Great post. Because it is 103 out today, naturally the first thing that comes to mind is hard freeze in winter weather. What is your water situation? Do you make provisions for the extreme cold (and extreme drought)?

Ditto on all the thanks for all the knowledge shared. WE are just getting started and hope to have our first 3 calves born around turkey day and also butcher our first steer around the same time.
I think we will look for a nitch market selling finished angus x lowline grass fed beef

Thanks to all for the information. I just started with my cattle and have 3 heifers and 1 bull at the present. I am starting from scatch. Although I have had some limited experience with cattle from helping a friend with his. I still do not have the responsibility of making the decisions on my own animals and how to manage the farm, so I know little or nothing to that effect. All of the information will be used to help me get this operation started and expanded in the future to make a living.

Thanks again.

@HDRider: Thanks for the summary. I'm often not too good at organizing my thoughts when writing.

To the newbies: Whether two cows or 20 cows, operate the same way... if you want profit.

I've seen several threads/postings dealing with concern of cattle in heat. Cattle are not human. They are very hardy and can handle extremes in temperatures as long as they have plenty access to water. Calves born in 100+ (F) heat are fine as long as the mama cow is giving milk.

As far as drought... that's a tough one. The main thing is water and quality of grazing. The grasses in drought areas, at this point, don't have enough protein to support animals. All they are getting is fiber. You'll most likely need to supplement their diet with protein. In times like this, I'll put out an all-natural 200 to 250 pound protein tub. (they vary in weight by brand.)

With us, we have acres of standing grass that is dead... no nutrient value, so we supplement with protein, especailly since we have calves on the cows. Milk production is directly linked to protein availability. We also have several ponds for water access.

Many smaller farms will have to be feeding hay and if the hay was cut early enough you will not have the problems with protein deficiency as those of us still using grass.

Other than that, I have no advice for drought conditions.

Paul,
You have done great and speaking for everyone, I hope we get more from you!

Thank you.

Paul, I am thinking about cutting a 20 acre field of soybeans and baling as winter feed for my cows.Some voluntary wheat in it now. These are beans that I planted no till into wheat stuble. With the heat and no rain I dont think it would be cost effective to plan on a bean harvest and I could use the hay.
Thanks, wally

Do you purchase your tub from the local feed/grain store or TSC-like rural living store? Can you share approx. cost/tub?

Regarding the dead grass. Do you mean dead, as in deceased, no longer living, never to be seen again? Or dormant? What will we be doing on the other side of this drought for our pastures? I've never experienced a total brown-out such as this.

A lot of us have never experienced this much of a "brown-out". I think there will be a lot of permanent damage to the grasses, especially your non-native grasses since they are generally not as drought hardy.

I have some big bluestem in some pastures and hay ground that is showing a lot of resistance, but I'm thinking my non-natives will have a lot of permanent damage. However, I'm not a horticulturist, so I can't say for certain or from any direct knowledge.

The protein.... Protein is already an issue with most herds although a lot of people are not yet feeding it.

There are many options for protein. There are tubs, blocks, range cubes, liquid, etc.

Within those types of protein products, you also have the all-natural tubs and you have tubs with urea. Urea is fine for cattle, not for horses. Horses can handle it, but it over time, it isn't a great idea.

Urea is used to get the high levels of protein. Without it, you can't get protein much higher than about 28%. So, any all-natural protein source will be the lower protein percentages.

If you are looking at tubs, there are two major types, other than the urea and the all-natural. You have cooked tubs and pressed or chemically hardened tubs.

The cooked tubs will usually be your better tubs. They have the moisture cooked out of them and are better for cattle self-regulating, so-to-speak. The other (cheaper) tubs are hardened by being pressed or having them hardened chemically, but they retain all the moisture, which is not so good.

So, as far as price... the two major factors: 1. all-natural are much higher than protein with urea. 2. Cooked tubs are usually higher than non-cooked tubs.

You asked about Tractor Supply tubs. They are cheaper. I think they are about $55+ right now. A good quality tub that is cooked, all-natural is about twice as much. Personally, I prefer the more expensive tub.

You can pay half for a tub, but the cows will eat it a lot faster than the others.

For the people with larger herds, sometimes the liquid is a better way to go. But, it also depends on brands. There are a lot of brands out there that I would not want. They are loaded with urea, way too much in my opinion. There is only one brand of liquid that uses a patented process of a "time-released" urea. It is the ONLY liquid protein I use. It is called "QLF".

