old cows

[cowman]

In a way the drought last year may have been a blessing in that we unloaded most of the older cows and the dogs as well as all the "high management" ones! You know the ones who try to kill you when they have a calf!! Why is it those type always have this humungous calf in the fall and your memory fades about the rodeo you had in the spring??
Anyway I kept a couple of old purebred pets and now they are basically worthless. So I figured I'd feed them seperate in a pen with a little shed. I suspect their teeth are getting a wee bit shaky! They aren't thin but they aren't hog-fat either!
Now is this the thing to do? Or should I unload them and take my 5 cents a pound? They raised fairly decent calves but no where what they used to do.

[kato]

Their genetics are still the same as ever, so maybe you'll get a heifer calf. She would pay for Momma's feed, if she turned out to be as durable as her mother seems to have been.

[ALICIA]

Lets change the name from old cows to just COWS
My heifers calf out at 2yrs old, so by fall they are now thought of as old cow.
Darn top beef for 8 cents a pound, wouldn't you say.

[cowman]

So Alicia, what will you do with that "old" heifer that lost her calf? Take a chance on her again or give her away for 8 cents? I suspect there are going to be a lot of calves born next spring!

[rusty1]

I guess I'm a little simple, but I understand it, our normal national annual cull cow and bull trade is around 650,000 head. Some are promoting the 3 S rules for these old crocks. If that's our normal cull harvest then shooting, shoveling and shutting up is not going to help that much because there is another 650,000 heifers in the wings?

[ALICIA]

I didn't loose any calfs this year from my heifers but I do have soom that I would like to move on down the road and I don't mean to another breeder. I believe that if she isn't good for me she needs to be beefed not sold 10 to 12 time. Plus I've picked out soom more heifers to breed nexted April, and out of them their may be only One or two I may keep. My average age on my cows are about 5 or 6 years old.
Plus I don't have a choose. I can only feed so many and I will not put feed into ones that I don't want in the hope that the boarder may open, because if the boarder doesn't open I may not be able to by more hay and then they all may have to go for even less than 8 cents.