Weight

[bizybeehill]

As I read through post often the weight of cows is refered to. Rule of thumb, good eye,or do you have a scale to use ?????? As a beginner how do you know the weight of your animals ???? :shock:

Thanks

 

[dun]

We weight them twice a year. At spring workup and again in the fall at weaning/fall workup.

dun

 

[MrBilly]

To answer your question, you don't know their wt. I did a little experiment with cattlemen that are experienced and feel they can guess wts real close. We weighed the cows and calves put them in a pen walked them around and asked them to estimat- and write it down. They were way off.

We weigh cattle all the time, all registered calves must be weighed for the data books, our feeder calves are weighed monthly so we can adjust their feed, we use wt. to administer the wormer accurately. Just think of the money that can be saved by giving just enought wormer? That alone will pay for the scale over a period of time if you have enough cows. Some local cattlemen's chapters buy a scale and then lend it out to members - good idea.

Billy

 

[dun]

we use wt. to administer the wormer accurately. Just think of the money that can be saved by giving just enought wormer? Billy

Our vet deals with cattle 6 days a week and can be off in his weight estimation (SWAG) by enough that the medication/wormer changes a good deal. He tends to over guess so there is enough administered. But as MrBilly stated, you can save significant money by doseing accuratlly.
We also get a feel for the condition that the cow/heifer comes out of the nursing period by having a weight when she has first calved till she weans. It also serves as an indicator of the forage quality. Granted it's the forage they were on over the summer, but unless fertility or moisture changes your nutritional value is going to stay pretty much the same for next year.

dun

 

[jerry27150]

get some close farmer to look at them & most can give you a good estimate, hard for a beginner to justify scales. just got my first set last year

 

[jerry27150]

you can also buy a weigh tape

 

[Rookie]

It's been my experience that with any given cow or steer, the buyer thinks "it didn't look that big!", and the seller thinks "I thought it'd weigh more than that!" :lol:

george

 

[poorboy]

I can guess pretty close on cows and calves but I will get burnt everytime on a bull. I can't get within 200 lbs. must be too many variables length height, thickness, contents?
Poorboy

 

[Craig-TX]

We never weigh anything. We just run commercial stock so there's no need for scales. When you're at the sale sit up close and practice eyeballing them as they go through the ring. Then check each guess when they show the scale ticket. You'll be surprised how close you can get with some practice.

Craig-TX

 

[G&L Cattle]

Agree with Rookie!!

G&L

 

[jerry27150]

go to some sales in northern ark. they don't weigh cattle til after you buy them