There are also protein blocks. These can be okay if you don't mind feeding them more often. They are usually a little on the "crumbly" side and an animal can eat them up fairly quickly, which means the amount of protein is not regulated and they disappear quicker than they should.

The main thing is to look at how much each animal is supposed to consume, calculate the price per head per day.

Like many products... what may be the most economical here, may not be in another part of the country. For example... if the liquid protein is cheaper per head per day here, in your part of the country, tubs may be cheaper. Like many things, a lot of it depends on your retailer, competition, brands available in your area, etc.

Personally, when it comes to the goats, I prefer the tubs. When it comes to the cattle, I prefer the liquid, but sometimes I use the tubs. Since the liquid is delivered by the ton, I will use it during the winter. If I am only supplementing protein short term, I will use tubs. Or, if it is in a smaller pasture, I may use a couple tubs.

You have to find what works best for you and which product is best priced in your area.

The main thing.... this year, the drought areas need additional protein since the grasses burning up have little to none.

I live in Oklahoma and the drought last summer was supposed to have been a historic drought that was worse than the '30's because it was hot and just didn't rain.

It started raining in late Sept/early October and according to the rainfall amounts by spring the drought was over, but the pastures were covered in winter annual grasses like cheat, ryegrass, and broadleaf weeds. Even thought it looked like the pastures were greening up, the warm season grasses like the native grasses and bermudagrass never seemed to start growing because of all the competition from the weeds and winter grasses.

Then it got hot, the rain stopped, and we are back in a drought again (it seemed like it happened much quicker this summer).

To my eye, the grass looks like it is thinner this year than it was last year. Even though we got the rain over the winter, it wasn't enough rain at the right time of year to let the root systems of the perennial grass recover from the drought stress from last year. It is going to have to rain during the summer for the grasses to completely recover.

So, plan for another drought next year by controlling your weeds and annual grasses this winter (if you get any rain) so you have a better chance of your warm season grasses recovering.

Paul, I feel like I have you in a rope-a-dope between this thread and my sweet pro thread. What category from the above would you consider sweet pro? It is hard, but not salt block hard. You can scrape away the surface and it becomes like a crumbly loose mineral mix. I probably am abusing the term 'tub'. I usually think of tubs are the molassesy sticky tubs.

And I would like to thank you for taking the time to post all of this info. I know it takes a tremendous amount of time, which is precious. I don't know where I would be without your kind of generosity.

urea should not be fed to young stock. under 2or 3 months of age?

Bruce, I couldn't tell if that was a specific question about the age of my stock, or a question about the low-end age limit for urea. In either case, I'm not feeding urea, but it is good to know such a limit exists.

Paul, I think I may be weaning early, or do not have a thrifty herd, or both. As a point of reference, I just took two head (steers) to the sale barn on Tuesday. I don't have the weaning record handy, but everything else I have pretty close to the tip of my brain.

Born 9/1/11 & 9/8/11.
Banded 11/15/11 when the herd was worked.
Weaned March(?)/2012. Weight was not measured or recorded.
Sold 7/24/12. One weighed 475, the other 515. The smaller had a serious bout of pneumonia over the winter that accounts for the weight differential.
One of the cows birthed yesterday.

That was my first pass thru the cycle. I can tell I already need to pay better attention to record weaning date/weight. I am pretty much following advise of my neighbor that has been at this his whole life on when to wean, sell, etc. Now I have this forum and a wee bit more experience as a second opinion.

If you are taking them directly to market at the weaning event, what is your weight average? If you are taking them in lots, I presume there is a range of weaning age/size in each lot?

Wouldn't the age you take them to market vary by current conditions on the farm? If I'm still building up my herd size, wouldn't it be better to use my excess pasture to fatten them up on pasture first? But if I'm near my max, then selling them to make room for more moms and babes would make sense. (Assuming an extra calf was worth more than the value increase I'd get from fattening up the steers.) Or would you find leasing out that land to another use more profitable than fattening steers on it?

PaulNKS and anybody else.... What is the difference between ...inbreeding and linebreeding if any? One rancher who raises a lot of Bulls here in the country says you will have problems with inbreeding using your own bulls if you have less than 500 head cow herd.
Another prominate consultant says that inbreeding is a myth, as long as you breed your best to your best. He said that back in the Bible times when they sacrificed thier best male calf they had to use the next best one as a herd bull, they didn't ship a new one in from somewhere.
What say you?

