The view from the ground

[kato]

When I worked at the vet clinic, a local "expert", who goes around making money giving lectures on low cost cattle raising came in and gave us a good stern lecture on how his cows are taking care of themselves, and costing less to care for, and all the stuff that goes with it.

A week later, in the middle of May, he was the subject of a newspaper story about how a late snowstorm had caused him to lose about fifteen or twenty calves. This was pre-BSE, so it was a good big loss.

I also remember a very large herd of pasture calving cows that managed to have an outbreak of coccidiosis in their calves. These people had a hired man who literally lived on the quad, and treated calves from morning to night. It was his full time job for three weeks. It was all he did. I don't know how many calves they ended up losing, but it was significant. They also used a truckload of those Calfspans, Sadie. ;-)

Which goes to prove "never say never", and it never hurts to be prepared to stop a wreck. Wrecks do happen, and they are expensive.

We've found that pasture calving does have less problems, but when they do happen, they are usually bigger problems. Everyone has to design a system that works for them. We'd love to go the less labour intensive route, but in our situation, it just doesn't work. So we take the bits and pieces of it, and apply them where we can.

[SADIE]

Thankyou Kato.

Gaucho---I put in 20 great years in beef cow calf practice where the clientelle were all great knowledgeable cattlemen. Herds averaging about 300 head up to 2400 head. I remember that I had about 1000 items in my "CHEST" to offer, sell my clientelle. I am now a cow-calf operator and do not sell any piece of medicine at all. I often are in conversations on what about this therapy and what about that. The best and most consistent piece of advice in spring time to the cow-calf operator is to have 1 bottle of 100 ml Trivetrin (borgal) and 1 box of calfspan (50s) on hand at all times. The calfspan doesn't outdate, keep it dry and the pills last forever. Damp or drop the box you got a mess.

Do not give this to newborn calves other than the 5 mls of Trivetrin. Trivetrin and 2 calf span is often given when we kick the pairs out to bigger areas.

Branding time, calves on the cradle if there is "loose" , black tarry or blood have a box close at hand also.

PFRA pasture managers like this combo also for 2-3 month calves on pasture.

All calves use "lub" on the pills so that you don't wreck the throats.
Often see a couple dead---3 -4 weeks old --big bull calves--pasturella pnuemonia but look at the rest---loose manure treat with protocal mentioned and you are out of the wreck.

These two drugs are very mild on these animals. The nuflor, resflor are also very good, more expensive but I say with caution do not overdose at all these products because they kill the "gut" flora. I have done that by mistake--trying to treat aggressively in a bit of a wreck.

Agriville is about sharing knowledge---I hope this helps someone somewhere sometime.

[SADIE]

we are 60 miles south of Saskatoon west of Gardiner Dam. Very happy to see spring this year. Thinking of all of you that are facing wet and snow melt to come <a href="http://s1138.photobucket.com/albums/n523/kphaber/?action=view&current=008-2.jpg" target="_blank"></a>yet.

[SADIE]

Picking the straw bales by grapple. Lifting great with strings (plastic) not breaking. Neighbor nest to me out cultiv<a href="http://s1138.photobucket.com/albums/n523/kphaber/?action=view&current=007.jpg" target="_blank"></a>ating today.

[SADIE]

Neighbor next to me out cultivating today. Ground is firm and no tracks no stucks. Very surprised compared to last year.

[grassfarmer]

How long have you been a cow/calf operator SADIE?

[gaucho]

Sadie no one is saying not to be prepared and trust me I have my vet supplies stocked and will use the products accordingly when they are needed. I do however have a big problem with spreading the notion of mass medicating with the idea of, "just in case". Disease as you well know is an outcome of stress.... Weather is a major factor in causing stress but there are many other factors as well... Chalices thread on cow BCS was a good example.... calve cows with poor BCS and you will have poor colostrum and weak calves... mix the two and add some bad weather and you are Pfizers best customer. Many time is you take a break sit back and really evaluate the situation you will see why it happened, bad weather was just the factor that put the system over the edge. I prefer to use management and planning to avoid the situation rather treating the symptoms of poor management with a fix from the bottle.... yes shit happens but my experience has been that it is easier for vets to prescribe a pharmaceutical than to get producers to look at how they run their herds.... Just look at how most guys run their grazing system.... that tells me enough that they still runs cows and are not in the grass farming business. With that I leave it up to GF to take it from here.... I know the Scotsman will have some good food for thought!

[BTOfarmallll]

IF that were my land SADIE I would be going night and day. Better git at'er, don't EVER put off what yous kin do today fer tomorrow. Time To Roll!!!!!

