Traditional Calf/Cow ver Heifers Only

[Bigdog13]

Thoughts on buying young heifers keeping them for a year and selling them bred each year vs keeping the heifers and selling the calves each year?

I currently run 32 head, 16 1yr old heifers & 16 bred 2 yr olds due in March. My 2yr olds each 3x as much hay and twice as much cake. Is there really that much more profit in retaining the cows and doing a traditional cow calf operation? Or can people make about as much or even more buying young heifers raising them to heavy bred and selling them?

 

[mtnhunter]

Yea, Iwant to know too!!!!

 

[angus9259]

I personally couldn't make any money buying heifers and selling them as bred. How are you calculating that?

 

[Bigfoot]

I have made a little money a time or two buying heifers to breed and sell. You can't run them through the yard and do any good though. Needs to be a special sale, or a private treaty. Year in, and year out, it's not that great of a money maker. It's also hard to find heifers of the quality it takes to be succesful. You can raise them, but its hard to go out and find them.

 

[Nesikep]

My biggest concern would be what Bigfoot says.. finding the quality in the heifer calves to have something someone wants when it's bred, and doesn't come and bite me in the arse. This is particularly important selling privately, but even selling through a sale barn it'll get around.

 

[muleskinner]

Why buy them. Why not background them for people. Take them after weaning and return them as breds the next fall when they
drop off the next load. I have a friend doing it and he is doing pretty good, he is doing around a 100 head. If a farmer doesn't have to feed and take care of the heifers it allows them run run a couple of extra pairs.

 

[SteppedInIt]

Something I read recently and kinda accidently did over the weekend has really got me thinking. One strategy is one could buy a set of bred heifers, calve them out, keep the calves, breed the heifers back and resale as second calf cow for more money. I assume he breeds the heifer calves he kept??? The point of the scenario is this guy feels he made more money selling the older stock vs keeping cows and selling calves. To me it makes sense to the point of consideration.

What I did this weekend, that somewhat follows this concept is... I bought a nice heavy bred cow a year ago, she calved a nice heifer that I am keeping. She is light bred back and I traded her for two nice bred heifers. There were of course some feed cost to maintain the cow, but I think I came out way ahead on the whole deal vs keeping the cow. I know how good this deal is really depends on how the new heifers perform.

 

[Supa Dexta]

Couple yrs late hopping on the heifer train. Herd rebuild is well under way in the US. Demand for heifers will continue to drop. you guys should be butchering as many as you can that aren't *great* animals.

 

[1wlimo]

Something I read recently and kinda accidently did over the weekend has really got me thinking. One strategy is one could buy a set of bred heifers, calve them out, keep the calves, breed the heifers back and resale as second calf cow for more money. I assume he breeds the heifer calves he kept??? The point of the scenario is this guy feels he made more money selling the older stock vs keeping cows and selling calves. To me it makes sense to the point of consideration.

What I did this weekend, that somewhat follows this concept is... I bought a nice heavy bred cow a year ago, she calved a nice heifer that I am keeping. She is light bred back and I traded her for two nice bred heifers. There were of course some feed cost to maintain the cow, but I think I came out way ahead on the whole deal vs keeping the cow. I know how good this deal is really depends on how the new heifers perform.

Calving heifers is not quite the same as calving out cows. If you know where the heifers come from, and the bull that was used, and you have the time and attention to detail to do an A1 job there may be a margin there. Does not take very may issues and you have lost any slim margin there may have been.

 

[Till-Hill]

Something I read recently and kinda accidently did over the weekend has really got me thinking. One strategy is one could buy a set of bred heifers, calve them out, keep the calves, breed the heifers back and resale as second calf cow for more money. I assume he breeds the heifer calves he kept??? The point of the scenario is this guy feels he made more money selling the older stock vs keeping cows and selling calves. To me it makes sense to the point of consideration.

What I did this weekend, that somewhat follows this concept is... I bought a nice heavy bred cow a year ago, she calved a nice heifer that I am keeping. She is light bred back and I traded her for two nice bred heifers. There were of course some feed cost to maintain the cow, but I think I came out way ahead on the whole deal vs keeping the cow. I know how good this deal is really depends on how the new heifers perform.

Calving heifers is not quite the same as calving out cows. If you know where the heifers come from, and the bull that was used, and you have the time and attention to detail to do an A1 job there may be a margin there. Does not take very may issues and you have lost any slim margin there may have been.

From the original post I think running heifers can be a money maker. Here is my twist on it. I have mostly seedstock kind of cows. I got few guys running just my bulls. They don't like to AI, don't like heifers, etc.

I want to trade them a bred cow in the fall carrying a bull calf for 2 of their weanling heifers. I'll get them AI'd and only animal to ever leave the farm as a bred would be them carrying bull calves or cows that don't need to be replacement type cattle. Anyone see why that would or wouldn't work? I think I'd need to give them 2nd-4th calf cows. I would only do it with known genetics too.

I got all kinds of room with dairy cattle around for heifers, cow calf pairs is where I'm limited to renting pasture and some of them I can't run a bull on..........also couple of the guys calve about 2 months later than I do so any "late" bred cows could be marketed that way....

 

[Supa Dexta]

It was said a cow doesn't start making money until 5 yrs old, perhaps 6 by now. You'd be getting rid of them just as they are about to start turning a profit, and even though you'd get 2 heifers in return - they are 2 that do nothing but cost money, and provide no income.

