Replacements Heifers

[thommoos]

Replacement Open Heifers

What are they selling for in your area?

Registered?

Commercial?

Private Treaty?

Breeder Sale?

 

[Stocker Steve]

Private treaty:

high epd registered $3,000
average epd registered $1,300
common $1,100

 

[gizmom]

What in the heck do you mean by High EPD and Low EPD is that the same as a good heifer and a bad heifer? Because some of the high EPD heifers are nothing but that high EPD's not fertile functional reproductive females. EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad.

gizmom

 

[Gators Rule]

What in the heck do you mean by High EPD and Low EPD is that the same as a good heifer and a bad heifer? Because some of the high EPD heifers are nothing but that high EPD's not fertile functional reproductive females. EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad.

gizmom

Apparently you have learned nothing from that guy up in Georgia that raises Top 1% Simbrah cattle.

 

[gizmom]

ROFL! (Rolling on floor laughing) I think I might have snorted when I read that Gator!

gizmom

 

[SPH]

You really have to narrow down what kind of replacement heifer to get a better idea on price. There is going to be quite a range of prices depending on the quality of heifer and if it's a registered purebred or a commercial heifer. We have more heifers than we need to retain for replacements and aren't even sure what we're going to ask private treaty for the ones we decide to sell but we usually have no problems finding buyers for them lately when we have offered some up for sale. If we had the capacity would love to hold over a few more to bred and sell as bred heifers as that seems to be a lot stronger market in recent years but just don't have enough pasture to be grazing more females than we plan to retain.

 

[Stocker Steve]

What in the heck do you mean by High EPD and Low EPD is that the same as a good heifer and a bad heifer? Because some of the high EPD heifers are nothing but that high EPD's not fertile functional reproductive females. EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad. gizmom

Don't blame me for all the $$$ being thrown around trying to buy "elite" females. There is a market for them but I don't play.

I buy some of the (passed over) average EPDs moderate heifers that are docile and have some bone.

 

[js1234]

EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad.

gizmom

agreed, but to pretend that EPD's aren't as big of driver as phenotype or maybe even more of a deciding factor in most purebred circles is inaccurate.

 

[Lazy M]

Commercial ready for fall breeding replacements are bringing around $1200 at the yard and $14-1500 private treaty. I have no idea what the registered are bringing but highly doubt you could touch one for less than $1600.

Spring bred heifers are all over the place, from around $1600 at the yard to $3000 private treaty (I think many folks are going to get stuck calving out heifers that they wanted to sell as bred)

 

[talltimber]

Commercial ready for fall breeding replacements are bringing around $1200 at the yard and $14-1500 private treaty. I have no idea what the registered are bringing but highly doubt you could touch one for less than $1600.

Spring bred heifers are all over the place, from around $1600 at the yard to $3000 private treaty (I think many folks are going to get stuck calving out heifers that they wanted to sell as bred)[/quote]

I think that may be true.

I sold nine a couple weeks ago, that I wished I could have kept. But, to stay my course as initially planned, I sold them. They were very nice, I thought, commercial heifers. I sold at a regional barn two weeks or so ago and brought 1.77 @ 778. I'm satisfied I could have got more out of them private treaty if I had wanted to deal with the tire kickers. Lots of tire kickers around.

 

[Stocker Steve]

(I think many folks are going to get stuck calving out heifers that they wanted to sell as bred)[/quote]

Lots of black bred heifers in this area. The lighter cut are going $1100 to $1400 at the sales barn. Kind of tempting for a gambler... :cowboy:

 

[BRG]

I purchased on order last week at Phillip Livestock Auction where they sold several thousand commercial calves of all kinds. The calves I purchased were nearly purebred Red Angus, weighed 500 lbs and brought $2.60/lbs. While feeder heifers were around $1.80/lbs. I saw a group of 525 lbs Hereford replacement heifers sell and they brought $2.50/lbs.

