Weighed my cattle his afternoon - calf % cow weights

[SRBeef]

I weighed my small herd late this afternoon. It's not weaning time yet but they are rotating to a next pasture away from the corral and scale. This is the last chance I would have to weigh them before weaning in mid Nov about 4 weeks from now.

Two things caught my eye:

My target "1200 lb" cows all weighed about 1350 lb I assume because of the unusually good rainfall and grass this summer.

My best calf out of my best cow today is 770 lb at 199 days old and using May weighing as a reference, has an average daily gain of 3.46 lb/day, no creep. His dam weighs 1360 lb today so as of today he is at 56.6% dam weight and should have a 205 day ratio of about 58%. Here is a picture from last week of the 770 lb T-21 calf:

By contrast, my heaviest (and also most photogenic/good phenotype) cow weighed in at a massive 1930 lb. She could hardly squeeze through my open chute! Her nice looking T-21 steer calf today weighed in at exactly 650 lb at 193 days for a ratio today of only 33.6% of his dam's weight today and this steer has had a 2.82 ADG using the same May weighing as a ref. His proj 205 day ratio will then be approximately only 35.4% of his dam's weight.

This has been a rare year as far as rainfall and grass. Fortunately this year I have had excess grass, even with the chow-hound 1930 lb cow and a couple other large ones.

However in a more normal year it is very clear that the big, beautiful 1930 lb cow with the beautiful 650 lb calf is going to cost me much more money than the 1360 lb cows with THEIR 650-770 lb calves.

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the 1930 lb cow is consuming a lot more groceries than my 1360 lb cow. Their calves, both from the same sire, will be both be "nice" calves but even there the 1360 cow is much more efficient and raises an 18% heavier calf than a 1930 lb cow 42% heavier than she is!

This data makes it very clear what direction I need to be heading. FWIW.

Jim

 

[alexfarms]

Thats a good weight and cow weight on you "target" cow/calf.

 

[bigbull338]

those are some good weights on the cows an calves.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

[u

]However in a more normal year it is very clear that the big, beautiful 1930 lb cow with the beautiful 650 lb calf is going to cost me much more money than the 1360 lb cows with THEIR 650-770 lb calves.

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the 1930 lb cow is consuming a lot more groceries than my 1360 lb cow. Their calves, both from the same sire, will be both be "nice" calves but even there the 1360 cow is much more efficient and raises an 18% heavier calf than a 1930 lb cow 42% heavier than she is![/u]

sounds like a good dilemma to be in,you can always make ajustments

 

[Brandonm22]

In THOSE conditions, I wouldn't worry at all about your target cow being 150 lbs heavier than target. With more walking and a lot poorer forage the same cow in west Texas would easily hit that 1200 lb mark (or less).....and probably still wean a 600 lb calf. The 1900 lb cow is just taking all those groceries and converting it into fat stores. She is not converting it to milk.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

In THOSE conditions, I wouldn't worry at all about your target cow being 150 lbs heavier than target. With more walking and a lot poorer forage the same cow in west Texas would easily hit that 1200 lb mark (or less).....and probably still wean a 600 lb calf. The 1900 lb cow is just taking all those groceries and converting it into fat stores. She is not converting it to milk.

wonder was she fed pretty hard during her development

 

[SRBeef]

In THOSE conditions, I wouldn't worry at all about your target cow being 150 lbs heavier than target. With more walking and a lot poorer forage the same cow in west Texas would easily hit that 1200 lb mark (or less).....and probably still wean a 600 lb calf. The 1900 lb cow is just taking all those groceries and converting it into fat stores. She is not converting it to milk.

wonder was she fed pretty hard during her development

The 1930 lb cow is one I purchased as a heifer calf from a neighbor. She was always on grass and probably not over nor under fed at any time. Never had much grain beyond a gentling treat. Her sire was a rent-a-bull so there is no telling what her background genetics are on the sire side.

Brandon, one of the positive things about this 1930 lb cow is that if you were raising grass-fed beef and had plenty of grass, that ability to convert grass to fat might be useful. If you had enough grass!