[SADIE]

Gf,Gaucho--these pictures I took from the tracter yesterday. I have two paddocks (Pic 1)--30 acres on each side of the farm yard, home corrals that I put the cow-calf pairs out on high ground around end of March or early april. The cows are fed from free choice Bale feeders and whole oats in troughs on these two paddocks. With the heat yesterday you can start to see a touch of green grass. These groups will continue to be fed oats and Bales till about 15 of May to give the grass in the next two paddocks a chance to get ahead of the cows.

Once the groups are off these two paddocks the piles are harrowed with some N granular spread. Before the end of the summer there will be a chance to graze this again or bale these pieces.

My corrals are on a north facing slope and in the spring the cow-calf pairs I keep moving to higher ground pens and out on the hilltops like you see in this picture.

I am a full believer in grass management and utilize grassing patterns that work in the area around Garderner Dam.

The bale picture is on land that has 3 quarter section pivots just north of the home quarter. All the land is 4 wire perimeter fenced. Presently have one pivot with Alfalfa/orchard grass mixture. This pivot next to the yard has often been seed to Italian Rye Grass which allows great versatility in silage, baleing and then fall and winter grazing. What great protein in that Italian Rye grass. (Featured on the Prairie farm report--a few years ago)

GF---I have owned cow-calf pairs since 1970 and since 1996 been cow-calf--about 120 pairs since that time.

BTO----If I got at farming side of things night and day I would be done in 3 days. I do not have that big of cultivation land base to worry about.

[ALLFARMER]

Sadie - Good lookin place and can I borrow that tractor!

gaucho - I never got into farming to make a quick buck. Also I sold the 143 bred cows to buy land that came up for sale connected to mine. I could net get land financing FCC with the cow debt I had. Now with the old cows gone I got a loan with another lender AFSC for just over 3 percent money for 7 years. Rusting with drill stem is not a concern maybe a problem maybe my grandkids will have. Also now I have funds to buy another 2 quarters connected to mine comming up on auction this fall, so this year it is likely I will double my land base. The new fence enables me to bunk feed 300 cows or 500 calves. This gives me the option of feeding grain, shredded hay or straw and one day silage. I will photo bucket when I get it all installed. I don't take no for an answer. FCC lost over 170K of my business. Thinking also about building a 40x60 shop, piling 250 acres of bush and building 2.5 miles of fence this summer. I will be calving out over 200 next spring! Cheers

[chalice]

Interesting thread everyone. Sadie asked me for what I usually prescirbe but I think that every situation is unique and I don't have a standard treatment. I am in total agreement with Gaucho with his statement that it is much easier to prescribe a pharmaceutical treatment than get a producer to look at their management. Most people I work for would rather pay me for a pill than criticism.
Unfortunately in the western world most of our medicine is reactionary treatment of symptoms rather than the prevention of disease. There is more money in treating disease than preventing it. That is why we see two page ads in Cattleman's magazine for antibiotics and business card size ads for the vaccine that prevents the disease. That being said I beleieve there are times when we need to use antibiotics to treat disease and there are some instances when we have found ourselves in a situation where we need to use antibiotics to prevent disease.
My rule of thumb for myself and the producers that I work for is everytime antibiotics are given, treat it as a failure of management. How did I put myself in a position that required me to use my last resort?
I once attended a talk that was on the prudent use of antibiotics and the speaker described the 4 stages of healing.
1.) Stop the offending agent.
2.) Clean up the tissue.
3.) Repair the affected tissue.
4.) Return to function.
Antibiotics and vaccines may work on stage 1, but it is what occurs before that ultimately determines how stages 2,3 & 4 unfold. This is where environment, nutrition, genetics and other factors play a role. In my perfect world, the better we are at these factors the less time we will have to spend dealing with the healing end of things.
Sadie I have used your treatment.
Gaucho I usually give out criticism before I give out a pill.

[grassfarmer]

Good to hear it chalice, there are too many in the vet profession that are happy to be pimps for the drug companies. I was horrified to read the vet column in a recent Charolais Connections magazine by one of the leading vets in western Canada advocating mainly to maximise use of hormone implants and endectocides. He was saying the endectocides have become so much cheaper WE MUST use them more often. No regard to whether we need them, or need to use them more often.

I really detest the dumbing down of agriculture that has gone on in recent decades. Sidelining generations and millennia of farmer/rancher knowledge and experience with garbage labelled as "sound science" when it's anything but.
Trying to replace the skills of a cattle breeder with breeding by numbers using computer generated EPDs and taking no account of regional/resource adaptation. Grazing columns in magazines written by pesticide salesmen from DowAgro chemicals. And I'm sorry but I put vets into this category too when they are just pimping drugs or when they give advice on not veterinary farm management. I don't get diet advice from a trauma surgeon so why would I get advice from a vet on how to feed my cattle? The vets in most cases only see the wrecks and the problems and I don't expect them to have the knowledge to run a farm business - that is not their field of expertise. Sure their are farmers/ranchers that need to get better at their job but I've met vets that could stand some improvement too.