Some of our Herefords

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BIZIN

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Southey, Saskatchewan
Here are some pics of our Horned hereford cows, bulls, hfrs, and calves. Let me know what you think. 76'... these are some of the better cows, but not necessarily the best. These are on rotational grazing around the feedlot so they were close today. I'm not the best photographer so bare with me.

This is a bull I raised. I dont like him all that much, but dad loves the guy so we kept him. He is 5 now.
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Yearling bull. No barley in this guy, just hay, supplement, and grass. Are bulls hit their stride as 2 yr olds.
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This is our oldest hereford bull. He is 9 now and still has perfect feet.
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This is a daughter of that bull I post at the beginning of the week. First calver. Coyotes got her calf.
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This is a yearling heifer out of that first bull I posted as well. She is bred to the bull at the top of page.
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Another daughter out of that first bull I posted. First calver.
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This is a calf out of that first bull I posted the other day as well. Born in mid May.
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Another calf out of that first bull I posted
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One of our cows
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Commercial hereford cow
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First calver out of the old bull. Bad pic
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Another commercial cow
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Full sister to that bull I posted earlier in the week.
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His dam was an STitan 7777 daughter and his sire was the sire of the other two bulls I've posted. I want to mount his head when he does get shipped though!
 
Also like to say that the calves were born from May15th - July 15th and will stay on their mothers till the end of November. So they are a little small now, but they will grow like weeds over the next 2 months.
 
like your good honest cattle they would blend in with our herd. Unpampered. The old bull has done well. I've come to accept that US/Canadian Herefords are often lighter in colour than the Australian ones and not the emphasis is placed on pigmentation around the eyes. The brand on the bull is it large because he was branded when he was very young and it has stretched as he's got older? Sometimes ours do that but our firebrands are much smaller. We brand on the rump as does most Australians.
 
BIZIN":k2qki83b said:
Also like to say that the calves were born from May15th - July 15th and will stay on their mothers till the end of November. So they are a little small now, but they will grow like weeds over the next 2 months.

Do you sell the calves as feeders and are they then grain fed? How do you winter the cows in that area?
 
Australian":escxz29h said:
We brand on the rump as does most Australians.

In Canada we brand where we are told , we have very strict laws when it comes to feed and id. You cannot just place a brand anywhere you want.
 
I didn't realise that. We do have a choice. In our state we brand on the near side rump usually and in the state to the north its the opposite side. Do you have livestock ID tags for the ears. We have National Livestock Identification Tags for the ears or you can have them put into the rumen. I use button type ones that are white for cattle you breed yourself and if cattle purchased a few years back they have to have orange non breeder tags. It won't be long before all will have white tags. We do lose the occasional one.
 
Good looking commercial cows and some fancy calves in those pictures, too. So is the nine year old 'perfect footed' bull out of the Titan 7777 daughter? Has he seen any black cows? Just a small part (7777 influence) of the genetics involved there, but I would rather see Line One or Mark Donald or Victor Domino or just about anything without 23D or 7777 in the pedigree. I do hope he and his daughters do well for you and the dilutor gene did not come through.
 
Every animal born needs a RFID tag, you need to register your premise which allows the government to come and do a routine inspection anytime unannounced and check your cattle and any feed you have.

All cattle in Canada starting Jan 1st 2010 will need a RFID tag no matter how old they are, the old bar code, UPC "universal product code" ,will not do anymore. The mandatory permanent implant ID's are just around the corner.

I do not brand as my cattle do not go to community pasture but all are tattooed.

Our government has taken over our herds and freedom and privacy because of BSE .. BUT if they would have had enforced the enhanced feed bans like they said they were doing we wouldn't be in the d@m mess to begin with.

Sorry for the rant, but this week sucks sucks sucks for me and I am very very p'od..

BTW Holstein Canada has been using mandatory registered RFID tags for almost ten years now.

