What breed of bull to use?

[Alan]

As I have mentioned a few times I'm in the herd rebuilding stage and have a few good Black Baldy heifers a long with some Polled Herefords. I'm starting to think about a different breed of bull to use next season or the season after. What breed of bull would you use on, what I consider, a true Black Baldy cow (straight Herf x with Black Angus). A little information for you, my cows are all pretty uniform, moderate framed cattle I want to stay in that area, moderate framed and easy to average calving breed with decent growth for my moderate framed cows..... No Belgium Blues :lol: , in fact Charolais would be a hard sell for me. Also up here I see very few eared cattle, i don't know if they don't do well or just take too big of a hit, none the less eared are not an option for me.

Thanks just starting to get my wheels turning in this direction.

Alan

 

[u4411clb]

Black Simmental or Black Limo and no I do not raise either or have any skin in the game. But with your definition I would use the Simms as replacements and the Limo's for terminal.

 

[Supa Dexta]

Sims got my vote also.

 

[JHH]

Gelbvieh or simmy. Or just breed em back to a hereford

 

[cattle60]

How do the blacks/bwf sell up there? I'm partial to the bwf so I would probably use a black angus. This would give either blk/bwf calves from both the bwf and herefords. A black simmental would probably give the same but i think it would add some frame.

 

[cow pollinater]

Gelbvieh or limmi. The heterosis in that cross is about as good as it gets without adding ear.

 

[WalnutCrest]

What is your end market?

 

[Son of Butch]

Gelbvieh or limmi The heterosis in that cross is about as good as it gets without adding ear.

Is a Limmi a cross between a Limo and a Simmi? ;-)

 

[John SD]

Gelbvieh or limmi. The heterosis in that cross is about as good as it gets without adding ear.

^^^^^This, given the breed preferences/limitations stated. But I sure :heart: the product of a Angus X Hereford cow bred to a Char bull 8)

 

[FlyingLSimmentals]

I would go with a Simmental or a Gelbvieh not ranking either one a 1st or 2nd choice. Both would do an extremely good job in your scenario.

 

[Alan]

Thanks for all the great input, with simmy's, which is/was one of my thoughts I'm a little concerned with frame creep and Calving ease. My thoughts was Gelvbieh or Murry Grey, any knocks on Murry Greys? Keep in mind that I realize in some years I will end up with a herd of Heinz 57, but at my age I want to keep with easy calving, decent growth and moderate frame.

Thanks again for the food for thought,

Alan

 

[ram]

Why not just stick with what you've been doing?
A Hereford and Angus cross is tough to beat. IMO

 

[Ned Jr.]

If I was keeping the heifers I'd probably go back with Angus or Hereford, but horned hereford ;-). If you want the 3 way cross I'd recommend limmo, red limmo, from what I've seen I think the red ones are usually better muscled.

 

[Son of Butch]

....from what I've seen I think the red ones are usually better muscled.

I think there is truth in saying the popularity of black cattle has inadvertently helped reds improve their overall breed
average. Less demand means a higher rate of good reds used for replacements and high demand allows too many
blacks to be sold as replacements that should have been headed to slaughter from the get go.

 

[Son of Butch]

But I sure :heart: the product of a Angus X Hereford cow bred to a Char bull.

Yes sir, but I hate to be the one producing them. Just talked with a fellow today that mentioned his daughter losing
a char cross calf at birth from her favorite cow because the calf weighed close to 130 lbs.

 

[Supa Dexta]

New modern sims aren't the big framed, calving trouble cows of a couple decades ago.

Angus is the one who's frames have been creeping up.

 

[Son of Butch]

New modern sims aren't the big framed, calving trouble cows of a couple decades ago.

Not the cows the bulls.
I just bought a group of simmi steers and the owner was lamenting the fact that he couldn't get the nicest one sold as a bull
because his bull customers all shied away when they saw his 118 lb birth weight.

(edited to add: I'm referring to his nicest steer in the group, but not the overall best of the bulls he had for sale)

 

[bball]

Gelbvieh or simmy. Or just breed em back to a hereford

:nod: :nod: :nod:

 

[WalnutCrest]

Thanks for all the great input, with simmy's, which is/was one of my thoughts I'm a little concerned with frame creep and Calving ease. My thoughts was Gelvbieh or Murry Grey, any knocks on Murry Greys? Keep in mind that I realize in some years I will end up with a herd of Heinz 57, but at my age I want to keep with easy calving, decent growth and moderate frame.

Thanks again for the food for thought,

Alan

What's your end market?

I might have different suggestions if your market is sale barn ... vs. beef off the farm ... vs. you owning them all the way through the feedlot ... etc.

 

[Backbone Ranch]

I have little experience with some of the breeds mentioned earlier in this thread such as Gelvbieh and Simmental, but I would definitely recommend Murray Greys. As a breed they are very docile and extremely easy to work with. They cross really well with both Hereford and Angus; in fact, we have several 50% Murray Grey x 50% Angus females in our herd.
Here is a 50% MG x 50% Angus cow with her 75% Murray Grey calf. The cow is a frame score 4. All of the Murray Grey x Angus crosses I have seen are like this cow in color, dark brown. The 75% MG calves are either silver of brown. This particular heifer calf is 4.5 months old. She weighed over 600 lbs at weaning, and had a 70 lb birthweight.

Murray Greys are typically very easy calvers. Their calves are very quick to get onto their feet and begin nursing. One man bought 5 of our Murray Grey bulls to put over his commercial black heifers. He had over 100 heifers calving and did not have to pull a single calf. He just sold the resulting heifer calves as short bred heifers. If I remember correctly, he got over 2 grand apiece for them.