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Post by kcm on Sept 17, 2011 9:35:23 GMT -5
We had more days over 100F in eastern Kansas than any year since 1980. I felt we would probably see some breeding issues. A friend of mine preg checked his cows yesterday and came up with a little over a fourth of them open. The vet said everything he has checked so far has shown 20%-30% open. This year just keeps on giving. Shelled some of my best corn yesterday, 16% moisture, 58 test weight, 35 bpa. Now if it just tests negative for aflatoxin.
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Post by feelnrite on Sept 18, 2011 11:25:08 GMT -5
Dont feel like you are alone. There is going to be alot of that and we had to deal with it here last year also. The weather is getting hotter and harder on cattle every year and is going to change alot of spring calving herds to fall calving it looks like.
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Post by Rich© on Sept 19, 2011 1:13:42 GMT -5
If I didn't farm for a living and was purely a cattleman I think a person would be a damn idiot for calving in the spring fighting slop, ice, snow, cold, and everything else that associates with winter still lingering on.
With farming going on full steam in the fall though.. trying to calve at the same time while planting winter wheat and harvesting fall crops just makes it a royal hardship for time management.
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Post by pldairy on Sept 19, 2011 12:04:51 GMT -5
think what this hot weather did to our milk cows,we lost a ton of just started calves in july and augest, this will have a long tail for milk and beef!
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Post by Rich© on Sept 19, 2011 14:34:30 GMT -5
We are at 4 dollars a gallon now for milk at the local grocery store.
Lets see in 6 more months where that leads to.
I am not going to be suprised at 5 dollar a gallon milk at the counter in a year from now.
and out of that extra buck... your going to get 8 cents pl.
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Post by kcm on Sept 19, 2011 20:01:22 GMT -5
I calve half in the fall and half in the spring(late winter, I don't know who decided February calves were spring). They ought to all be calved in the fall. They are simply pretty trouble free. No scours ever, calves never freeze in August or September, and the cows rebreed much better, haven't ever been able to quite get my finger on that one.
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Post by John SD on Sept 19, 2011 20:22:44 GMT -5
Rich, the beauty of late spring calving (or fall calving for that matter, no experience there) is that the cow does the job herself and you don't have to babysit her round the clock like you would in Feb or March. Take a run through the herd morning and nite and call it good, then go about your farming.
A guy does lose one now and then but the overall odds are certainly better than early spring when it's cold and snowy and you're wearing yourself to a frazzle trying to be everywhere at the same time.
Sometimes cows are smarter and more capable than we give them credit for. And if they aren't they need to go down the road.
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Post by kcm on Sept 19, 2011 21:18:02 GMT -5
John 2 years ago we had sort of a Dakota winter, one like we haven't seen for years, like about 30. We simply aren't set up in this country to deal with those conditions, and lots and lots of "spring" calves were lost. I went to help a neighbor who was having trouble with a cow that was calving, I forget the exact situation, but what I remember is sitting in the pickup to warm up and watching the blowing snow and saying to him "who was the stupid son of a bitch that ever thought it was a good idea to calve in February", lots and lots of us do it though. The story always is, "you wean a bigger calf", well you do if it lives.
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Post by John SD on Sept 19, 2011 22:14:21 GMT -5
John 2 years ago we had sort of a Dakota winter, one like we haven't seen for years, like about 30. We simply aren't set up in this country to deal with those conditions, and lots and lots of "spring" calves were lost. I went to help a neighbor who was having trouble with a cow that was calving, I forget the exact situation, but what I remember is sitting in the pickup to warm up and watching the blowing snow and saying to him "who was the stupid son of a bitch that ever thought it was a good idea to calve in February", lots and lots of us do it though. The story always is, "you wean a bigger calf", well you do if it lives. And if it lives, you take a price hit because it has frozen off ears and a bob tail.  ;D |
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Post by feelnrite on Sept 22, 2011 17:58:34 GMT -5
I calve half in the fall and half in the spring(late winter, I don't know who decided February calves were spring). They ought to all be calved in the fall. They are simply pretty trouble free. No scours ever, calves never freeze in August or September, and the cows rebreed much better, haven't ever been able to quite get my finger on that one. I thnk the reason they rebreed better and calf better is the cow is in better condition. I have half now calfing in the fall starting this year and that is from a bull dying last year and hot weather. Mother nature has been trying to get me to go to more fall calving for a while now but I am a hard head. We have prolonged heat and humidity each year now that is making it hard to get cows bred and keep them bred. |
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Post by jrtheoriginal on Sept 23, 2011 4:57:05 GMT -5
I am choppping for a beef guy right now. he says he had 35% open cows last week when he preg checked! He is sick about it. And it looks like those were the ones that settled on first service AI. He says the clean up bulls didn't.
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;D