Line breeding is to select genes from a specific individual, while inbreeding is just a small closed population.

Both will cause an increase in expression of recessive genes. Some recessive genes are good, and some bad.

Example: You believe you have the perfect cow, and want to spread her genes. Her son only has 50% of her genes, and won't carry all of them forward as herd sire. If you breed the son to the mother, the next child will carry 75% of her genes, and 25% of grandpa's genes. Keep repeating, killing the old bull as soon as the next is ready, until the perfect cow can't be bred any more. The young of the herd will have an increasing percentage of her genes as each of the bulls used on the herd have an increasing percentage of her genes.

Now the first downside is if that cow had only one copy of an uncommon recessive gene. She doesn't suffer from it, and neither does her first son, but the second son has a 50% chance of having one copy, and a 25% chance of having two copies. The odds get worse from there.

The second downside is tradeoffs. Let's say you start your linebreeding during a drought. You pick an animal that has excellent drought survival characteristics, and push hard to spread those genes throughout the herd. Now on the fifth year the drought lets up, but the next year you have a harsh winter, and you've bred out all your harsh winter survival genes in favor of the drought survival genes, and you have a very very bad year.

You might look up conservation breeding. It uses line-breeding to establish multiple male lines, then interbreeding to keep the majority of the flock diverse as possible. Downside: maintaining multiple bulls. It was developed for sheep, so it's not such a huge deal to keep multiple rams/bucks as it is multiple bulls.

Thanks, very interesting. My Dad would sometimes want to keep a bull calf that he liked but mainly because he liked the calf's dad. We usually maintained 2 or 3 separate herds due to geographic location. most of the cows were related to some degree, but had 3 different unrelated bulls with them. I have 2 or 3 cows that I consider very good, but they are mixed. If I could spread their traits throughout the herd that would be good.

You can always use AI to bring in more genes if you're too inbred?

crownranch, I was not sure of age. You do not want of feed urea until fully developed functioning rumen.

The old joke is that when you breed closely related animals together and it works you call it linebreeding. When it doesn't, its called inbreeding.

The other version is that "I do line breeding, They do inbreeding."

I think the key to successful line breeding is a vigorous cull program. Line breeding result in offspring that are more and more homozygous for a given trait. If there is a genetic defect, you are more likely to expose it in a line breeding program. If you then cull that line, you rid the herd of that defect. This is good.

Unfortunately, some traits are at their best when heterozyogous, or controlled by more than one gene. This is much harder to breed for.

Another factor, is that even if you are culling heavily to keep only the best offspring, there is a inbreeding depression that occurs the more inbred a line is. All breeds are more inbred to a degree - this can be used to help you. If you cross to pure breeds, you release that depression and get hybrid vigor. The ofspring will be bigger / stronger than either parent line.

Unfortunately this jump only occures when you are breeding unrelated lines/breeds. So when you run out of unrelated lines/breeds you get no more increase.

They need to be ruminating before it is fed to them which usually occurs around 300 to 350+ pounds with a standard beef breed. (If I remember correctly.) But, if you have calves with your cows at the time you need to start, you can get by with it. Or.. you could buy all-natural. The all-natural does not have urea.

If they were standard sized beef breeds, then yes, you have a problem with your weaning weights. We wean and sell at around 650 to 700 pounds. The time it takes to get there will depend on several factors.
1. how much milk does your cow produce?
2. Are they only on grass/hay or are they being grained.

Naturally, a grained calf will reach weaning weight much faster than a grass/hay calf.

Keep one thing in mind... Protein=milk

Protein is a necessity for higher milk production.

Good thread, I started raising cattle last year. My grandpa had raised cattle, but he died when i was 1 and dad sold the cows and switched to row cropping. So I he hasnt been much of a sorce of info.

Im always supprised to see how much infor a person will give out to a "newbe". Some are an great source of info patiently answering questions and even opening up the books for you. Unfortunatly ive only ran into one like that and hes not avaliable now. Most seem to have an attitude of I learned on my own you can to, need to spend a few years in the school of hard knocks. I dont know if its viewed as competition or what. On the job is great training but with the investment it takes these days id prefer to get all the advice i can, hopefully itll keep me from making some costly desicions.