 

[SPH]

EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad.

gizmom

agreed, but to pretend that EPD's aren't as big of driver as phenotype or maybe even more of a deciding factor in most purebred circles is inaccurate.

We pay attention to EPDs and use them as part of making our breeding decisions but I sure as hell would not buy a poor looking heifer just because she has good EPDs. Anyone that is doing that is not using all the tools available to evaluate animals and EPDs are just that, it's only 1 of many tools one can use to evaluate an animal. That's one of the biggest flaws with how people use EPDs because they aren't necessarily gospel and a lot of people also don't pay attention to the accuracy numbers of those EPDs when looking at them too. A perfect example is picking out a "heifer bull" to use, someone might tell you "well look at that low BW EPD! he'll be just fine on heifers" but a lot of times that BW EPD accuracy is fairly low so you can't always say that with confidence till you start seeing what kind of calves that bull is making and the accuracy of the EPD increases from actual birth weights being reported back in that animal's pedigree.

 

[Oldtimer]

What in the heck do you mean by High EPD and Low EPD is that the same as a good heifer and a bad heifer? Because some of the high EPD heifers are nothing but that high EPD's not fertile functional reproductive females. EPD's sure don't make an animal good or bad. gizmom

Don't blame me for all the $$$ being thrown around trying to buy "elite" females. There is a market for them but I don't play.

I buy some of the (passed over) average EPDs moderate heifers that are docile and have some bone.

Yep gizmom- I agree... And Stocker Steve I know you are right but most those "elite" females I wouldn't want to own either...

We are going to wean the end of the month and keep some extra registered females to sell after they are weaned, but are going to price them at around $250 more that the commercial heifers sell for..

Here are a few we probably will have for sale:

18194097 LBB Clovanada 513
18194088 LBB Clovanada 510
18194101 LBB Juanada Rain 514
18194089 LBB Miss Lead On 517
18194090 LBB Lady Blackbird 516

As you can see- not much for fancy EPD's- but they do offer some good Cole Creek and Rito bloodlines that should make good mama cows...

 

[gizmom]

SPH

Well said, and Stocker Steve was just answering a question so I should not have jumped on what he said the way I did. I guess the EPD thing is my trigger, we get a call on bulls, after talking for a few minutes we find they don't want a bull unless he is in the top 1% for $ beef or top 1% for yearling weight. We just don't breed for numbers we breed for cows that will work in our environment.

js - EPD's might be a driving force in some purebred circles but they are not going to drive this old girls train. I am not going to join the bull of the month club either, just going to do what I love and breed good functional cattle, that work in my environment and let the chips fall.

gizmom

 

[js1234]

SPH
js - EPD's might be a driving force in some purebred circles but they are not going to drive this old girls train. I am not going to join the bull of the month club either, just going to do what I love and breed good functional cattle, that work in my environment and let the chips fall.

gizmom

it would improve cattle in general if more purebred folks adhered to your logic. the vast majority will say they do but a good percentage of them don't. i get the "pitch" to come buy bulls at an awful lot of auctions around and have looked at a lot of programs. for every purebred outfit i visit where they genuinely seem to understand what a cow is supposed to be, there are 2, maybe 3 that i truly believe would buy a donkey to use for a herdsire if he had "curve bending, breed leading, industry changing, blah, blah, blah EPD's"

 

[Luckiamute]

At the annual Evergreen Exclusive, hosted by the Washington Angus Association last Saturday (Oct. 10), registered open heifers went from $1,200 to $7,000. The bottom end heifers were usually born in April and either out of relatively unknown herd bulls rather than known AI sires or from smaller operations. There was one April 2015 heifer that sold for $6,000. The four high-selling heifers ($7,000; $6,250; and 2 at $6,000) were sired by SydGen FATE 2800, AAR Tex X 7008 SA, Connealy Final Product and Silveiras Style 9303. A good mix of show prospects for juniors and brood cow prospects for breeders.

