The cows are on their way again, hopefully

[wbvs58]

I have just finished breeding my cows again. I am very happy with how things went. There was only one cow that I gave up on, a 1st calver that was being a bit of a "female dog". I did 36 cows and 9 heifers. I use cidrs for 8 days with PG and a bit of help with oestrodiol which you folk don't get to use. I got a good response with 50% on heat at 48 hrs and the remainder over the next 36 hours. I heat detect and inseminate when they are well and truly standing. I do them in batches of 10 with 3 days between batches. This eases the load on me and on the cleanup bulls. I am shooting to get them all calving in July, if I get 60% from my inseminations I'll be happy and the bull deals with the rest.
It is a lot of work sorting out the groups of cows along with their calves then treating them, heat detections before I even get to the inseminations, all mostly by myself. This year things couldn't have been better, the weather fine and the cows were just easy to do. The gun just seemed to find its way to the cervix itself and it was over in a few seconds which makes it easy on me. There were no ginormous cervixs to deal with probably because my calving was tight, 80% in July and they had time to cycle a time or two before I got to them. It is always a worry each year with my hands getting weaker whether I am going to be up to it but all good this year.
My calving this year was great too. I lost two calves with mature cows early on, one was a breech that I didn't get to early enough and the other the mother was standing over her dead newborn when I found her in the morning. The first cow to calve had twin heifers and one got separated from her and I was bottle feeding it so I was able to graft it to the one that had the breech birth. The other cow got sold. I had another set of twin heifers and a heifer had a pair of twin bull calves and all are doing well. The last two sets of twins I have them in a small paddock close to the house and I am supplementing the cows with a bit of grain. I have 36 cows and 38 calves so hard to do better than that.

Ken

 

[moses388]

What is your weather in July for winter calving?

 

[wbvs58]

What is your weather in July for winter calving?

We actually call it spring calving Moses, I don't know why because it is winter. We have regular frosts but no snow. Grass is dormant but usually enough stockpiled to see us through. It works out good as by the time things start to grow the calves are at an age where they can utilize it and get the full benefit of the summer growth up to weaning.

Ken

 

[Dsth]

sounds like you have a system that works well for you. I agree that every year is a little different. glad to hear this year has been good for you so far. Hope you have a satisfactory conception rate. with all the info you posted, I would expect an 80% or better conception rate. good luck

 

[frieghttrain]

What bulls did you use Ken? Hoping they stick well for ya!

 

[wbvs58]

What bulls did you use Ken? Hoping they stick well for ya!

New ones this year were
KCF Bennett Exponential
SS Brickyard
Hoffman Bar None
then these for 2nd or 3rd year
Sterling Pacific
DB Iconic
44 Brigade
So far I'm sitting on 66% (15 of 44 I have seen with the bull), I'll take that. One sire seems to be a bit over represented with them returning on heat.

Ken

 

[StrojanHerefords]

Why all the American bulls and no Aussie bulls?

 

[wbvs58]

Why all the American bulls and no Aussie bulls?

More to choose from. A lot of the Australian bulls have too much hype to them and consequently the owners and semen companies price them out of my budget and for bulls that are often unproven so they lose my interest. Most of these bulls are by US sires anyhow so I just go straight to the source. An example was the Australian record price set a few months ago for a bull at $360,000, he was by Poss Rawhide and was only 12 months old, EBV's weren't that special and I doubt that you could really say at 12 months of age that he was that much better than everything else. He went off to be collected. I haven't looked at the price of his semen but it doesn't interest me.

Ken

 

[StrojanHerefords]

I have had the same experience trying to Hereford semen out of Australia. They want an excessive price for the semen and with most of the cattle in have stuff in the pedigrees that I am trying to get away from. The weird thing to me is that the Herefords in Australia seem to be doing better than the Herefords here in the US.

 

[Travlr]

I have had the same experience trying to Hereford semen out of Australia. They want an excessive price for the semen and with most of the cattle in have stuff in the pedigrees that I am trying to get away from. The weird thing to me is that the Herefords in Australia seem to be doing better than the Herefords here in the US.

A lot of Americans seem to believe that inbreeding/line breeding and a lack of genetic diversity aren't something to be careful of. It's my impression that the rest of the world is more cautious, and I admire that in some nations in particular, Australia and Belgium especially.

 

[blackladies]

A lot of Americans seem to believe that inbreeding/line breeding and a lack of genetic diversity aren't something to be careful of. It's my impression that the rest of the world is more cautious, and I admire that in some nations in particular, Australia and Belgium especially.