So a thread like this from an experienced cattleman is very appreciated. I have some general questions, is it best to post them in this thread or in a seperate thread?

Go ahead and post your questions. That's what this thread is all about. It's about learning how to make a grow a herd/make a profit from standard beef cattle.

What I relate is from my experience being around it all my life, working in the feed industry for a number of years, and going through hours of nutritional training.

However, I'll admit I don't know a lot. But, what I do know or remember, I'll gladly share, especially when it comes to my own experience and how we built our own herd into a profitable venture.

My Herd
 

Ok a couple of questions on my mind right now. Can you brand a heifer or cow that is pregnant? Kind of seems like a bad idea to me but im not going off of anything but my gut there. Need to work the calves next month, so well be working them anyway if it can be done preg.

I guess ill give some background. Last year i started my herd by buying 7 beefmaster heifers from a local farmer with the agreement that i could use one of his bulls. Worked great, got 4 nice heifer calves and 3 nice bull calves this spring. I also bought 5 more heifer calves from him this spring, unfortunatly use of the bull wasnt included this year, and i made the decision to buy a 1 yr old beefmaster bull as well. I had really wanted to AI but everyone kept telling me i needed to have a bull to clean up if i AI'd. Hes running with the 7 cows and 5 heifers now.

Now that i have a bull can you make money buying heifers in the spring, and then selling them as bred heifers in the fall? I know it all depends on the market but is this something that is done? My actual plan would probably be to turn in the 3 bull calves that were born this spring and keep the new herd sire with the cows.

Obviously i started the exact opposite from your recomendation of buying older cows, but i knew when i bought them i wasnt counting on them being profitable imedietly. My desire is for this to become a profitable opperation, i just was fortunate enough that i was able to buy some nice heifers at a decent price so i jumped on it.

Ug. Be very careful when breeding for such a trait to not throw other desirable traits out the window chasing after it.

There's a coat color pattern in Great Danes that's a double hybrid.

HhMm - desired pattern
HH** - prenatal fatal
hhMm - undesireable pattern, usually culled
hhMM - undesireable pattern, can cause deafness/blindness, usually culled
*hmm - less desieable pattern, often kept for breeding. Impossible to tell if remaining gene is H or h.

To get a litter of 50% HhMm, you'd need a parent with Hh, a parent with hh , a parent with MM and a parent with mm, but they don't breed any MM or known hh parents, and perfer Mm to mm.

As a result, they spend a whole lot of time chasing after the perfect coat, and the rest of the health/confirmation is not selected for as well as it is in the other coat color patterns of the breed.

Although I've worked out the best way to produce these dogs, I'd never do it. The politics in the show world would roast me alive for breeding such animals.

WE are done with our zuchinni squash plants for the year. Im going to pull the plants this weekend.
Does anybody know if the plants would be good or bad for my cows to eat. I hate to throw them on the compost pile if the cows would enjoy them and it would do them no harm

Clearly, I am below that growth rate considerably. At this week's price, that equates to around $150/hd. On the bright side, I like having a target to aim at. I'm on grass all the way, so it looks like that is where I need to start. Got any tricks to make it rain? :rainprf:

Mine also take longer since they are grass/hay fed. But, I do add protein supplement to help the cows, especially in this drought and in the winter. At $150 per head with even just 10 calves.... it adds up. BUT... you also have to consider what works for you. It will take longer to get them to weaning weight which can be problematic if you want to sell quicker and get another calf sooner. Also, you have to have enough ground to support them longer.

Personally, in the beginning, while building a herd, I would do what I could to get them to weaning weight quicker so the cow could be bred back and calve sooner... if you are still profiting from each calf. In the beginning, if I'm selling at the auction, who cares if the calves are grass fed or grain fed. You want that calf ready to sell in as short a time as possible.

Ideally, a cow will come in heat 3 weeks after calving. She will have a calf in roughly 9 months. (283 days, I think). But, you want her dried up and rested for no less than 30 days, but preferably 60 days before she calves again. The only way to get a calf to weaning weight in 7 to 8 months is with feed. You can grain the calves without graining the cow. Once you get your operation up and running and it is running at a profit (minus the feed costs), and you're out of debt, then you can grass feed because it won't matter if your calves are born farther apart.... so long as it doesn't crunch your revenues to the point of no longer being profitable.

