Steers and heifers in the snow (pics)

[SRBeef]

It's been snowing all day in SW WI. With the weather forecast for snow, and being a softee, yesterday I put a stalk bale on the ground behind the house for the steers and heifer calves. These are all about 11 months old. Plowed some snow and took a couple pictures of them as I came in.

I am still amazed at how much they like to eat these stalk bales. There is a bit of corn in them and lots of leaves.

The ones with the yellow eartags are heifer calves. White eartags are some of the steers.

With the moisture we are getting and since they have eaten their way through most of the grazing corn, I think I will hang onto these steers through the spring flush of grass and see what they weigh.

Looks like we will have about 10" of new snow out of this storm. Pond is still solid snow covered ice. I did put up an electric wire around it. Sure hope calves do not come early this year. Theoretically first new calves should start in about 3 weeks.

Jim

 

[jallen]

Good lord their whoppers. Cool pics

 

[SRBeef]

Good lord their whoppers. Cool pics

I'll know more when the snow covering my scale platform in the alley melts and I can weigh them.

Thanks.

Jim

 

[jasonleonard]

SR , those are some nice calves for 11 months! Have they been on a creep or had some grain at all?

 

[haase]

They look like their doing good Jim, we used stalk bales this year also, alternated them with hay bales, due to the drought hay was in short supply. Cows did well on stalk bales, just went through more mineral.

 

[fitz]

Your animals always look great. Nice pictures.


fitz

 

[SRBeef]

SR , those are some nice calves for 11 months! Have they been on a creep or had some grain at all?

Jason, Those calves were born around the first week in April last year, weaned October 24th, no creep at all. They have been grazing some very poor drought standing unharvested corn (mostly just bare short stalks) since early December. What corn I had is gone and they have been on good hay and stalk bales 50/50 for the past few weeks.

I usually send them to the processors directly off of grazing corn for freezer beef in mid April. However as we are getting some moisture now I think I will keep these steers around through the spring flush of grass, see what they weigh then decide how to market them in June.

Maybe process one for my family to check out the carcass off of grass then decide on the rest. there is a nice premium locally for grass finished beef.

Jim

 

[SRBeef]

I purchase all of my winter hay and now for the first time, these stalk bales. My hay is very good quality but running very short, especially since we are a long way from turning them out and starting rotational grazing maybe first week in May.

There is a good supply of stalk bales available to purchase locally at reasonable prices. Good hay is hard to find locally right now and extremely expensive if you do find some. The stalk bales have greatly extended my hay supply at a reasonable cost. Lots of pastures planted to corn = lots of stalks available. I am surprised at how aggressively the calves eat these stalk bales. I've heard of folks having to pour molasses on stalk bales to get cattle to eat them. Not these. May be the way they were made with an old cast iron roll corn head, not shredded, lots of leaves and husks even some grain in there. I think the roughage also contributes to their health. My hay is high enough protein to make up the difference. The Mineralyx tubs fill in everything else.

I'm looking forward to when the ice and snow on my alley scale melts and I can get a good weight on each calf. Should be interesting.

Thanks for the kind words all. Many different ways to raise cattle.

Jim

 

[FB-Maines94]

First off, very nice cattle. If they are that fat in the winter, I can't imagine how big they'll be when you sell them.

Secondly, I didn't know that cattle would eat stalk bales. I hadn't even heard of it. Do you buy them directly from farmers?

 

[SRBeef]

First off, very nice cattle. If they are that fat in the winter, I can't imagine how big they'll be when you sell them.

Secondly, I didn't know that cattle would eat stalk bales. I hadn't even heard of it. Do you buy them directly from farmers?

Thanks for the kind words. Yes they do look good - even better as I look at them today.

I was also pleasantly surprised at how aggressively my steers and also my cow group have taken to eating these stalks bales. I had heard all sorts of horror stories about having to pour molasses on the bale etc to get them to eat them.

I am sure these are RR or maybe even Bt corn stalks. However the fellow I bought these from had a poor corn crop this year due to the drought. He also has an old corn head with cast iron rolls but a good rake and baler. He does not shred the stalks before baling. So there are a lot of leaves, cobs, husks etc in addition to the tough lower stalk itself.

They eat about 2/3 of the bale and the rest, mostly tough lower stalks, turns into bedding and manure soaked carbon for my compost piles after rotational grazing starts in May. This is what I was hoping for.

I've never fed stalk bales before but needed to do something to extend my dwindling hay supply. At $35 a large round bale the stalks are a lot less expensive and more plentiful than good hay this time of year. I have cut my hay consumption about in half with the stalk bales and cow condition is looking good yet.

I do see an increase in consumption of my Mineralyx barrels since I put out stalks but that is OK, especially just ahead of calving which should start in about 2 weeks. I like to see them getting their trace elements and vitamins ahead of calving.

Jim

 

[FB-Maines94]

Thanks for the reply!

 

[SRBeef]

The National Weather Service just revised their forecast for tonight:

Tonight Snow. The snow could be heavy at times. Low around 26. Blustery, with a north wind 14 to 16 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 6 to 10 inches possible.

Likely going to push back the time when we see anything green around here. Those stalk bales are becoming more important every day. Calving getting closer every day.

I am glad I didn't put the bulls in any earlier than I did. Sure wouldn't want to be calving now.

I am circling June 23rd on my calendar right now and no matter now tempting it might be, my bulls do NOT go in until June 23rd = April 1 calving start.

Good luck to you northern folks that are calving now.

Fields and pastures can use the moisture but the ground is still frozen rock hard under the snow and most of it is likely to run off unless we get a slow warm up this coming week.

Jim

AHA Gestation chart: http://www.hereford.org/node/316