There are a lot of big names that brag about the line breeding. The argument is they want conformity. May bite them in the ass at some point but they make a lot of money off their animals and are doing well. This is one of those deals that I'm leaning toward people are allowed to have different opinions. Breeding like that can be done well and it can be done very wrong.

 

[Travlr]

There are a lot of big names that brag about the line breeding. The argument is they want conformity. May bite them in the ass at some point but they make a lot of money off their animals and are doing well. This is one of those deals that I'm leaning toward people are allowed to have different opinions. Breeding like that can be done well and it can be done very wrong.

The consequences are hard on people when they are sold something and don't have the discretion it takes to filter out the downsides.

Americans, (and maybe others) have been indoctrinated with the idea that people need to have opinions about everything, and we jump to quick investment in ideas and then jump into defending those ideas to the death instead of taking in new information and modifying our perceptions. The best line breeders have bad outcomes and the worst get lucky... and somewhere in the middle is where the sweet spot is and we get value without hitting a brick wall. Sadly, the average time people take to consider an idea and either jump on board or deny it is 20 seconds... and most people make their decisions based on who they are talking to or if they agree with an article in the moment... instead of delaying forming a conclusion until they have investigated alternative points of view.

 

[Peace]

New ones this year were
KCF Bennett Exponential
SS Brickyard
Hoffman Bar None
then these for 2nd or 3rd year
Sterling Pacific
DB Iconic
44 Brigade
So far I'm sitting on 66% (15 of 44 I have seen with the bull), I'll take that. One sire seems to be a bit over represented with them returning on heat.

Ken

I watched a couple of your recent videos on youtube....calves look good, what did you use last year on those calves, more specifically the heifers? If you don't mind sharing

 

[wbvs58]

I watched a couple of your recent videos on youtube....calves look good, what did you use last year on those calves, more specifically the heifers? If you don't mind sharing

The 2022 breeding was done under extreme hardship with very waterlogged conditions making things hard to get around. Sitz Stellar was going to be the main bull for my heifers but the fertility of his semen was below par, I ended up getting just one Stellar out of my heifers, 3 overall out of 14 doses. DB Iconic was again very reliable and I got 2 out of 2 on the heifers and then 1 Ashland. I used Sterling Pacific on some cows as well and 44 Brigade I was sampling. I do like those DB Iconic's I'll have to put together some photos of them, I have 2 years of them now, they just seem to catch my eye, thick and plenty of depth to them and the quality of the semen makes him easy to use. I used some again last year and I think I'll get some more again this year and I usually only use a bull for 3 consecutive years. On those calves just weaned I used an Ashland son for clean up on the heifers and a Sydgen Enhance son on the cows. I am very happy with the calves from both those bulls. I think my Enhance son even enhanced Enhance.
I'm glad you enjoyed the videos.

Ken

 

[Peace]

The 2022 breeding was done under extreme hardship with very waterlogged conditions making things hard to get around. Sitz Stellar was going to be the main bull for my heifers but the fertility of his semen was below par, I ended up getting just one Stellar out of my heifers, 3 overall out of 14 doses. DB Iconic was again very reliable and I got 2 out of 2 on the heifers and then 1 Ashland. I used Sterling Pacific on some cows as well and 44 Brigade I was sampling. I do like those DB Iconic's I'll have to put together some photos of them, I have 2 years of them now, they just seem to catch my eye, thick and plenty of depth to them and the quality of the semen makes him easy to use. I used some again last year and I think I'll get some more again this year and I usually only use a bull for 3 consecutive years. On those calves just weaned I used an Ashland son for clean up on the heifers and a Sydgen Enhance son on the cows. I am very happy with the calves from both those bulls. I think my Enhance son even enhanced Enhance.
I'm glad you enjoyed the videos.

Ken

Thank you. I do check out your videos, in fact I hope the calves stopped bawling and you're getting some sleep. We don't get enough as it is when we season.

 

[crossbreed]

The consequences are hard on people when they are sold something and don't have the discretion it takes to filter out the downsides.

Americans, (and maybe others) have been indoctrinated with the idea that people need to have opinions about everything, and we jump to quick investment in ideas and then jump into defending those ideas to the death instead of taking in new information and modifying our perceptions. The best line breeders have bad outcomes and the worst get lucky... and somewhere in the middle is where the sweet spot is and we get value without hitting a brick wall. Sadly, the average time people take to consider an idea and either jump on board or deny it is 20 seconds... and most people make their decisions based on who they are talking to or if they agree with an article in the moment... instead of delaying forming a conclusion until they have investigated alternative points of view.

No truer words ever spoken than "people think they need to have an opinion about everything "