The (US) Beef cattle tapes that I use have 2 sides -- one for breeding or dairy cross cattle, the other for fed cattle. 4 body conditions are listed -- poor, moderate, finished, and fleshy. I also use a tape made especially for Dairy cattle, with separates weights listed for Holstein, Gernsey, and Jersey.
Sounds like you did about what we did -- we weighed everything and everybody in sight to test the tape! And it's amazing how accurate they are -- 2 lbs off on my sons. Less than 5 lbs on 500 lb calves that were sent to the salebarn. I'm still trying to convince Dad that they are accurate. He's sold 2 steers to be picked up next week. I'll tape them, but Dad insists on taking them into town to be *properly* weighed -- he'll be quite surprised when he sees just how close the tapes are (close enough to save that trip and extra expense)
Ann B
> The cattle weight tapes have both
> USA and metric numbers on them.
> Assuming you are using the USA
> numbers, there are 3 rows of
> numbers relating to the estimated
> "condition" of your
> cattle. We generally use the
> "properly finished"
> (middle) row of numbers since we
> keep our cattle in very good
> condition.
> The tape is wrapped around their
> chest from behind the front legs
> to straight up on back (withers on
> horse). Don't pull tape too tight,
> just nice and snug. Read the
> weight shown.
> Lot easier with larger calf or
> mature animal if two people do
> measuring with animal in a squeeze
> chute or "Medina Hinge"
> device (unless animal is
> halter-broke). Make sure they are
> standing on level ground and not
> bouncing around. Little hay or
> cubes helps to distract the
> fidgety ones.
> We figure the tapes are accurate
> enough for 205, 365 day weights as
> well as de-wormer injections.
> Probably +/- 5% weight error,
> depending on who's doing the
> measuring and how the animal is
> standing. (Incidentally, we've
> found these tapes fairly
> accurately "weigh" a
> human too! Assuming they don't
> have a large pot-belly...lol).
> Bill
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