Where Do You Make the Most Profit?

[Chuckie]

Do you make more profit in your area selling your calves at weaning age or when you fatten them up as yearlings? Chuckie

 

[buckaroo_bif]

wean in the fall run on wheat pasture and sell as yearlings in march.

 

[Rod]

I sell my spring calves at weaning, there's no wintering cost envolved that way. A 450-550 lb. calve still brings you $550-$600 where as a 600 pounder still only brings you $600 give or take and you've got hay and feed envolved for that extra weight. I'll let my fall calves grow out till the grass runs out the next summer and I fell I gain a little extra selling at 700lbs plus. I feel this is what works best for me in my area. Best of luck.

 

[jscunn]

Glad to see you again Chuckie!!

We sell our bottom end at weaning time and keep the better steers and heifers.

It depends on what you pay for feed. (yes I am a smart alec).
Seriously though we grow most of our feed and the numbers are not good for selling background animals in our part of the world. However we only feed those for our freezer beef customers so we are making a little profit. All of this is based on ground feed, if you have extra oat, ryegrass, fescue, etc. pasture the numbers change a little bit but so does the rate of gain, that is the important factor.


On mixed feed (milo, oats, soybean hulls, hay)
I ran the numbers based on cummulative intake and cummulative gain and if you are gaining 2.75 lbs a day you are basically breaking even. I personally don't think the hassle of feeding them is worth it to sell at the auction. It saves you some room to develop heifers, which eat less and you can sell by the head not the pound.

How are my Ally heifers doing??? :lol:
Send me a pm and give me an update!!

 

[BlackBaldyMan]

wean in the fall run on wheat pasture and sell as yearlings in march.

My professor was telling us all about that down there how you guys run the cattle on the wheat, pretty interesting I must say, alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

 

[Anonymous]

BlackBaldyMan, you gotta make up your mind. You are either from the dry side or T9O. LOL

 

[aplusmnt]

wean in the fall run on wheat pasture and sell as yearlings in march.

My professor was telling us all about that down there how you guys run the cattle on the wheat, pretty interesting I must say, alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

Went down past OKC to get a heifer a couple weeks ago and everywhere you look there is calves on wheat fields. There was some pretty rough looking wheat fields though, between the calves on them and the drought I bet wheat harvest wont be very good, this year in that area.

 

[buckaroo_bif]

Yeap
well the wheat won't make much of a crop in a lot of places might as well graze it off. only problem is you can't graze it off and collect insurance both. there are still a lot of smaller cattle around probably is why you still see them on wheat. Plus the prices are low right now guys are trying to get more gain on them and hoping the market will come back.
we get excellent gain on wheat pasture it's very common to see 3lbs. adg.

 

[rc]

I have 7 calves born last sep. oct. not a good time as I had to winter them. I figure them at about 500 lbs. so I guess I would be just as well to take them now to sale or would I come out much better to let them eat grass and take them this fall?

 

[buckaroo_bif]

I have 7 calves born last sep. oct. not a good time as I had to winter them. I figure them at about 500 lbs. so I guess I would be just as well to take them now to sale or would I come out much better to let them eat grass and take them this fall?

prices are not so good at this time i would wait if it were me.
don't cost much to graze them on summer grass.
or at least wait till may or so prices will climb back up some.

 

[rc]

You are right. It's not going to cost any more to keep them on grass. I might decide to keep some of the heifers anyway. I only have 30 cow/ calves on 75 acres of grass so they should summer fairly well.

 

[TXBobcat]

alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

Hunting on the edge of a wheat field is a good place to get deer down here.

 

[backhoeboogie]

alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

Hunting on the edge of a wheat field is a good place to get deer down here.

Exactly. Turner Seed mixes wheat with their winter deer mix seed. There is so much wheat around that the deer have their pick of pastures. This time of year you can see 20 at a time running together.

 

[Bobg]

When I lived in Montana we ran cows all winter on winter wheat and pulled them off in April when we started to calve. The only time we feed them was if the snow was too deep for them to find any feed.

In the Pullman area there is a lot of winter wheat and stubble that they could utilize. But, they've removed or let all the fences go. Besides the farmers in this area don't want to be bothered with livestock during the winter.

Bobg

 

[6M Ranch]

We make the most profit by feeding them out and selling the beef. Not a large market, 6 - 8 steers a year, but the most profit per head.

 

[Chuckie]

We fed some over the winter and they gained quite a bit of weight. But they cut the price for the size too. Looks like selling right after weaning would be better unless to indiviuals.

JSCunn, check your pm.
Thanks Scott! It is good to be back.

 

[Susie David]

Looks like we have a few more folks from the northwest on the board. Our whole operation is freezer beef. The only time a cow leaves this farm alive is if she is a non-team player, the opens get put into the production line-up along with the steers. To tight of a balancing act to do cow/calf on a small scale. We save about $75-100 by keeping calves over buying weanlings.
Don't see many cows in wheat fields this time of the year.
Always thought that Ellensburg was the dividing line between east/west or is it middle ground?
DMc

 

[stocky]

I sell mine right off the cow and I freshen year round. Rc, I have some calves like yours, born in Oct, and I am planning on running them on the cow until the first of June, when they should weigh 700 and sell them at that time. Dont know what is best, because those 500 lb calves will bring 1.25-1.35---that is alot of money per calf right now----good luck

 

[cypressfarms]

alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

Hunting on the edge of a wheat field is a good place to get deer down here.

Exactly. Turner Seed mixes wheat with their winter deer mix seed. There is so much wheat around that the deer have their pick of pastures. This time of year you can see 20 at a time running together.

Last night rode out on the mule to check the cows in the back pasture. I have two pastures with ryegrass, and as I was going through the first one, ran up on at least 20 or 30 whitetail. Looks like I'm wintering every deer within a few miles. Don't mind though, as the look on my daughter's face with deer flying everywhere was worth the price of the ryegrass seed.

 

[aplusmnt]

alot different then up here where if a deer goes in the wheat crop the farmers arent happy :lol:

Hunting on the edge of a wheat field is a good place to get deer down here.

Exactly. Turner Seed mixes wheat with their winter deer mix seed. There is so much wheat around that the deer have their pick of pastures. This time of year you can see 20 at a time running together.

Last night rode out on the mule to check the cows in the back pasture. I have two pastures with ryegrass, and as I was going through the first one, ran up on at least 20 or 30 whitetail. Looks like I'm wintering every deer within a few miles. Don't mind though, as the look on my daughter's face with deer flying everywhere was worth the price of the ryegrass seed.

Cypress.....sounds like some money to be made there with some hunting lease, if you could tolerate some city slicker on the place. My 15 year old son keeps begging me not clear the cedars and brush on a back 30 acres we have. He loves the easy picking Deer Hunting. It is cool that every time you go to the back field you see deer or turkeys running for cover.

Ps. How did you like that LSU and Duke game? Glad I did not bet on that one!