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Post by looter on Oct 11, 2011 6:50:33 GMT -5
I need about 20 heifers to make me happy. I'm in no hurry to get income out of them, so maybe I should just keep back some replacement heifers out of my present herd? It does seem like buying bred ones is a no-brainer?
Why are bred heifers cheap compared to weanling heifers? Clearly there is no urge to build up the herd size? TX drought a factor?? At what point does a guy go "all in" on heifers?
People think a $1,600 bred heifers is high! That's dumb. Look what that same girl cost at the start of the year... Probably $900. The guy who bought her and bred her works cheaper than I want to... Plus he has to buy more at an elevated price if he's gonna stick with that occupation. Looks like he's doing me a favor?
I have zero interest in short term cows. I can't understand why anybody would want to do that unless they were long term bearish the market. Being forced to replace females every year in a secular bull market is gonna get brutal IMO. Yet everybody wants to do this.....
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Post by ses on Oct 11, 2011 7:56:34 GMT -5
I'd probably lean towards buy bred if I knew somebody I could trust. Heifers should be syncronized, pelvic measured, have all of their shots etc. We calved 265 heifers for a guy one time. They were all sale barn bought out of Ogallala. I told him I would calve them out but I wanted heifers that were going to calve close to the same time, thinking they would be done pretty much in 90 days. We got them just after Christmas, got our first calf that night and were still calving when they left the Middle of April. One group had blue ear tags. We remembered them cuz we had to pull every damn calf and even had the vet out to help on some. I'm not saying to not buy heifers just saying if you can buy from somebody you know and they turn out like the blue tags ones, you can go kick his *&^^% ass. lol. Point is you have to watch heifers pretty close. If you only buy 20 and lose a heifer or two or get in a bad situation and lose three or four calves to boot, it makes the rest of them pretty damned expensive. You need to buy the right ones. Some guys just kick a bull out with a bunch of heifers and call that good enough.
If you buy replacements and want 20 bred ones then you probably should buy 22 or 23 cuz if you're AI ing, and I sure would be, then using a clean up bull ,you will probably end up with two of three that don't stick. If you're pelvic measuring, and that hasn't been done before you buy them, you will probably have a couple that don't come up to par. So maybe you would need to buy 25. For my money if I could find the right ones that have had the proper work done to them I would buy the bred ones.
If you mess with heifers I think you're going to find out why second calvers bring such a premium. There is a helluva lot of work in properly calving heifers plus the death loss adding to the expense.
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Post by kcm on Oct 11, 2011 8:07:51 GMT -5
Looter, if all it takes in life to make you happy is 20 bred heifers, you are the luckiest SOB I know of, and fairly easy to please.
I keep heifers, I wouldn't pay too much attention to what I do though because I do nearly everything wrong, like feed silage to my cows. I have bought really balanced bulls with good maternal EPDs and birth weight EPDs that weren't extreme for the last 24 years, I want my own heifers. I calve between 25 and 30 a year, and lost my first heifer this fall to a calving problem(one in 24 years ain't bad). But, I see some really sharp looking heifers sell on Superior about every time I watch it, there are some good heifers out there. I'd probably lean toward buying cows that were going to have their 2nd calf if I were buying them, you can be fairly certain they did it right once, and got bred back.
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Post by sandbox on Oct 11, 2011 11:16:24 GMT -5
Raising replacements vs. buying replacements is a personal thing.
One aspect that hasn't been discussed - make sure you know the tax aspects of buying vs. keeping your own.
Good luck.
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Post by looter on Oct 11, 2011 19:09:22 GMT -5
Thanks for the info! I know nothing about when to do pelvic measurements etc. Here are the 3 choices I have;
1) Keep back replacement heifers. Miss out on selling them for $900.
2) Buy some bred heifers from a kid I know. $1650/head AI'd.
3) Make deal with my neighbor. He calves out quite a few. He buys them bred and sells pairs in Spring. I think I can make a deal with him now to buy some for $1900 as pairs. I pay him in Spring but he keeps em and runs them with his bull all summer. I take delivery in fall.
My big concern is that beef is soon the new Blue Fin Tuna and the days of expansion are over. (Without Rustling)
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Post by ses on Oct 11, 2011 19:23:17 GMT -5
#3 wins hands down if he's a guy that knows how to calve heifers and has the facilities. Looks like a no brainer to me. IMO heifer pairs are going to be well north of $2,000 by grass time. You're looking at taking them over as second calvers. IMO second calvers are worth $400 more than first calvers.
