Trust the sale yard vet

[Dave]

I bought two cows that came into the ring together on January 14. Both bred cows from the same seller. The vet called one 8 months and the other 6 months. I really didn't want a 6 month bred cow at that time and they were selling them together. But I got them cheap enough that I went ahead and bought them. So here we are 2 months and 11 days later. The 8 month bred should have already calved and the 6 month has a ways to go. This morning the 6 month bred had a brand new calf. About 4:30 this afternoon the 8 month bred cow had her calf. So the vet had them 2 months apart and they were both born the same day.
We are about 3 weeks from turn out. The 34 cows left to calf better get with the program.

 

[jltrent]

I bought a couple with a zero (open) on their back in October with one being 4 yo and the other 6 yo. Both have a calf on the ground now. Lord knows how old they maybe, as inaccurate as the birth was. One cow looks young and the other looks older than they said. The calves are starting off good so I am happy.

 

[callmefence]

What do you expect from someone who went to college to spend his days up a cows azz............... where is buck randall anyways. ??????lol..

 

[Dave]

I have another that I bought on November 11. The vet called her 7 months bred. The calf was born on March 20. The calf hit the ground running. But it should it was already 2 months old when it was born.

 

[farmerjan]

I have gotten even less positive about relying on the vet's "preg check".... bought an 8 month bred and she calved the next day.
But our own vet has been off quite a bit lately with shorter bred cows.... calling several open (that were 2-3 months); we put them back with a bull because several were young cows with big strapping calves.... and have had to pull the bigger calves off because 2 have just dropped a new calf.... Got another one this evening that dropped a brand new one so her older calf has to come off... it is not a real big calf so I don't know if she is not milking the way that she should.... but I am hoping that the new calves get along since I was not expecting new ones. We were getting ready to bring them all into the barn and preg checked and the calves sold.... so the 2 have had the older calves pulled and sold... now got to do this other one. I think there are 3 more so, the cows will get brought to the barn and checked now, the calves will get pulled to sell.
We try to have a more defined calving season, but with my son breaking his hip nov 2019 and my ankle replacement in feb 2020.... bulls did not get pulled and not all the cows did as good through the winter feeding so some just did not cycle.... friends helped out alot but some things just slid by.... it could be worse.
Hope to have a better defined calving this fall and get back on track. But the good thing is we did not sell some of the younger "open cows" and even though they are a little out of synch from their original calving group, they are calving now with the spring calving bunch.
A vet that used to do alot of the dairies told me once that when you get over 5-6 months, the calf is so far down over the pelvic floor, and the calf grows at different stages in different cows, that it is very hard to tell when they are over 5+ months.
I can tell if they are bred after 5 months so on the ones that are supposed to be further along, I will check. I am trying to get son to let me get the one vet I like to come and do the ultra sound.... more reliable AND easier on the cow than just palpating.... won't disrupt a short pregnancy as much either....

 

[Buck Randall]

What do you expect from someone who went to college to spend his days up a cows azz............... where is buck randall anyways. ??????lol..

 

[Till-Hill]

There isn't a vet or anyone in the world that can can much more than a educated guess on a cows pregnancy after 4 months. Always been that way always will be. I hope before I'm dead and gone they will announce it that way. She is 4-9 months.

 

[gcreekrch]

They are fairly accurate to 150 days. After that I believe very few can keep up the accuracy.

 

[Buck Randall]

As others have said, palpation gets pretty inaccurate beyond 5 months pregnant. Especially so in a sale barn setting, where speed is going to be prioritized over accuracy. If a sale barn cow bucks like a bronco or lies down in the chute, her odds of being called "open" go up dramatically. Nobody wants to get their arm ripped off so a stranger can make an extra $50 over kill price.

 

[Dave]

As others have said, palpation gets pretty inaccurate beyond 5 months pregnant. Especially so in a sale barn setting, where speed is going to be prioritized over accuracy. If a sale barn cow bucks like a bronco or lies down in the chute, her odds of being called "open" go up dramatically. Nobody wants to get their arm ripped off so a stranger can make an extra $50 over kill price.

You get paid to do a job. Do it right or go back to the clinic and take care of Fluffy the dog.

 

[Till-Hill]

You get paid to do a job. Do it right or go back to the clinic and take care of Fluffy the dog.

Like I said nobody can accurately check a cow after 4 months. Its buyer beware buying cows at that point

 

[Nesikep]

As others have said, palpation gets pretty inaccurate beyond 5 months pregnant. Especially so in a sale barn setting, where speed is going to be prioritized over accuracy. If a sale barn cow bucks like a bronco or lies down in the chute, her odds of being called "open" go up dramatically. Nobody wants to get their arm ripped off so a stranger can make an extra $50 over kill price.

many times you won't even get over kill price from what I've found.. I've never bothered preg checking my culls. If I'd do a herd reduction of decent cows with some calves left in them I'd do it

 

[wbvs58]

In Australia there is a system of accreditation of vets for pregcheck by the cattle vets branch of the Aus Vet Assoc.. Vets have to display a high level of accuracy to be accredited and are the eligble to put tail tags on the cows with their accreditation number and a serial number for each tag. The tags are colour coded. I can never remember the colours but there are only 3 categories, over 4 mths pregnant, less than 4 mths pregnant and no pregnancy detected.

Ken

 

[Ky hills]

A couple years ago had some heifers pregnancy checked and had a couple open. Consigned them to a graded feeder sale. After being checked open they were away from a bull. Saw them showing signs of heat after that and even pulled the bull in an adjoining field and put him in the barn for a few days to make sure he didn't get in with them. After the sale we got a call from the coordinator of the sale saying that one was bred and per the sale guidelines we were required to pay $200 to the buyer. I am very confident that the heifer was open. I believe there was maybe a mix up on the numbers.

 

[Silver]

A couple years ago had some heifers pregnancy checked and had a couple open. Consigned them to a graded feeder sale. After being checked open they were away from a bull. Saw them showing signs of heat after that and even pulled the bull in an adjoining field and put him in the barn for a few days to make sure he didn't get in with them. After the sale we got a call from the coordinator of the sale saying that one was bred and per the sale guidelines we were required to pay $200 to the buyer. I am very confident that the heifer was open. I believe there was maybe a mix up on the numbers.

That sounds kinda shady. Did you pay the $200?

 

[Ky hills]

That sounds kinda shady. Did you pay the $200?

I thought so too. I did pay it, as that was part of the stipulations in the sale guidelines. Had I not seen the heifer in question in heat after our vet checked them, I would have surmised that she may have been under a month bred at the time the vet checked them at our farm and thus too early to detect. The coordinator told me that they had found a total of 5 heifers bred in the sale and he assured me that everything was on the up and up. I'm still not convinced of that though.

 

[SBMF 2015]

You get paid to do a job. Do it right or go back to the clinic and take care of Fluffy the dog.

I talked to the local sale barn vet about a group of cows I was interested in. I asked him if there were any head hunters in the group or how they worked through the chute. His reply was the the crazy one ALWAYS seem to come up open for some reason.

When I worked for the vet and the barn. We called them how they were. It didn't matter their temperament . If someone wanted to take home a 2nd stage cow that would keep the coyotes out of the neighbor's pasture it was okay with us.

We had our own inside assessment of temperament on bred cows. One of the old guys came up with the idea of "Stars" 1-star was just a bluff, when you got to 5-stars those were the cows that would leave the group to come across the lot and camp out on you!
We had an offal lot of fun in that place, I sure miss it.