Stockers vs developing heifers

[BFE]

I have some extra grass going into this season and a short crop of fall calves due to a lazy bull stretching my breeding season in '20. I'm hauling calves almost two hours to take advantage of preconditioned feeder calf sales so it's in my best interest to at least make full trailer loads.

I also have a few heifers I'm interested in retaining and a bigger group would make it more worthwhile.

All this brings me to the question of what would be more profitable to focus on, turning 2-3 groups of stockers or developing some heifer groups to take to heavy bred or even possibly calving them out? Or would I be better off to do some of both?

I can grow my own baleage and then double crop corn or soybeans behind it so quality feed isn't a problem, or I could chop and bag some silage as well. I'm also a back haul away from a crusher so soyhull pellets are easily obtainable.

 

[Son of Butch]

IMO - Stockers
Given your previous history of 'bad luck' (lax management) with a 'lazy' bull, stockers have less risk than a large group of heifers.
Just calling it as I see it and I apologize in advance for any hurt feelings.
Stockers have fewer moving parts to manage than growing, breeding and marketing bred heifers.

 

[BFE]

IMO - Stockers
Given your previous history of 'bad luck' (lax management) with a 'lazy' bull, stockers have less risk than a large group of heifers.
Just calling it as I see it and I apologize in advance for any hurt feelings.
Stockers have fewer moving parts to manage than growing, breeding and marketing bred heifers.

Thank you for your thoughts.

No hurt feelings. What hurts is when you see a bull breed cows, but he gets too lazy to cross a ditch to pick up all the girls, as some cows stayed on one side of the ditch and some the other. I had a young bull that got the rest when I moved them home for the winter, all calved within a month so they had to be cycling. The previous year I was down to a 60 day window, other than some purchased cows that weren't on the same schedule.
Needless to say, the old boy lost the only job he had. As my vet says he went to study at hamburger university.

 

[Dave]

It is possible to do both. Start with smaller heifers. Once they get to the size where you would turn the bull take a look at the market and decide. I have always shot for breeding at 800 pounds. In this area anyway the feedlots like 800 pound heifers to start on feed. It will depend on your market and the numbers you have to play with.

 

[Dsth]

I pretty much agree with @Dave. around here, unless heifers have a good pedigree or are impressive going through the sale, the price difference isn't worth the extra time and expense to market as bred heifers. one benefit of breeding is you have your own replacements if they are needed.

 

[Ky hills]

I've done both stockers, and heifer developments. Both has their pros and cons. At this point, I feel like I would have probably been better off to stick with stockers. You can run a volume of stockers and turn them over quicker. Seems like if all goes well with them once they get started there isn't a lot of hands on work with them, but the down side is you are going through that process more often.
I went from running steers, to heifers, and eventually got into selling heifers as breds. Around here there are several established bred heifer consignment sales, or you can sell them private treaty. The sales are a pretty good way to go if you have several heifers. Getting to be a part of the sales can be difficult some place are a click with no possibility of getting in. Others if you know who to talk to and when to start trying you can get in.
Its a long program, around a year, I would buy calves in the fall and sell them the next fall as bred. Even with trying to buy higher end cattle, a lot fall out along the way. Disposition, usually one or two would be nonbreeders, or they don't have a big enough pelvic measurement.
Then if you sell through a sale they are screened at the fall working prior to the sale. Any open ones are culls, any with blemishes ie pink eye scars, warts, etc are rejected. Each of those that are sold as culls along the way, are usually losing propositions as they are sold as singles or a small group, and most likely at that point they are a size that is odd for the buyers.
I did the bred heifer program for 10 years. A lot more expense in comparison to stockers, have to keep more bulls around. My current cowherd is largely made up of animals that I bought that either picked out from the group to keep back or ones that had some minor thing that got them rejected from the sales.
A lot of people don't think that heifers purchased through the stockyards can make good cows, but we have had overall good results with retaining those purchased heifers.

 

[Lucky]

If doing heifers I'd shoot for a 45-60 day calve out period and have them calving 30-45 days before ranchers in your area turn out their bulls. Overall I'd say the reward would be greater with heifers but so would the risk.

 

[littletom]

Purebred bull sale sold several commercial heifers here saturday i saw there posted numbers i was not there. I have in the past pretty sure they were plenty fancy. Open yearlings 1240 bred to calve next month 1800.

 

[JRGidaho`]

Strongest argument for stockers is much more rapid inventory turnover compared to breeding heifers. This is particularly true is you are buying the stockers. Custom grazing there is less advantage to the rapid turnover concept.

Contrary to what most people believe, there is generally more margin in non-black cattle if you can do a few things.
1) Buy the sorted out cull steers or heifers. Those that are reds, white, gray, yellow, gold, purple. Whatever the buyers don't want.
2) Accumulate enough for a pot load when you sell them.
2) Sell directly to a buyer rather than running them through the sale barn.
Ugly cattle are only ugly when there is a handful of them among a nice set of black cattle. When you have a whole pot load, they are no longer ugly. When you buy a nice set of number 1 blacks, you can add weight to them but there will be some who slide back from being beautiful number 1s. They lose value as an individual and get sorted off. With ugly cattle, they almost always gain in individual value if you can consolidate them into a pot load. Hence, more profit margin per individual animal.

Breeding heifers for resale on a rising cattle cycle can be very profitable.
Breeding heifers for resale on a falling cattle cycle is more often a financial disaster.
You need to be fully in touch with the overall market to be consistently successful in the bred heifer market.