I need to add the we as cattlemen so far still have a say and are enforcing things that work well for us ,instead of letting pencil pushers behind a desk set up the rules. I spent most of the morning talking to a few ladies at ccia today and they were more than helpful and very very understanding and actually knew about the cattle biz. So as long as we keep ahead of the game and stay in control the ag industry should still run smoothly.. :)
 
Australian... the brand is so big because he was fire branded at a young age and it stretched. All of our herd have ID tags in their ears, Metal crimp tags with their corresponding number and owner, we only RFID our cattle when they are sold because RFID tags are expensive. We are looking at getting implants for our cattle and would like to find one with GPS locators because we have an issue with cattle being stolen every year it seems. We are also starting to freeze brand our cows ID numbers on their hips so when we lose a tag and a metal tag we still know who they are. We collect performance data on our purebreds and commercial cows so when we lose an ID tag we lose that cows information and I dont want that to happen. Im trying to get our cows to the point of all of them having pigment around their eyes and red udders and testicles. We like our cows DARK red and most of our cows are pretty dark.

capt... ya that damn bull throws the occasional diluter but his offspring havent yet in the last 7 yrs. and yes it is the old bull that is out of 7777. Glad to see dad and grandpa arent the only ones who say that bull had simmental in him!!!

alexfarms... we wein our calves at the end of november and they go into the feedlot. the bull prospects and heifer prospects get put into different pens and get hay and a small amount of barley. the rest of the calves are put on feed and we feed them to 1400lbs and send them to slaughter. we collect carcass data on all our calves as well as weigh them at weining, as yearlings, and as fats both on the commercials and purebreds. we also weigh all our cows at weining and our bulls every spring when they go out and again in the fall when they come back in. we also do soundness evaluations on our bulls every spring and score their feet. we also semen test every bull every year. The cows go onto alfalfa regrowth after the calves are pulled off at the end of november and then onto stockpiled grass till January. Then we put them onto swath grazing for the rest of the winter and if they swaths run out we bale graze on our old alfalfa stands to put down nitrogen and phos, but last year we didnt have to feed bales. The bulls are pulled at the end of October and are put onto alfalfa regrowth till january as well and then are brought home and put into a well treed slough bottom where we take them hay and straw every 3 or 4 days.
 
We don't have what you call community pastures over here. The only time cattle get together are in some places in flood time when they are sent to flood refuges. Thats when they get mixed. The NLIS tags are by no means a preventative to cattle theft. Take them out easily ( apart from the rumen ones)
 
BIZIN":2v2z9f3j said:
alexfarms... we wein our calves at the end of november and they go into the feedlot. the bull prospects and heifer prospects get put into different pens and get hay and a small amount of barley. the rest of the calves are put on feed and we feed them to 1400lbs and send them to slaughter. we collect carcass data on all our calves as well as weigh them at weining, as yearlings, and as fats both on the commercials and purebreds. we also weigh all our cows at weining and our bulls every spring when they go out and again in the fall when they come back in. we also do soundness evaluations on our bulls every spring and score their feet. we also semen test every bull every year. The cows go onto alfalfa regrowth after the calves are pulled off at the end of november and then onto stockpiled grass till January. Then we put them onto swath grazing for the rest of the winter and if they swaths run out we bale graze on our old alfalfa stands to put down nitrogen and phos, but last year we didnt have to feed bales. The bulls are pulled at the end of October and are put onto alfalfa regrowth till january as well and then are brought home and put into a well treed slough bottom where we take them hay and straw every 3 or 4 days.

That sounds like a very practical game plan. Kudos to you for doing all of that cow weighing, etc....I know from experience that is alot like work. I weaned the last of my calves today and just got in the house, slid some supper in the oven turned this thing on to relax a bit. I ran out of daylight, so I will weigh calves tomorrow. I am currently living in an environment that is alot different than yours, it is just a matterof learning what works and sticking to it. Thanks for the info.
 
alexfarms... we didnt think swath grazing or stockpiling grazing would work at all, but we gave it a try and now we will hopefully never feed a bale again. Just gotta find out what works like you said.
 
BIZIN":15ebithk said:
alexfarms... we didnt think swath grazing or stockpiling grazing would work at all, but we gave it a try and now we will hopefully never feed a bale again. Just gotta find out what works like you said.

How does swath grazing work? Don't you get alot of snow? The latest I've not feed was January 1st one year. Normaly we run out of grass or get snowed in to deep by the first part of December. I live at over 8,000 feet elevation and normaly have to feed 5-6 months a year. The ground is often buried under snow all that time. It's been snowing here most of the day today. I think I've read about swath grazing before and didn't think it could work for me, how do you do it?
 
Sigma...Ya he is. We run him with 35 black cows. Big reduction from the 40-50 cows he used to run with. I figure he has atleast another 2 years with us. He looked great this year and got them all covered I hope. He always semen tests really well and our vet said this year that he was very impressed with his results being as old as he was.

