliably at 12 months that's just fine by me.
 
I know "inline" breeding was done for years to streamline breeds. That is inbreeding at its best. I am no expert but inbreeding like you describe happens every year at my neighbors place when a sire breeds a calf at 6 or 7 months old before weaning. He never has a problem. Usually just drives up and a calf is there in the morning. The calfs do fine and his registered stock are bred for low birth weight calving ease.
 
Good to hear success stories! My dad had an old cow that popped a calf as a yearling and she kept producing calves til she was 20! Guessing she was an exception. It's interesting that this heifer did cycle soon as Brown Swiss mature a little later, must have got the fertility from her Simangus side. So I wonder about the 4 that got bred here several years ago.. the two that survived being born both died in a month or two..? Lower disease tolerance?
 
one thing I forgot to mention is young heifers sometimes dont mother as well. Calves can starve even when momma has milk. Watch their nursing frequency. My neighbor keeps jersey nurse cows around all year for these unexpected babies. I had to tie heifer up once to get her to have her calve nurse in the first 12 hours. The colostreum deficiency will set them back and cause all kinds of problems
 
That's probably what played for in there with those two that died. They were out on pasture and didn't watch them very closely so could be they didn't get a fair start either. This mama and baby got constant care til I was sure they would be ok and still are close by so I can feed her grain and keep an eye on them. In a way I'd not mind if she doesn't breed back this year so she can catch up. If she's in good condition will it drag her down to breed back again? So far she's kept herself up well with the calf growing along with the rest!
 
JCcattle":2ndvc6cn said:
Good to hear success stories! My dad had an old cow that popped a calf as a yearling and she kept producing calves til she was 20! Guessing she was an exception. It's interesting that this heifer did cycle soon as Brown Swiss mature a little later, must have got the fertility from her Simangus side. So I wonder about the 4 that got bred here several years ago.. the two that survived being born both died in a month or two..? Lower disease tolerance?
Our old Granny cows oldest daughter settled with her current calve somewhere around 3 weeks after she had the last one. We really got a shock when we saw her with a new born calf
 
I think part of the higher death rate may also be from lesser quality colostrum from a young cow.. older cows have more colostrum and a better variety of antibodies.. they've been there, done that, and the immune system remembers it.

If she's a truly valued cow, I'd wean the calf early and not breed her this year.. if she's just a run-of-the-mill cow, make her work and what happens, happens
 
Thanks Nesikep.. have to decide what she means to us. I'm sure she will raises brutes of calves with the added dairy for milk, her mother's half dairy calves look like beef and are at the top of the calf crop! Dun, that would be a shocker!! Reminds me of a cow we had that popped twins one year and before 11 months she surprised us with her next before calving season was even supposed to start!! Not a wonder that the fall after that she showed up open. The reason she'd had a chance to be bred early it dawned on us later was we'd had her in a pen for extra feeding with her twins, bought a young bull and they shared space a few weeks as we didn't wanna throw him with the old guy right away, and obviously she was eager to be the first to use his services.
 
Just thot I'd update on this... calf made it to selling time and we got our bonus $$.. mama rebred and tho she is a lil small she's in good condition! Looking forward to seeing what she does this year!
 
what do ya think happens in the wild? if they weren't domesticated every cow on the planet would be related somehow..brothers sisters moms dads free for all....soon as they were old enough

btw I don't turn my heifers to the bull til at least 18 mos...
 
dieselbeef":27mp01tn said:
what do ya think happens in the wild? if they weren't domesticated every cow on the planet would be related somehow..brothers sisters moms dads free for all....soon as they were old enough

btw I don't turn my heifers to the bull til at least 18 mos...
Was a inbred herd a man had here,,you see one of them, then youd have seen them all.. All looked,and were cut from the same cloth....
 

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