New herd

[cowgirl8]

Everyone is weaned and ready to become a member of the herd. First, tags, tattoos and vaccinations.
Got up early and marked the tags....first number is the last number of the year they are born. Quick glance i know just how old the cow is just by her number.

We tattoo that number in their ears, just in case they lose their tag. On average we replace about 5 tags a year out of a herd of 75ish. We also start a new book every year, each cow as they come through the chute gets jotted down with any notes about her health, teeth, calving issues.

Normally we'd brand at this time, but as i was warming the brander up, sparks shot out of it and it died. Scared the heck out of me.... I've been expecting it to go, its over 35 yrs old. Husband called the makers of this brand and they still had ours on record. Got a bigger one, been wanting a bigger one for years.
New girls all tagged and ready to live in a new herd. Probably the calmest heifers we've had, almost too friendly. When we give them the second dose of their vaccine, they will get branded.

Note the big cow with them in a pen next to heifers. She's the cow out of the neighbors bull i mentioned in another thread. Decided to keep her if she behaves.

 

[3waycross]

Looks like you are ready for business there. Good planning can sure make a difference!

 

[branguscowgirl]

Love your pens cowgirl! They sure are nicely done.

 

[cowgirl8]

If i ever remember to, i'll video our corrals as i run a cow through it. My husband designed them and had them built when we moved here in the 80's. We had always used run down corrals where half the time someone would break out. My brother in law was a painter and painted them in the 80's after they were built. That is the original paint. He did a very good job. I remember at the time i was like, "How can it take so long to paint corrals" Well, when you do it right it takes a long time. Those were lean times and we paid him by the hour. We plan to put in a new gate that will help with sorting, like the one in the video we've all seen. We have the perfect spot. Planning on getting a new chute soon, and once the new gate is in i'll do a video run though and post it.
Along with our brander breaking, we also broke the old tattooer. Gotta get a new one of those too...I need better tables, one day i'll have some.

 

[Brute 23]

Very Nice.

How do you know a 2004 from a 2014 from a 2024?

 

[cowgirl8]

Very Nice.

How do you know a 2004 from a 2014 from a 2024?

Honestly, if you cant tell a 10 yr difference in a cow by just looking...you shouldnt be in the cow business...BUT, if you have problems, i look to see how many of that number we have and if we started out on 400 in 2004, and say i think we have around 10 old 400s left and all are under 419, i started on 420....just in case we get someone who cant tell an old cow from a young...we tagged 60 heifers

 

[TexasBred]

Very Nice.

How do you know a 2004 from a 2014 from a 2024?

Honestly, if you cant tell a 10 yr difference in a cow by just looking...you shouldnt be in the cow business...BUT, if you have problems, i look to see how many of that number we have and if we started out on 400 in 2004, and say i think we have around 10 old 400s left and all are under 419, i started on 420....just in case we get someone who cant tell an old cow from a young...we tagged 60 heifers

An serious question gets the typical smart a$$ answer. Nothing new under the sun. :???:

 

[3waycross]

Very Nice.

How do you know a 2004 from a 2014 from a 2024?

Honestly, if you cant tell a 10 yr difference in a cow by just looking...you shouldnt be in the cow business...BUT, if you have problems, i look to see how many of that number we have and if we started out on 400 in 2004, and say i think we have around 10 old 400s left and all are under 419, i started on 420....just in case we get someone who cant tell an old cow from a young...we tagged 60 heifers

An serious question gets the typical smart a$$ answer. Nothing new under the sun. :???:

Gone for a long time. I thought maybe she learned something about how to talk to folks here and gave her the benefit of the doubt. I guess I was wrong. Some ole girl different day and different thread.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

Very Nice.

How do you know a 2004 from a 2014 from a 2024?

Honestly, if you cant tell a 10 yr difference in a cow by just looking...you shouldnt be in the cow business...BUT, if you have problems,

An serious question gets the typical smart a$$ answer. Nothing new under the sun. :???:

:nod: :nod: :nod:

 

[Taurus]

Anyone want to bet that this thread will goes to 15 pages full of nonsense bullshyt?

 

[Limomike]

Looks like a good setup there .. I do the same on all my replacements when I tag them. put the year on the back though, and the corresponding number to their mama cow.

 

[M5farm]

Anyone want to bet that this thread will goes to 15 pages full of nonsense bullshyt?

not if ya'll will ignore the OP and move on. A leopard cant change their spots.

 

[cowgirl8]

Looks like a good setup there .. I do the same on all my replacements when I tag them. put the year on the back though, and the corresponding number to their mama cow.

I started putting the brand at the top of the tag and if i have time on the back but didnt on these. Really hated turning them out without their brand, you just never know with young weanlings like this if they will stay put. We should get our brand any day now, so once branded we'll take them to their pasture with better fences. Didnt want to haul them there and have to haul back so they are at a pasture connected to the corrals.

 

[cowgirl8]

These girls are feed junkies. They just hear us out in the gator and they come running.

 

[Nesikep]

We use a letter for the year, we skipped i and o because they can look like 1 and 0, though next go round I'll probably use them as well, at least i, since that will make a 25 letter alphabet... Pretty unlikely to have enough cows make it through the alphabet to be confused about which ones they are.

 

[Brute 23]

In her defense I agged it on. That was a poor excuse for humor on my part. :kid: Sorry about that.

 

[Black and Good]

Looks like a good setup there .. I do the same on all my replacements when I tag them. put the year on the back though, and the corresponding number to their mama cow.

Limomike, That's what I do as well. I tags all calves with mamas number then a dash with a letter first calf A, second calf B and so on. Heifers get Orange tag in left ear, Bull/Steers get Yellow tag in right ear. Then put DOB on the back with bull they are out of right above that. B&G

 

[fitz]

Nice looking step up cowgirl. I need to come up with a new system for i.d. here. But no more than I have telling one from the other isn't a huge problem. I still tag them all as I get confused when working calves.

fitz

 

[James T]

Looks like a good setup there .. I do the same on all my replacements when I tag them. put the year on the back though, and the corresponding number to their mama cow.

I started putting the brand at the top of the tag and if i have time on the back but didnt on these. Really hated turning them out without their brand, you just never know with young weanlings like this if they will stay put. We should get our brand any day now, so once branded we'll take them to their pasture with better fences. Didnt want to haul them there and have to haul back so they are at a pasture connected to the corrals.

I gather ya'll are using an electric branding iron. Have been thinking about branding ours along with the ear tags we already use. Who makes the branding device you just ordered?

 

[cowgirl8]

Yes its electric. I'd like to freeze brand some day, but looks like we'll be sticking with the electric. They work great, although, one year we couldnt get our generator to start so we ran a 'big' electrical extension cord to the corrals from my greenhouse. Worked ok, but, when we went back to using the generator it was way better. That was 2012 and half the heifers brands are crap. You can sure tell the ones that got all the juice from the generator, they are perfect.
I have no idea on who we get them from, but, when we get the new one i'll look and post it here. Husband took care of all that ordering. Its branded thousands of cows and feeders, the floor around the squeeze chute and various other things...lol I think 35+ years is pretty good....
We have a neighbor who brands numbers on the cows side. Husband considered it but i think there is no point since we tattoo their ears and its very easy to read when we tag. Why put them through any more than they have to just for our convenience is how i think.