We spend much time and energy and internet postings talking about bulls. But the fact that these two cows, 1360 and 1930 lb, under the same conditions and same sire, produce two such very different results points out to me the importance of COW genetics in addition to bull genetics.

edit: last November (2009) at weaning in Nov the 1360 lb cow weighed 1275 lb. Nov 2008 she weighed 1200. She is about 6 years old. So I agree that with less forage and in a Texas like environment she would come back down to the 1200 lb range.

By comparison, the currently 1930 lb cow weighed 1745 at Nov weaning in 2009 and 1375 after weaning her first calf in 2008. So she is not nearly as stable in weight as the lighter cow.

Jim

 

[purecountry]

Great data Jim, thanks for sharing. You've hit on a key management factor in beef production, cow efficiency. When you analyze data like this, you realize the results, but it's what you DO with them that's most important. For starters, you would never want to keep a heifer out of the 1900lb cow, as it will probably pass that inefficiency on. Second, you would not want to grass finish her steers either because they would most likely get to one helluva size before slaughter, and end up with huge cuts from the carcass. A finished animal from the 1360lb cow would finish at an ideal 1100-1300 on grass given time and proper nutrition, and my bet is he'd be more profitable than the steer from the big cow.

Thanks again, good info to spread around to more producers.

 

[KNERSIE]

We spend much time and energy and internet postings talking about bulls. But the fact that these two cows, 1360 and 1930 lb, under the same conditions and same sire, produce two such very different results points out to me the importance of COW genetics in addition to bull genetics.

I agree, but its usually a much more practical approach to change the bull rather than changing the cowherd.

 

[ANAZAZI]

We spend much time and energy and internet postings talking about bulls. But the fact that these two cows, 1360 and 1930 lb, under the same conditions and same sire, produce two such very different results points out to me the importance of COW genetics in addition to bull genetics.

I agree, but its usually a much more practical approach to change the bull rather than changing the cowherd.

True! And to put great cosideration as to what kind of cow the bull will sire.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

ive always thought with good set of quailty moma cow's will make your bull selection less a headache '''''commercial herd'''

 

[SRBeef]

We spend much time and energy and internet postings talking about bulls. But the fact that these two cows, 1360 and 1930 lb, under the same conditions and same sire, produce two such very different results points out to me the importance of COW genetics in addition to bull genetics.

I agree, but its usually a much more practical approach to change the bull rather than changing the cowherd.

I agree it is easier to change the bull than a cow herd.

However the above data makes it very clear as to which cows I am keeping heifers from and which cows I will never keep heifers from. I have a number of mid range 1400-1600 lb cows which I am going to try to bring downward by using a homegrown T-21 sired bull from one of my target cows. I may keep heifers from these matings.

I think there is only so much size reduction I can do working just on the top side of the pedigrees and what can be accomplished will likely take quite some time.

Heifers from cows over 1600 lb however are going in with the steers after weaning to graze corn then for processing in April. A couple of these heifers look very good but would just perpetuate the weight explosion.

I am not going to cull these big cows since I need the beef production and they do know how to have a calf unassisted. Their heifers however will always go for processing while I concentrate expansion on the cows with a higher calf/cow weaning weight ratio. jmho.

Jim

 

[bigbull338]

just be sure that you dont hurt yourself getting your cow weights down to 1200lbs.keep your eye on what makes a productive cow,if you loose sight of that then your lost.

 

[JHH]

just be sure that you dont hurt yourself getting your cow weights down to 1200lbs.keep your eye on what makes a productive cow,if you loose sight of that then your lost.

Yes single trait selection can wreck havoc.

 

[DOC HARRIS]

SRBeef-

These are remarkably explicit results, and prove, once again, that smaller cows are more PROFITABLE than larger matrons!

[" edit: last November (2009) at weaning in Nov the 1360 lb cow weighed 1275 lb. Nov 2008 she weighed 1200. She is about 6 years old. So I agree that with less forage and in a Texas like environment she would come back down to the 1200 lb range."]

