Some Spring Pictures

[creekdrive]

Things are going pretty well here. Pretty much done calving - 15 or so stragglers left. Was on track for the best success rate ever - 286 calves so far all born alive, lost 1 due to weather & 1 due to a navel infection. Everything else was alive & thriving till a few weeks ago when we found 3 just about 2 month old calves that had been vaccinated & out on left over swath grazing for 3+ weeks dead. All died fairly close to each other in the field and within 24 hours of each other. Had the vet come out & post mortem them the next day and he couldn't find any reason. No sign of pneumonia, black leg or any other kind of sickness. He felt it had to be some kind of toxin that they ingested but being it was a long weekend and they weren't real fresh when he cut them open he didn't think sending any samples away would yield any results. Very disappointing to lose them and I still feel sick about it. But we are still on track for a very good year so it's not all bad.

Grass was very slow to grow this year - too dry & too cold at night to even get it started. Had to feed a couple weeks longer than usual, but finally have just about all the pairs out on pasture. We've been lucky to get a few decent rains at home to help things along, but some places (including a good chunk of our pasture) not very far from us are very very dry. We are getting a good rain today that is covering a large area of the province so hopefully everybody gets some much needed moisture.

Anyway here's the pictures.

Black Angus pairs. The heifer calf in the foreground is one of my favorites so far.

Lots of hair is good in this climate but some of the real wooly ones look pretty shaggy this time of year.

Not a great picture - but one of my favorite cows. She comes by the nickname 'Short Round' honestly.

Commercial pairs - cows are a mixed group, some of just about every breed out there. Calves are mostly Charolais sired, with the remainder being Red Angus sired.

6 yr old Sim X cow

3 yr old Herf x Sim x Angus cow

8 yr old black cow (Angus x ???)

Rain on the way

As always thanks for letting me share.

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

Cattle look good. Those commercial pairs look like they are doing great.

 

[Bright Raven]

Beautiful cattle.

 

[sim.-ang.king]

Who are your char bulls out of? I'm thinking I may go back to char to replace my current terminal bull.

 

[Ky hills]

Very nice cattle, thanks for sharing :tiphat:

 

[creekdrive]

Cattle look good. Those commercial pairs look like they are doing great.

Thanks RBB. That is good hard native grass over in that pasture. It doesn't produce a lot volume wise, but the cows & calves always do well there.

Who are your char bulls out of? I'm thinking I may go back to char to replace my current terminal bull.

The 2 char bulls we ran last year are mostly full french genetics. I really know nothing about Char bloodlines but have been very pleased with these two. They are both from the same breeder. One is a 4 yr old tan bull that we purchased as a yearling - his sire is from the Pinay line. The other was a white yearling that is from a Buckshot line. We are super impressed with him. He bred 30 out of 33 cows in the first cycle. I have their papers filed away somewhere and if you want more info on their pedigrees I can dig it up for you.
This year we are adding another white char (Encore bloodline) and will also turn out 2 tan yearlings that are home raised sired by the Pinay bull.

 

[greybeard]

Not a great picture - but one of my favorite cows. She comes by the nickname 'Short Round' honestly.

I dunno about the 'short' part if short is opposite long. That is one long cow!!

Too bad about the 3 calves dying. I worry some every spring at first green up.........you just never know for sure what is going to come up..

 

[creekdrive]

Not a great picture - but one of my favorite cows. She comes by the nickname 'Short Round' honestly.

I dunno about the 'short' part if short is opposite long. That is one long cow!!

Too bad about the 3 calves dying. I worry some every spring at first green up.........you just never know for sure what is going to come up..

Short in height! Haha
The calves dying was sure a downer...you do everything 'right' and stuff still goes wrong sometimes. There was 45+ other pairs out in the same field with them. Got them out of there the day after but sure makes a person nervous especially not knowing what it was that caused it.

 

[gcreekrch]

Your area looks better than I expected, a lot of Western Canada really dry. Was just on the phone with a guy from Calgary talking about some cheap pairs that sold today. He said it was raining there and rain in the forecast all this coming week. I hope so as Alberta and Sask. need to grow some feed and grain in order for feeder cattle to bring anything this fall.

Your cattle are exceptional, shows a cowman owns them!

 

[creekdrive]

Your area looks better than I expected, a lot of Western Canada really dry. Was just on the phone with a guy from Calgary talking about some cheap pairs that sold today. He said it was raining there and rain in the forecast all this coming week. I hope so as Alberta and Sask. need to grow some feed and grain in order for feeder cattle to bring anything this fall.