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Post by looter on Oct 11, 2011 19:57:50 GMT -5
#3 wins hands down if he's a guy that knows how to calve heifers and has the facilities. Looks like a no brainer to me. IMO heifer pairs are going to be well north of $2,000 by grass time. You're looking at taking them over as second calvers. IMO second calvers are worth $400 more than first calvers. Cool cool. I can pick out the pairs, so I spose its the way to go..... Wasn't figuring on digging that deep... I will inform the old lady that the thermostat will get turned down to 58 all winter. Will report back.
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Post by sandbox on Oct 11, 2011 21:01:22 GMT -5
#3 wins hands down if he's a guy that knows how to calve heifers and has the facilities. Looks like a no brainer to me. IMO heifer pairs are going to be well north of $2,000 by grass time. You're looking at taking them over as second calvers. IMO second calvers are worth $400 more than first calvers. +1 if the guy is calving them and running them for the summer for $250.00. I know that you are bullish on owning the factory (cow) for the medium term. Why does that rule out short-term cows? If the market is bullish the weigh-ups will be strong. Usually short termers (especially late-breds) are only slightly more than weigh-ups. Just wondering. I like avoiding the depreciation hit inherent when buying young cows/heifers.
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Post by ses on Oct 11, 2011 21:13:41 GMT -5
Some of the best buys in the cattle business are middle aged cows IMO. It also has to do with what sale barn you buy through. I haven't been to a cow sale in Ogallalla for a long time but they used to dump anything from three year olds to good solid mouths in the same group. Some groups from that barn would have a big percentage of young cows in the bunch but sell for solid mouth price. Not all sale barns do that. McCook does that way too. If you buy a group of solids from these barns you're buying mostly young cows. Around here they sell them as hfrs, 3's, 4 to 6's , solids, short solids, broken and running age.
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Post by looter on Oct 11, 2011 21:55:29 GMT -5
#3 wins hands down if he's a guy that knows how to calve heifers and has the facilities. Looks like a no brainer to me. IMO heifer pairs are going to be well north of $2,000 by grass time. You're looking at taking them over as second calvers. IMO second calvers are worth $400 more than first calvers. +1 if the guy is calving them and running them for the summer for $250.00. I know that you are bullish on owning the factory (cow) for the medium term. Why does that rule out short-term cows? If the market is bullish the weigh-ups will be strong. Usually short termers (especially late-breds) are only slightly more than weigh-ups. Just wondering. I like avoiding the depreciation hit inherent when buying young cows/heifers. I spose if the short termers are only slightly higher than weigh-ups, then my thinking is wrong?? Would that be the case if feeders are $2/lb in 2005 $$ Maybe so? Maybe I should buy some fall pairs now? $1,400 for 8 year old cows with 6 week old calves at side. I really don't want to buy the extra hay right now though. A year from now I will have corn stalks to supplement hay. I need more critters for my grass next spring unless its a total drought. Don't need more this winter though....
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Post by sandbox on Oct 11, 2011 22:14:01 GMT -5
+1 if the guy is calving them and running them for the summer for $250.00. I know that you are bullish on owning the factory (cow) for the medium term. Why does that rule out short-term cows? If the market is bullish the weigh-ups will be strong. Usually short termers (especially late-breds) are only slightly more than weigh-ups. Just wondering. I like avoiding the depreciation hit inherent when buying young cows/heifers. I spose if the short termers are only slightly higher than weigh-ups, then my thinking is wrong?? Would that be the case if feeders are $2/lb in 2005 $$ Maybe so? Maybe I should buy some fall pairs now? $1,400 for 8 year old cows with 6 week old calves at side. I really don't want to buy the extra hay right now though. A year from now I will have corn stalks to supplement hay. I need more critters for my grass next spring unless its a total drought. Don't need more this winter though.... Cornstalk fields rule. IMHO the $1400 pairs sound cheaper thant the $1600 heifers. But that is why there is a market - everybody gets to place their bets and take their rides. With heifers you take such a pounding on the 10% or so that don't breed back for their 2nd calf. That adds quite a bit to the cost of the remaining heifers. At least that has been my experience. I know fall calving has been discussed on here and lots of guys like it. I never have had the feed to fit that program to keep pairs going through the cold. Cow market is a fickle bitch. Early-bred short-term cows in a lot of places will bring pretty good $$$ in the winter for guys who want to run/calve on cornstalks and/or before corn planting. The late-breds (May/June) sometimes go for weigh-up or $50.00 over weighup. I love walking home with a load of late-breds to get the last calf or two for free. I can see where young cows are good in a bull market - but if beef truly gets hard to come by I think the weigh-ups will bring the $$$$. Putting pounds on a dry cow can pay as good as buying bred cows. Buy the thin girls and they explode on wheat pasture or spring flush grass. Then sell back for more per pound than you paid for them.