NedJR... what we do is seed down feed quality barley. We dont spray it but we do put down N and Phos because its a new field, but after a year or two we will let the manure the cows left behind be the fertilizer. We swath it all in straight lines down the field and then run 1/8 inch aircraft cable across the field and use rebar posts with insulators. We run one electric fencer around the perimeter fence and a smaller electric fencer across the cross fence. They both run on solar. Its somewhat hard getting the rebar in during the winter, but we drill holes with a drill and pound the rebar into the hole. We bale the outside 2 rounds on the field and that gives us an idea of how much feed we have to work with, then we figure out how many swaths the cows need to get through 3-4 days and we give them that many swaths. We make them clean up the swaths before we move them, so the amount of swaths we give them is more of a guideline. We also give them a few straw bales every week to clean up as well and cheapen down our feed costs. Our cows eat snow as long as there is good powdered snow around, they wont eat crust. Our cows will dig through pretty deep snow to get to the swaths. As long as the snow is below their bellies they will dig for it. Same goes with stockpiled grasses. We let a pasture or two grow all summer and then we put the cows in their when the snow falls and as long as the grass comes through the snow they will go searching for it. But it has to be a grass that doesnt turn when it goes to seed and it has to grow fairly tall. We use smooth wheat grass. Our cows dont leave any swath behind and they will graze the sloughs and in the trees where there is grass to eat, as well as along the fencelines. Just make sure that the land they are swath grazing on has places to get out of the wind or have portable windbreak fences making up a large enough area that all the cows can get behind for protection. We are getting portable windbreaks this year and the only thing with them is that you have to move them so the bedpack doesnt build up. You want to spread that manure out as much as possible.
 
You sure do have to have good doing cattle to survive in your country. We think our country is tough. it is tough in a different way. Think I'd rather the heat and the piddly bit of cold weather we get in our area. Our cattle would lay down and die in your cold as yours might in some of Australia's hot country. Thats what makes our world so different.
Colin
 
BIZIN":glyw3d3w said:
Sigma...Ya he is. We run him with 35 black cows. Big reduction from the 40-50 cows he used to run with. I figure he has atleast another 2 years with us. He looked great this year and got them all covered I hope. He always semen tests really well and our vet said this year that he was very impressed with his results being as old as he was.

NedJR... what we do is seed down feed quality barley. We dont spray it but we do put down N and Phos because its a new field, but after a year or two we will let the manure the cows left behind be the fertilizer. We swath it all in straight lines down the field and then run 1/8 inch aircraft cable across the field and use rebar posts with insulators. We run one electric fencer around the perimeter fence and a smaller electric fencer across the cross fence. They both run on solar. Its somewhat hard getting the rebar in during the winter, but we drill holes with a drill and pound the rebar into the hole. We bale the outside 2 rounds on the field and that gives us an idea of how much feed we have to work with, then we figure out how many swaths the cows need to get through 3-4 days and we give them that many swaths. We make them clean up the swaths before we move them, so the amount of swaths we give them is more of a guideline. We also give them a few straw bales every week to clean up as well and cheapen down our feed costs. Our cows eat snow as long as there is good powdered snow around, they wont eat crust. Our cows will dig through pretty deep snow to get to the swaths. As long as the snow is below their bellies they will dig for it. Same goes with stockpiled grasses. We let a pasture or two grow all summer and then we put the cows in their when the snow falls and as long as the grass comes through the snow they will go searching for it. But it has to be a grass that doesnt turn when it goes to seed and it has to grow fairly tall. We use smooth wheat grass. Our cows dont leave any swath behind and they will graze the sloughs and in the trees where there is grass to eat, as well as along the fencelines. Just make sure that the land they are swath grazing on has places to get out of the wind or have portable windbreak fences making up a large enough area that all the cows can get behind for protection. We are getting portable windbreaks this year and the only thing with them is that you have to move them so the bedpack doesnt build up. You want to spread that manure out as much as possible.

At what stage do you swath the barley? Do you cut it at boot stage? I've done the drilling for the rebar posts when I lived in northeast Nebraska. I think we, here in north central Kansas, would probably have problems with the cows tromping the swaths into the mud. That is where your frozen ground works to your advantage in that scenario. It's interesting. The barley would be good feed of course.
 
We swath the barley at mid dough I believe. I'm not a grain farmer so I have no idea on correct terminology, I just know when its gotta be cut. I'm pretty sure its mid dough stage. Our cows can take alot and have gotten through alot. But we are learning as we go at what works and what doesnt. And sometimes you learn the hard way.
 

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