 

[Oldtimer]

SPH
js - EPD's might be a driving force in some purebred circles but they are not going to drive this old girls train. I am not going to join the bull of the month club either, just going to do what I love and breed good functional cattle, that work in my environment and let the chips fall.

gizmom

it would improve cattle in general if more purebred folks adhered to your logic. the vast majority will say they do but a good percentage of them don't. i get the "pitch" to come buy bulls at an awful lot of auctions around and have looked at a lot of programs. for every purebred outfit i visit where they genuinely seem to understand what a cow is supposed to be, there are 2, maybe 3 that i truly believe would buy a donkey to use for a herdsire if he had "curve bending, breed leading, industry changing, blah, blah, blah EPD's"

AMEN- sadly I agree !

 

[gizmom]

js

I wish I could say I never used the hot bull of the month. When we first started (25 years ago) we would read the Angus Journal and not knowing any better buy into the hype of the new bull. But over the years learned that was not what worked, you have to have a genetic plan then the hard part is sticking to that genetic plan no matter what hot new bull they parade out in front of you. We do use bulls from AI studs, but not unless they have the genetic makeup to fit our plan and not for curve bending EPD's. My calves out of our herd bulls work every bit as well and in most cases better than the AI sired calves, but it is also a business and we have a few customers that don't want to buy a bull unless he is AI sired :bang: I tend to get crabby when folks start talking about those curve benders, my experience with them was so dang bad. Purchased a cow back 15 years ago from a dispersal in Ohio, curve bending carcass EPD's she had a heifer calf on her side the top 1% of carcass the marketing rep told us we just had to have this cow and calf the kind to build a herd around. We bit hook line and sinker got her home there wasn't enough feed in Florida to keep that cow in condition we finally got her bred never did get the heifer calf to breed. The second calf out of the cow was as bad as her just couldn't deal with washy grass heat and humidity. It was an expensive lesson but those are generally the type that will stick with you. After that we haven't veered off our plan I let all those big boys play the curve bending game and I just do what I love and breed cattle that I like and hopefully others will like them as well.

gizmom

 

[SPH]

One thing to steer clear from I think is believing in unproven sire stud bulls just because they have some great EPDs and the sales guy is talking him up. We've bought semen on some of these bulls in the past and have moved to buying semen directly from proven reputable programs instead where those sires are working for them in their program and the EPD accuracies are much higher because of it. It's a lot easier sell IMO if a guy can show you just how well a bull is doing in his own program that backs the EPDs that go with it. I don't know how you can put much faith into some of these yearling and 2 year or even 3 year olds that the sire studs are hyping as the next big things when you have little to no progeny to look at or even daughters in production yet. Just this next spring we'll finally have a daughter calve out of a 2012 born bull we sold to another breeder but retained semen interest on so really with any bull it's not until his 3rd year of calves are hitting the ground that you really have any solid information on what kind his progeny are going to do until you see his first set of daughters calve and finally into production themselves. We like what we have seen of his calves so far in a small sample size but his true test comes next year when we have a daughter in production to see what kind of cow she will be.

I guess you can make the argument, well how can you trust a yearling bull you use naturally in your pasture and that's a valid point you do have some risk and blind faith going into those decisions as well. But, I think lost in some of that decision making for some is the ability to properly read and research a pedigree of a purebred animal. Does that animal come from a line of cattle that has solid and proven genetics or is it a one hit wonder out of a cow that typically is not a high performer? We dig through a pedigree to see what sires are on both sides of the pedigree to see if there are any that concern us and we look at several of the immediate dams in the pedigree to see what kind of ratios those dam's calves have as we like to see strong maternal traits and cows that are consistently producing calves in the top part of their contemporary groups.

Like I've said, EPDS can be a useful tool in selection and from a marking standpoint it's great when you can have good EPDs to go with a good looking animal, but those who disregard phenotype and structural concerns and use EPDs as their main source of criteria are really being narrow-sighted in their selection process. I could probably go through our cows and pull out some EPD examples where a cow with a better set of EPDs is being out-performed by one with lesser EPDs.