Just as an aside comment to this quote regarding the differences between "Texas Forage" and "Wisconsin-like Forages", - West Texas forages are "drier" plant genetics as opposed to that grown in higher rainfall areas, but, factually, contains a higher percentage nutritional value for the same volume forage. By extrapolation, the Total Digestible Nutrients does make a definitive result rather speculative. But that is a minor consideration in the overall results you have determined! You have done a fine job of testing and comparing!

The "Single Trait Selection" comment in a later post is certainly appropriate in this instance! It just proves, again, that this business requires a variety of thought processes in order to be successful!

Well Done!

DOC HARRIS

 

[Brandonm22]

The general rule of thumb (and beware relying on general rules of thumb) is that a cow's steer calves "finish" around her mature weight. In this case, I doubt that is going to be accurate, but take 200 pounds off of that 1913 and you still end up with a target weight of 1700++ lbs. IF the calf weighs 600 lbs now, that means he needs to put on 1100 lbs to reach his finishing target. IF he is finishing at 2.5 lbs per day (a very difficult number to achieve on grass), to achieve THAT weight he is going to have to spend 440 days on pasture finishing. He will be 645 days old by then. If you don't get perfect weather, there is a little bit of a hay letdown, etc and that goes down to 2 lbs of gain per day then we are talking 755 days of age. Heavy weight calves out of heavyweight cows need to go to the feedlot.

 

[KNERSIE]

The general rule of thumb (and beware relying on general rules of thumb) is that a cow's steer calves "finish" around her mature weight. In this case, I doubt that is going to be accurate, but take 200 pounds off of that 1913 and you still end up with a target weight of 1700++ lbs. IF the calf weighs 600 lbs now, that means he needs to put on 1100 lbs to reach his finishing target. IF he is finishing at 2.5 lbs per day (a very difficult number to achieve on grass), to achieve THAT weight he is going to have to spend 440 days on pasture finishing. He will be 645 days old by then. If you don't get perfect weather, there is a little bit of a hay letdown, etc and that goes down to 2 lbs of gain per day then we are talking 755 days of age. Heavy weight calves out of heavyweight cows need to go to the feedlot.

I agree, but lightweight calves out of heavyweight cows really need to go to the feedlot.

 

[Brandonm22]

I agree, but lightweight calves out of heavyweight cows really need to go to the feedlot.

Actually, when the 1900 lb cow shows up with the 380 lb calf at 205 days.....the best thing to do is probably sell that little dude by the pound to some unsuspecting stocker guy and run that big cow across the scales. When things aren't working, cut your losses early.

 

[Idaman]

SRBeef. Congratulations on several fronts, the great calf weights, taking the time and effort to check and report this, and recognizing the importance of efficiency in the cattle raising business.

In the prior discussion about cow/calf weaning percentages raw and with adjustments for condition score I would like to add the following. Since your heavy cow weaned a raw cow/calf ratio of 35.4% if we use the Diamond D method of adjustment and assume that she has a condition score of 7 then we would need to subtract 160lbs. from her weight to figure the adjusted cow/calf ratio. 1930 less the 160lbs is 1770 divided into the calf weight of 683 (205 day adjusted weight) then we now have an adjusted ratio of 38.6%.which is higher than the raw ratio.

If we do the same with the lighter cow and also assign her a condition score of 7 then we also need to subtract 160 lbs from her weight which results in an adjusted cow weight of 1190 which divided into the calf 205day adjusted weight of 789 is an adjusted ratio of 65.7%. Since you said that your cows were about 150 lbs over normal weight that would come very close to the 2 frame score increase.

Although the condition score adjustment helps both cows the lighter weight cow is helped much more.

In the Pharo sale catalog there is a cow with a raw weight ratio of 68% with the calf weighing 530 and the cow, a two year old, weighing 775. I would have to wonder at that weight even on a small framed cow just what the condition score would be or if she is bred. In her case if she has a condition score of 3 then you would have to add 160 lbs to her weight to get the same condition score adjusted ratio and that ratio would be 56.6%

I don't honestly know if this all good or bad but interesting at least to me.

 

[JHH]

Jim they look good and have done an excellent job for you. I am with you on the big cow thing.