In cow/calf operations and in feedlots, everything boils down to cost per head per day...everything. So, you have to find a balance of cost per head per day vs. profitability. With the coming soar in grain prices, it will get much harder to do. You will have to watch your dollars very closely and budget accordingly. Grain prices are going to soar. That in turn will cause beef prices to possibly come down a bit in the markets. BUT, it will cause the beef prices in the grocers to soar.

I don't know. Maybe someone will know. The one time my cows got into the garden, the only plants left were the zuchinni... lol. go figure. :)

Are you timing your cows to calve so that they have maximum nutrition available at or shortly after calving.

Well actually, no. I had a few nice March births. But I am still in start-up mode. Most of my cows arrived here last fall with either calf on the side or one in the oven, or both. Some of those are birthing again now. The march births weren't any of my doing--I just lucked into them. The aforementioned steers were born into poor conditions. It seems like a distant memory now, but last fall was excruciatingly dry. I thought the winter forage was crusty compared to how it was the winter prior when we bought the place. I have restarted them on free-choice protein supplement (18%) which they are inhaling now.

PaulNKS, I am curious. How do you give grain to the calves and not the cows prior to weaning? A hot wire that is a smidgen higher than the calves? At the time being, I am thinking I will avoid grain with this lot, but you have my interst piqued.

They are called "creep" feeders. They have a "cage" around it so that a calf can get to the feed but not the cows. You can also build anything that would work. You can use pipe, 2x4's, anything.

Here's pic of a small one. You can google "creep feeders" and see a lot of images of different types. A good one is adjustable so that you can raise it as the calves grow.

http://countryhome.ipower.com/homest...reepfeeder.jpg

As far as the protein... at first they will "indulge". After that, they should slow down on it. If not, a major key in regulating is the location of the tub. If it is too close to their loafing area or to close to their supply of water, they will consume more. What happens? They lick on it, it makes them thirsty, they turn around, get a drink of water, turn back around, and keep licking. When they have to walk a ways to get to water, they don't lick on the protein as much. So, make sure it is a fair distance from their water supply and from their loafing area. Most of them you see will be out in the middle of pastures and that's the reason why.

Makes sense. I guess the top of the pond dam is a little too close to the water! I put out 2 at a time to keep them from contending over one pile. One is out in the middle of pasture, and is getting eaten at about 1/2 the rate of the one by the water. It is days like this that I am glad I have a 16 yo son that can drive the tractor...

LOL... We learned to drive tractors by the time we are about 10 years old.

Yeah, these days when you buy tubs from places like a farm and home store, the clerks seldom know anything about it, much less, tips on how to regulate consumption. The main thing is to look at the label. They usually state the expected rate of consumption. Just move the tub until you think they are at that point....

...or if one tub is half gone, you may have it too close to the water ( on the dam, huh? LOL)

I think I am gonna have to have a talk with my girls ... :pound:

Paul- Im wondering what your outlook is on cattle prices right now? I thought last year with the drought we had that prices would drop but they rose. They have fallen some as of right now. This time last year was 1 60-1.90/lb and is currently around 1.20-1.40/lb. We're now in drought year #2... Would you suggest buying now, wait til fall/winter or wait even longer?
We have a few head but would like to buy around 10 more head of either bred or calf at side cows, or better yet the 3-1 you aimed for when starting. I figure from there we can let the herd grow and maybe add a few every year. Have land for around 100 and could lease land close by cheap or use our other 80 acres that's not too far.
What are your thoughts on how to grow? Keep buying quickly, slowly, or let the herd grow by keeping back heifers?
Thanks for this thread and any insight you can share.

I don't know a thing about future prices, but it sounds just like stock market gambling. You could consider dollar cost averaging, which is setting a budget for a period of time, and getting however many head fit in that budget, so you buy more cows when they're cheap, and fewer when they're expensive. Over time that works out to your advantage. It's similar to the suggestion of going for maximum production of calves over market timing to aim for high price points in the year. It avoids mistiming the market.

But... There's also opportunity cost. If you save $50 a head by waiting, will you loose out on $150 a head in lost calf sales? Will you be able to make $100 more in hay sales to make up the difference? (Those numbers are entirely out of a hat, do your own more realistic math.)