 

[Lucky]

I've bought 8 month bred heifers any where from $1,100 to $1,750. Not much difference in quality either. I'd say the break even is $1,250-1,300. Last year my open heifers brought $1,100 at the sale in August and I bought breds back for $1,150 in January. Pretty sure that man didn't make any money. If you can market them at $1,500 that's a money maker though.

 

[Stocker Steve]

Breeding heifers for resale on a rising cattle cycle can be very profitable.
Breeding heifers for resale on a falling cattle cycle is more often a financial disaster.
You need to be fully in touch with the overall market to be consistently successful in the bred heifer market.

We get one turn per year with either breds or stockers in the north. I tried two stocker turns once, but washy fall grass here did not work well, and our feeder market usually declines during the fall.

We used to graze only steers to maximize VOG. Now only graze heifers to maximize flexibility. Have had best success selling private treaty breds to fans of the heifer bull bloodline.

Unless you have lots of free pasture - - you need to look at GM/acre. Here stockers usually have a financial advantage due to a lower body weight and a shorter grazing season. Almost double the head per acre - - and double the price risk.

So, we cull hard before turning out bulls. The open heifers we retain could be considered hobby heifers.

 

[Dave]

With corn prices shooting up my thinking is taking stockers up to heavier weightswill be the way to go. Getting a better VOG on grass. And as always selling closer to the end user the better. We will be taking calves to higher weights and selling direct to the feedlots. It has worked well in the past and it looks like that kind of year again. So I am going two ways this year. One and done cows and stockers which we will take up into the 800 pound + range.

 

[Stocker Steve]

So I am going two ways this year. One and done cows and stockers which we will take up into the 800 pound + range.

What will your stockers be grazing, and what is your ADG target?

 

[Dave]

What will your stockers be grazing, and what is your ADG target?

Not sure at this point. Talked to B about it this morning. He listed off several options. This is a me tagging along on his coat tails deal.

 

[Stocker Steve]

With corn prices shooting up my thinking is taking stockers up to heavier weights will be the way to go. Getting a better VOG on grass. And as always selling closer to the end user the better. We will be taking calves to higher weights and selling direct to the feedlots.

Higher corn prices creating higher feeder VOG is classic, but I think the correlation has gone down due to more byproduct usage and packer consolidation.

The stocker supply issue in snow country is we have very few fall calvers and high hay cost. The BTOs buy, custom background locally, and then truck them north from the SE or the mid-south. Virgina, Tennesse, Arkansas, Misery...

The local lazy man method is to calve in June and leave them on the cow for most of the winter. I think this could work with some stockpile and the right kind of genetics.

 

[BFE]

I'm conditioning some calves now. Feeding baleage, shelled corn, and free choice protein blocks. I weighed them the day I started this program, will weigh again next week, and weigh at the sale in April. I'll figure all my corn cost at $7+ since that is local cash price now, when i started it was less than $6. It will be interesting to see what my cost of gain is. I've never weighed in before, just out, so it should give me a good idea of what I can do for the money.
I'm going to get some more bulk storage to handle enough soyhull pellets to make it worth the backhaul from the crusher. $7 corn translates to $250/ton, SH pellets are currently $215. I'm hoping the pellets will be a more versatile feed for me. I would like to use them for creep feed as well, since I'm moving to more fall calving due to the bull snafu of '20. I also hope it would be a better feed for developing heifers and bulls from my registered cows. I want breeding stock that's not been pushed too hard but has plenty of nutrition, and I'm hoping the pellets will give me the kind of supplementation to do that properly and be cost effective.

 

[Dave]

Contrary to what most people believe, there is generally more margin in non-black cattle if you can do a few things.
1) Buy the sorted out cull steers or heifers. Those that are reds, white, gray, yellow, gold, purple. Whatever the buyers don't want.
2) Accumulate enough for a pot load when you sell them.
2) Sell directly to a buyer rather than running them through the sale barn.
Ugly cattle are only ugly when there is a handful of them among a nice set of black cattle. When you have a whole pot load, they are no longer ugly. When you buy a nice set of number 1 blacks, you can add weight to them but there will be some who slide back from being beautiful number 1s. They lose value as an individual and get sorted off. With ugly cattle, they almost always gain in individual value if you can consolidate them into a pot load. Hence, more profit margin per individual animal.

That is one of the things I do. Calves here at the sale barn sell in single owner sorted groups. The buyers will often sort off a calf or two. Those calves will generally sell for 20 to 60 cents a pound less. Quickly off the top of my head I can think of two heifers like that in the pen right now. They were 400 pound heifers when I bought them. Groups that size and sex were $1.45 when I bought them. I paid $1.10 and $0.80 for those two. They have done nothing but grow since they have been here.

 

[Muletrack]

Nice talk, guys.

 

[BFE]

It is possible to do both. Start with smaller heifers. Once they get to the size where you would turn the bull take a look at the market and decide. I have always shot for breeding at 800 pounds. In this area anyway the feedlots like 800 pound heifers to start on feed. It will depend on your market and the numbers you have to play with.

I think I'll take your advice. Since my fall calves are heavy on the heifer side I'm going to purchase some more to match. I have a LBW Angus bull to turn in with them. Probably make a trailer load of steers to match though, spread the risk.

 

[ClinchValley86]

Thank you for your thoughts.

No hurt feelings. What hurts is when you see a bull breed cows, but he gets too lazy to cross a ditch to pick up all the girls, as some cows stayed on one side of the ditch and some the other. I had a young bull that got the rest when I moved them home for the winter, all calved within a month so they had to be cycling. The previous year I was down to a 60 day window, other than some purchased cows that weren't on the same schedule.
Needless to say, the old boy lost the only job he had. As my vet says he went to study at hamburger university.

Had one do the same thing last year. I suffer from lack management in ways too. Great company.