Does this cause any problems?

[cowman]

Driving up north for Christmas we saw a herd of cattle out swath grazing. Now I will tell you these cows looked awfully fat! I think the swath was probably fairly mature barley!
I learned a long time ago that if you want to have lots of calving problems, just get those cows nice and lardy and give them lots of protein!
Barley has too much protein for a beef cow? 12% is just too much, in my opinion.
Now maybe this isn't a problem if you are using a certain kind of bull...but what about if you are pushing the envelope and using some of these big bulls like Red Max or something? I know the buzzword these days is low cost easy maitenance...but the fact is you still get paid for pounds in the fall and those big crossbred type bulls can pack the pounds on?
I just thought those cows are too darned fat.

[grassfarmer]

Cowman I wouldn't be too worried if my cows were fat this time of year - that's my objective in fact. I use the last three months of the year to fatten cows (after early weaning) and then let their condition drop off slowly through until the spring. With plenty cold weather ahead of us and a growing calf inside them cows will drop condition quick enough. I have never felt the Alberta Ag. theory that your cows must be fed to gain weight over the winter to be correct. It clearly defies nature.

Certainly excess protein late in pregnancy can cause calving difficulties but so can lack of exercise a factor that affects most winter calving herds. If these cows you saw are going to calve later in the spring the exercise they are getting swath grazing will probably outweigh any excess protein they are getting at this stage in pregnancy.
Having said that I would suspect that if they are on mature barley swaths it will be the energy that is putting the condition on them rather than the protein. Mature barley greenfeed is sometimes only in the 6% protein range, not surprising as it is basically barley straw with a few handfuls of grain thrown in. I have never believed the protein values assigned to barley grain here - they call it 12%? I don't think it feeds that way - in Scotland years ago I think it was reckoned to feed about 4-6% protein.

[cowman]

Well yes grassfarmer I guess you are probably right about the protein thing in that mature swath...the straw would lower it considerably...especially weathered straw.
Don't know about you contention of barley protein, I only go by the numbers they put up? When I used to actually care about such things...protein....I used to test all feed and quite often good two row barley straw(with chaff on top of windrow) tested over 4%. I had a heavy hay crop(mostly timothy) that tested 7.2% that was the best cow feed I think I ever fed! Cows did really well on it and calved/milked well in Jan/Feb!