I agree with dlskidmore.... dollar cost averaging... I think. lol

If you set a plan and buy over a period of time (much like with investing monthly into mutual funds), you will be buying some when high and some when low which can hedge your potential future costs.

Last year, there was a drought but if I'm correct it was nothing like the one this year. In our area, we had some corn burn up and some that was okay. It as like a roulette wheel.

My partner and I were discussing this issue last night as we are looking to increase our herd again. He is of the opinion that the prices will drop in the local sale barns as well as in the retail outlets. I am of the opinion that the prices "may" drop in the local sale barns but will go through the roof in the retail outlets.

My reasoning is this.... ALL the corn around here is being cut for silage. We will have very little corn for feed grown in our area. If the rest of the drought areas are as badly hit, then it will mean a drastic shortfall in corn nationwide. That means cattle will flood the market and prices will drop. How much is anyone's guess. I don't think it will be a lot, but I don't know. However, when cattle get to the feedlots, it will cost a fortune to fatten them because of the short supply of corn. (most feedlots will NOT use distillers grain for good reasons.) So, those high feed costs will most likely (IMHO) relate to skyrocketing retail beef.

I could be wrong on all that.

The other thing to consider is hay and pasture. If we get back to a snowy/icy winter, hay will really be short and no grass. Will you have the hay, or be able to afford hay to feed?

So, when my partner and I were discussing this last night, I wanted to go ahead and expand our herd. We may not be able to come to an agreement. lol So, we may have to split and expand half now and half next Spring when we see what's going to happen.

If we get a wet winter, Spring cattle prices might go up a lot.

It is a gamble not knowing. I have to also say that I haven't looked at any of the forecasters and their predictions, which I should do.

There are a couple links you may find interesting:

AgManager.info: Livestock Charts

Farm Marketing - AgEBB

Here's a pdf from the USDA on July 17 of the forecast.
http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/855579/ldpm217.pdf

Hopefully, those can shed more light than I can.

As I write this,... and thinking.... we'll most likely play a "wait and see" game.

I tend to agree on your outlook of what is probable. If they drop 10-20¢ this fall, that's 1000-2000 dollars we COULD save on ten cows though. Which could buy 1-2 more cows.
We should have more than enough hay to get them through the winter. We shipped in semi loads last year and sold enough to make what we kept free. If we're goin to be short i expect i could do that again. We only have 25 acres of alfalfa that we farm ourselves but we've gotten 2 good and one decent cuttings so far.
When trying to grow, do you suggest taking all profits from steer calves sold and putting it back into cow purchases?
Is it more economical to grow your own replacements or just keep buying cows in the beginning?

That's a good way to look at it in my book. The outlook for August is hot and dry. What if it let's loose Sept 1 and rains for a month. lol Then the price could go up.

I was noticing on the forecasts that cattle, overall, have actually gone up. So, who the heck knows what will happen for sure?

No. The first thing you need to do is develop a budget, monthly quarterly, semi-annual, and annual. What happens if you put all your profits back into buying cows and then need to buy more hay at $85 per bale? Some may disagree with me which is okay, but I would be budgeting a certain percentage to go back into animal purchase, a percentage to unseen expenses such as vet expense, hay purchase, feed supplements if needed, etc., and (depending on your goals) a percentage to be put into savings and NOT used but budgeted long term for land expansion.

We keep a certain percentage of ever calf crop put back for buying more land with cash, or as much as possible. Also, a certain percentage is put back for fencing, taxes, insurance, etc. We budget every dime.

Depends on several factors. In the past, it was cheaper in the long run to sell your calves, rather than feed a heifer for three plus years before she provided a revenue (2 + years until her first calf, plus the time until the calf is weaned and sold.) Recently, it has been more advantageous to keep the heifer replacements, which is what we do.

Other considerations would be your breeding. Believe it or not, we had a registered bull for 16 years. He provided fantastic cow coverage every year and our calves topped the market many times because of the frame his calves had. So, we had to keep using him. Yes, he bred daughters, grands, great-grands, etc.... But, the calves only got better with the genetics we had. The quality of the bull can determine a lot of the decision of whether to keep the heifers or sell them. Even when we plan to keep heifers for replacements, if they don't perform well enough of if they end up not looking as good as we hoped, they go. It's good to have well thought plans, but even better when you aren't rigid.

So, if it would be cheaper to raise a replacement and/or if you have great genetics that carry into those heifers, keep them.