Your cattle are exceptional, shows a cowman owns them!

We have been lucky right at home and have had a few good rains. We've had a little over 2 inches and are at another 8 tenths so far today. We send roughly 135 pairs and 30 replacement heifers to pasture around Amisk (30 miles east roughly) and they have only had 2 tenths of moisture all year. Down around Oyen they have had less than a tenth all year. It's not looking good in a lot of places.

I think our pastures look better than a lot of peoples around here. We try to always manage pastures for a bad year which makes a big difference in a year like this. Pastures that get chewed off to the dirt every year aren't looking good right now.

 

[Bright Raven]

Creekdrive

The 3 dead 2 month old calves. You said close together and right after vaccination. Did the vet give any thought to anaphylaxis.

 

[creekdrive]

Creekdrive

The 3 dead 2 month old calves. You said close together and right after vaccination. Did the vet give any thought to anaphylaxis.

not right after vaccination - they were vaccinated April 21st and found dead May 19.

 

[Bright Raven]

Creekdrive

The 3 dead 2 month old calves. You said close together and right after vaccination. Did the vet give any thought to anaphylaxis.

not right after vaccination - they were vaccinated April 21st and found dead May 19.

Thanks. That does not fit then. Sorry but by gosh your percentage is great. I have a crusty old friend near me that has 300 cows. He doesn't bat an eye at anything under 10 percent loss.

 

[creekdrive]

Ooops hit submit before I meant to.

Vet thought maybe something in the water...algae or sulfates or i can't remember what else he suggested. There is a water trough there but there is a couple low areas in that field that hold runoff water that they all would have access to. And for this time of year there was definitely more algae due to how dry it was. There is some old equipment in the bushes and stuff too. I looked through everything trying to find an old battery or something laying around that they found but couldn't find anything out of the ordinary and nothing that hasn't already been there for decades. Have put pairs on that piece in the spring most years and it has had cattle on it just about every year since it was homesteaded in the early 1900's. Our vet is very experienced and even he was stumped. I'm leaning towards something in the water but who knows.

 

[creekdrive]

Thanks. That does not fit then. Sorry but by gosh your percentage is great. I have a crusty old friend near me that has 300 cows. He doesn't bat an eye at anything under 10 percent loss.

Thank you. I know it is still a good percentage, I just really take it to heart when we lose one, especially if it is from sickness or something preventable. Last year was our worst year ever - I think we ended up at 7% death loss and I'm still disgusted by it. Crypto is a nightmare that I wouldn't wish upon anyone.

 

[Bright Raven]

Thanks. That does not fit then. Sorry but by gosh your percentage is great. I have a crusty old friend near me that has 300 cows. He doesn't bat an eye at anything under 10 percent loss.

Thank you. I know it is still a good percentage, I just really take it to heart when we lose one, especially if it is from sickness or something preventable. Last year was our worst year ever - I think we ended up at 7% death loss and I'm still disgusted by it. Crypto is a nightmare that I wouldn't wish upon anyone.

I fight coccidia but I got it figured out. I use corid. Is crypto worse?

 

[creekdrive]

http://www.thecattlesite.com/diseaseinfo/209/cryptosporidiosis/

If I caught them soon enough I could tube them electrolytes 3 times a day usually for 3 days and they would bounce back pretty good. Also treated with Excenel for 3 days to help with secondary infections. If I didn't catch them in the first 12 hours it seemed like it was a losing battle. Hauled a few to the vet for IV which worked good as well but was not cheap.

 

[Bright Raven]

http://www.thecattlesite.com/diseaseinfo/209/cryptosporidiosis/

Both act as protozoan parasites. Sounds very much like coccidia.

 

[creekdrive]

Coccidia at least has a treatment though. We calve on pasture and have never had a scour problem until last year. Through the years have had the odd case of scours but we really had no experience dealing with an outbreak like that. It was exhausting. This year I did not treat a single calf for scours. Same cows/same pasture, just a different year I guess.

 

[gcreekrch]

Coccidia at least has a treatment though. We calve on pasture and have never had a scour problem until last year. Through the years have had the odd case of scours but we really had no experience dealing with an outbreak like that. It was exhausting. This year I did not treat a single calf for scours. Same cows/same pasture, just a different year I guess.

Last year was a bad year for weather here, thinking your spring was ugly to if memory serves right.

We are at 4% loss since preg test last fall. Quite happy with that. Will see what the bears and wolves do to change that percentage this fall.