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Post by kcm on Oct 11, 2011 22:52:08 GMT -5
Too tweek this conversation just a little.......Looter you seem bullish on cows(no pun intended) and conventional wisdom would back you on that. I have a worry that I aired on Agweb and I think it applies even more in 2011. High prices cure high prices. My fear is cash strapped consumers are going to turn away from beef in favor of cheaper chicken and pork, and in the end our small cow herd won't matter anymore, because demand for beef will be down. Any thoughts?
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Post by ses on Oct 11, 2011 23:48:11 GMT -5
KCM I think the beef market is more driven by exports than domestic consumption. Who knows what will happen if the world economy collapses but if things don't get clear out of hand I don't see the cattle market going to crap any time soon.
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Post by looter on Oct 12, 2011 4:20:24 GMT -5
I spose if the short termers are only slightly higher than weigh-ups, then my thinking is wrong?? Would that be the case if feeders are $2/lb in 2005 $$ Maybe so? Maybe I should buy some fall pairs now? $1,400 for 8 year old cows with 6 week old calves at side. I really don't want to buy the extra hay right now though. A year from now I will have corn stalks to supplement hay. I need more critters for my grass next spring unless its a total drought. Don't need more this winter though.... Cornstalk fields rule. IMHO the $1400 pairs sound cheaper thant the $1600 heifers. But that is why there is a market - everybody gets to place their bets and take their rides. With heifers you take such a pounding on the 10% or so that don't breed back for their 2nd calf. That adds quite a bit to the cost of the remaining heifers. At least that has been my experience. I know fall calving has been discussed on here and lots of guys like it. I never have had the feed to fit that program to keep pairs going through the cold. Cow market is a fickle bitch. Early-bred short-term cows in a lot of places will bring pretty good $$$ in the winter for guys who want to run/calve on cornstalks and/or before corn planting. The late-breds (May/June) sometimes go for weigh-up or $50.00 over weighup. I love walking home with a load of late-breds to get the last calf or two for free. I can see where young cows are good in a bull market - but if beef truly gets hard to come by I think the weigh-ups will bring the $$$$. Putting pounds on a dry cow can pay as good as buying bred cows. Buy the thin girls and they explode on wheat pasture or spring flush grass. Then sell back for more per pound than you paid for them. Wow! Thnx! You guys know tons of stuff and I'm learning a lot! I've noticed that folks are not really buying a lot of heifers, they damn sure aren't keeping back replacements, they are replacing cull cows with 5 year olds. That seemed foolish to me, but maybe not?
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Post by looter on Oct 12, 2011 4:45:01 GMT -5
Too tweek this conversation just a little.......Looter you seem bullish on cows(no pun intended) and conventional wisdom would back you on that. I have a worry that I aired on Agweb and I think it applies even more in 2011. High prices cure high prices. My fear is cash strapped consumers are going to turn away from beef in favor of cheaper chicken and pork, and in the end our small cow herd won't matter anymore, because demand for beef will be down. Any thoughts? Of all the commodities, beef is the market i have the least short term fear of market collapse because of supply constraints. Look at buffalo price, that's become the new lobster. My uncle is selling bred buffalo heifers for $3,000. Ground buffalo meat in Hy Vee in Sioux falls is pushing $10/lb.... When they can get it. The buffalo people always thought their market needed widespread consumer demand created by a large herd. "Can't create a market without supply". That was their mantra. How stupid!!! The key is to move demand destruction up the economic food chain. I don't want people making $30,000 a year eating my product. I want the people making $30,000 eating Ramon Noodles. . A relative was a wealthy man before the 2008 collapse. Now he rarely eats beef and complains bitterly about the price. That scenario is the only way we will get paid properly. You can't have the common man eating beef twice a day and expect to make saving calves worthwhile for anyone except the calf. I reckon China is gonna implode and the export market to dry up. With any luck by then the herd will so small that beef will be the new Blue Fin Tuna. The sushi people sell Bluefin Tuna for $500/lb and that's the truth. It's all about supply problems. The fish supply problem is 100% of the reason I got into cattle biz. I'm 100% convinced that life for most people is gonna mean spending half income on food, or else gardening professionally. The ocean is empty, the entire world is producing less cattle, and protein is getting scarcer. I do buy Livestock Revenue Protection on every calf I raise. It's a govt racket. I'm actually getting paid on LRP for calves I insured in august for protection expiring in Oct. Don't ask me how. It's a crazy govt program that near as I can tell is a lot like crop ins... Such a no-brainer its crazy. Only thing is very few crop ins agents understand how it works. $30 will insure $1,000 from falling in price. It works sorta like put options, except way cheaper. Oh ya, forgot to mention, now that I'm officially sucking from the govt teat, I decided to trade in my libertarian halo. If ya can't beat em, join em!!
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