I can understand the check stub shock. We had gone through that a few times in the past. Now, a calf doesn't get sold at the sale unless one of us is there to watch. On occasion we also have a good friend that is a buyer, moves alot of cattle, and he will have our weight tickets. We took 16 heifers last week. 10 weighed 400, 5 weighed almost 500. One weighed 495 and they put bloated on the ticket. She was not bloated, she was a pig and would just gorge herself on hay every time we put a new roll in. Since she was out of my cow, I was not happy; my son told the buyer friend that if she brought less 1.00/lb. to buy her back. $.50 was the high bid and he said she didn't look very bloated to him. We went back and picked her up Sat morning. She's still out there eating away. She will get sold eventually, I will worm her the next time in the barn and see if that is part of her "pot-gut" look. But, if we did not take precautions, she would have been worth less than 250.00.
These heifers were nothing to write home about but were not real terrible. Brought 1.13 and 1.26 I think. We've sold better and some that were worse.
Hardly ever take one that has had pinkeye with a bad spot left in the eye; or one that had a bit of a deformed hump in the spine one time, because you know they will get killed on price. They are the butcher/beef ones we raise, besides my jersey and guernsey crosses. Have one now that has a crooked nose. He eats good but may not be able to keep all the grain in his mouth due to the deformity. He will be beef next year for someone. His momma had a normal calf the year before and is due anytime again now. We've never had one like that before, sorta like a cleft lip/palate. Also find that the couple of speckled ones get discounted real bad, so we have a steer from one of the blue speckled cows that will also be beef next year. I want to have the hide tanned with hair on, it is so pretty....
A good friend/cattle trader years ago told my son that he made more money on the so-so cattle than he ever could/would on the real nice top-notch ones. Kinda like what Kenny does; and if you know they aren't the best, but you make them better than they were, you can usually do okay.
That is why I don't hesitate to buy the "older" bred cows or c/cf pairs. It is a bit of a joke that after the better cows sell at a cow sale, the "lesser" ones that come through are -------- (our name) Farm type of cows. But I have done more with turning over a few dollars with those type of $800-$1,000 cows than I ever would with the $1500-2500 cows. Sure we bury a few. Just this week found one out at pasture dead. Looked her up, figured she was only about 8 yrs old, had a calf on her. No apparent reason. Got 2 others that we got at the same sale, mouthed and wrote down that they have no teeth, that are doing good and look very good. Calves are decent. So you never know. Buried a 1st calf heifer, one we raised...she had a dead cf about 6 months, no hair but well formed though small. Calf was dead, she was dead right there with it, no idea why. Not going to spend $150 for posting her. Dead is dead, it happens. Everyone else in that group has calved, except 2 that are due in Nov., from a different breeding pasture.
When we take nice calves in we expect them to do good. When they are mediocre, then you hope to do decent. But we don't just drop them off and hope for the best anymore.