 

[Till-Hill]

It was said a cow doesn't start making money until 5 yrs old, perhaps 6 by now. You'd be getting rid of them just as they are about to start turning a profit, and even though you'd get 2 heifers in return - they are 2 that do nothing but cost money, and provide no income.

I agree 100%. These are the cows that are only raising sale barn calves anyway and can lessen the hardest part about me having cows on my boss's property. Wintering cows. I have a very cheap TMR ration to use on the heifers. Plus heifers have higher conception rate. I have sexed semen on hand and if deal took off I could AI my March heifers for March calves with sexed female and turn cleanup bull in for April and May calves what more and more guys want and more than double our number of animals and double our equity. Cows are pretty much stuck to eating decent round bales out of rings. And in a way it would get my name out there more on selling some bulls along with if someone didn't want to do the trade deal I can always sell them. We are only carrying about $500 a cow debt at the moment. Own everything except the ground they live on....

We sold pairs last year for $3,500 on registered cows that were never going to raise seedstock, our cows are culled hard and calve in tight windows.

 

[Stocker Steve]

Thoughts on buying young heifers keeping them for a year and selling them bred each year vs keeping the heifers and selling the calves each year?

You can stock more heifers per acre than pairs - - so the potential profit (or the inventory loss in a down market) per acre will be greater than pairs, but less than stockers.

 

[Stocker Steve]

Couple yrs late hopping on the heifer train. Herd rebuild is well under way in the US. Demand for heifers will continue to drop. you guys should be butchering as many as you can that aren't *great* animals.

Folks are still expanding in my area.
A lot of $700 to $850 heifer calves were retained late this fall.
Better late than than losing $$$ on crops?

 

[SteppedInIt]

Something I read recently and kinda accidently did over the weekend has really got me thinking. One strategy is one could buy a set of bred heifers, calve them out, keep the calves, breed the heifers back and resale as second calf cow for more money. I assume he breeds the heifer calves he kept??? The point of the scenario is this guy feels he made more money selling the older stock vs keeping cows and selling calves. To me it makes sense to the point of consideration.

What I did this weekend, that somewhat follows this concept is... I bought a nice heavy bred cow a year ago, she calved a nice heifer that I am keeping. She is light bred back and I traded her for two nice bred heifers. There were of course some feed cost to maintain the cow, but I think I came out way ahead on the whole deal vs keeping the cow. I know how good this deal is really depends on how the new heifers perform.

Calving heifers is not quite the same as calving out cows. If you know where the heifers come from, and the bull that was used, and you have the time and attention to detail to do an A1 job there may be a margin there. Does not take very may issues and you have lost any slim margin there may have been.

From the original post I think running heifers can be a money maker. Here is my twist on it. I have mostly seedstock kind of cows. I got few guys running just my bulls. They don't like to AI, don't like heifers, etc.

I want to trade them a bred cow in the fall carrying a bull calf for 2 of their weanling heifers. I'll get them AI'd and only animal to ever leave the farm as a bred would be them carrying bull calves or cows that don't need to be replacement type cattle. Anyone see why that would or wouldn't work? I think I'd need to give them 2nd-4th calf cows. I would only do it with known genetics too.

I got all kinds of room with dairy cattle around for heifers, cow calf pairs is where I'm limited to renting pasture and some of them I can't run a bull on..........also couple of the guys calve about 2 months later than I do so any "late" bred cows could be marketed that way....

I traded a bred cow for two bred heifers that will calve this year. I think the profit potential is in the fact the heifers are breeding age and already bred. You may be leaving money on the table trading for weanlings. You will have to raise them to breeding age then breed them. Also, I don't understand why you would have to trade more than a first calf cow. It depends on the values of the cow vs heifers between you and the other guy.

 

[Till-Hill]

I'd trade a 2nd calf on up cow so guys don't have to deal with calving heifers. I'm using last year sale price but we sold our 650# steers for $1325/head. Using that dollar amount would make my cows worth $2650 in the fall. I figure because of TMR situation on heifers I can feed 3+ weaning heifers cheaper than I can feed a cow.

I'd say you got a great deal!

 

[SteppedInIt]

I'd trade a 2nd calf on up cow so guys don't have to deal with calving heifers. I'm using last year sale price but we sold our 650# steers for $1325/head. Using that dollar amount would make my cows worth $2650 in the fall. I figure because of TMR situation on heifers I can feed 3+ weaning heifers cheaper than I can feed a cow.

I'd say you got a great deal!

Something to think about though. Take that $2650 and subtract cost for maintaining/breeding the heifers until they wean their first calf. Where are you financially on the deal at this point?

Also, I may be wrong but by the time you get two calves out of heifers, you could possibly have had two calves out of the cow you traded. Right? So did you come out on the deal? I dunno, honestly I am a little foggy this morning. Going to get more coffee.

 

[Dave]

I have done it the last three years. Made money every year. The biggest investment is in the cost of buying the heifers. I know the selling price has gone down but so has the purchase price. Fro me the second biggest expense is the cost of feeding over the winter. I cut that considerably by simply buying heifers later.

Try to put together a large uniform group. The larger your herd the more sale options you have.
Buy good looking heifers but don't get carried away paying too much for great heifers. If you feel you must raise the absolute best get into the registered business. A good solid heifer will work fine for the majority of the commercial outfits.
AI to drop dead calving ease bull. Clean up with calving ease bulls.
Vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate. And keep records of that to show buyers.
PI test. It is cheap to do and shows buyers that you are doing everything possible to give them a good cow.

 

[SteppedInIt]

Good response. Thanks Dave. :clap: