wbvs58
Well-known member
As a follow up to my random photo in the other post. I started calving at the beginning of July and now have 27 calves on the ground w3ith another 4 coming in the next couple of days leaving just 5 to go over the next couple of weeks. I am pretty happy with that even though this year it was more by accident as the conditions last September/ October when I was synchronising and inseminating the cows were pretty horrific with waterlogging. My yards which usually handle the wet very well were just a quagmire and hard to walk through. I decided to just do the one round of AI and then leave it up to the bull and the result was getting most of my calves in July which I really liked. My goal now is to get 100% calving in July. I have had a couple of repeat offenders with late calving so now they have to shape up or ship out. When you think about it, things should get easier as they all should be 60+ days when insemination comes around. I lost 2 calves from older cows which is very unusual, one was a breech which I really should have got up the night before but being a mature cow you give them the benefit of doubt and the other I found the cow standing over a dead calf in the paddock one morning, don't know what happened there she is usually a very reliable cow, $hit happens. I was able to retrieve things with the first one as the first cow to calve had twins one of which got mixed up with the dry cows so I had her on a bottle and it only took about 24 hours to get the cow to take it. I've had 10 heifers calve with only one I helped with a hand pull.
The calves being all similar ages seem to join up in big packs and they just seem to be everywhere. They are very sensible and go through gateways together.
R10, a cow by SS Niagara with her 2nd calf by DB Iconic.
I can't get the captions to go with the photos so you will just have to work them out, might be a bit jumbled up.
U2 is the twin I had on the bottle until her new mother turned up, she is doing OK, she is by 44 Brigade.
U4 a bull calf by DB Iconic out of an Ashland heifer, doing well.
Q5 is by Basin Rainmaker with her calf by 44 Brigade. This is her 3rd calf, she is shaping up as a good reliable cow.
S11, another Ashland heifer with her 1st calf by one of my bulls.
I will stop here as these full images will take a while to load and you will be cursing me.
Ken
We are in winter of course, we don't do hay they survive on stockpiled feed and they find a lot of greener feed amongst the trees and rocks which gets them through. The next photo you can see a lot of dead trees along the edge, these died from lack of water during the drought of a few years ago. The last three years water has been surplus to requirements however the outlook for this summer is not good. So to those of you who are experiencing severe drought now take heart things do change
.Here are some waiting at the gate.
The calves being all similar ages seem to join up in big packs and they just seem to be everywhere. They are very sensible and go through gateways together.
R10, a cow by SS Niagara with her 2nd calf by DB Iconic.
I can't get the captions to go with the photos so you will just have to work them out, might be a bit jumbled up.
U2 is the twin I had on the bottle until her new mother turned up, she is doing OK, she is by 44 Brigade.
U4 a bull calf by DB Iconic out of an Ashland heifer, doing well.
Q5 is by Basin Rainmaker with her calf by 44 Brigade. This is her 3rd calf, she is shaping up as a good reliable cow.
S11, another Ashland heifer with her 1st calf by one of my bulls.
I will stop here as these full images will take a while to load and you will be cursing me.
Ken
We are in winter of course, we don't do hay they survive on stockpiled feed and they find a lot of greener feed amongst the trees and rocks which gets them through. The next photo you can see a lot of dead trees along the edge, these died from lack of water during the drought of a few years ago. The last three years water has been surplus to requirements however the outlook for this summer is not good. So to those of you who are experiencing severe drought now take heart things do change
.Here are some waiting at the gate.
