Hurdles of a feeder calf producer

[agmantoo]

This post is not a gripe, the intent is to share some of the situations a farmer encounters.

The last rain of any significance was April 14 2007
As a producer of grass fed animals you can imagine the consequences of a summer in the southeast without water.
As most of the regular readers of this forum know I do management intensive grazing.
I am running a head count of less than 1.4 acres per animal. Thus far I have not had to feed hay. However I am less than 2 weeks out from running out of grass.
Yesterday, the last farm pond that had any water in it (this pond was thesole source for the cattles' water) must have run out of oxygen, the fish died. Now there is a smelly mess with the buzzards circling!
Today I installed a make shift watering system on a marginal well.
On the plus side, the cattle are mostly in good body condition. A few young first calf heifers are showing a little rib as they are giving up body condition in converting fat to milk.
For some unexplainable reason the cattle are more docile and manageable than one would realize under such trying conditions. I know they are accustomed to being better fed and having better feed.
Now, for the really good news that I hope materializes...Tomorrow Rain is predicted!

[Oxankle]

Agman:

Weatherman says that you are getting soaked by Humberto's remains. Hope you get the three inches predicted.
Ox

[Rockin'B]

Agman,

I hope you get a really good soaking rain.

No rain since April is just not right!

[Up North]

No shame in feeding stored feeds if conditions require it. Noone will think less of you or your operation.
Hope things turn around and you have a lush green fall.

[agmantoo]

I only have 16 days worth of stored feed! Provided rain comes I can make it. I am prepared to plant winter feed as the seed are on hand and I have the fertilizer already applied. Otherwise, I will either buy feed or liquidate the herd. I will not let the cattle go hungry.

[B Adams]

Agman, I so feel your pain. Last year was a horrific drought for us in Texas.
We lost water, all ponds but 1 dried up. We were lucky as in having troughs in place and are on a rural water system. We watered over over 300 head of cattle, always hoping for that rain. Shoot we couldn't evan buy a cloud.

We started feeding the last of June, sold over 100 head of mama cows. Some were ones that I had hand raised, still miss them to this day, but we had to buy alfalfa hay, as our hay fields produced less than 150 bales, which normally cuts 4-500 per cutting. We fed until the end of March this year, and that was everyday.

Yes profit margins were way down, but we did what we had to do and hung on. Thank goodness the knot on the rope was only frayed and it will take us a few years to get all the cattle back to the breeding program we had (black on black etc) in place.

We have been blessed with rain this year,, lost our 1st cutting of hay to 6 inches of unpredicted rain, finally got the second cutting in and will be able to cut again before 1st frost, ponds are full to running over, our grass has never been as good as it is right now in 6-7 years.

There is nothing in this that will help you other than the fact I know how you feel. I really feel your pain. I hope you are getting some rain.
B Adams

I just want to say our cattle remained in good condition, had plenty of good fresh rural water and did not suffer, but had they been hungry or thirsty I could not have held on we would of had to sell out. We had an excellant calf crop this year and pastures did recover.

[B Adams]

Okay now that I have relived that experience, let me tell you what we did.
First we sold all calves that were between 350-400 pounds, just to help the cows out. We unrolled every bale of grass hay so everyone could have hay. Alflalfa was flaked off in leafs so everything had access. It really is a chore and a dusty one at that. We palpated and if they didn't have a calf, and were not heavy bred we sold. This is really a hard situation and not all programs work for all people. If you need some alfalfa producers telephone numbers I will try to help you out. We did start buying our alfalfa early so now it might be a problem for you we bought out of kansas and nebraska.
Best of luck to you.
B Adams

[Oxankle]

Did you get rain?
Ox

[agmantoo]

Yes we got rain. : ) However we did not get the amount forecast as the bulk of the rain was northwest of us. I am thankful for the .67 inch that was recorded. This should be enough moisture to allow planting of the rye grass for winter forage. As B Adams mentioned above, I too will be downsizing the herd. I have some feeder calves that are lighter than I normally market but I will sell them next week. I may sell one bull and a few of the older cows that the feeder calves will be coming off of. Thanks for asking.

[TSYORK]

I'm northeast of you a ways, we got a little over six inches. It was a frog-stranglin here.

[RosewoodfarmVA]

Here on the NC-VA line central piedmont we only got 1 inch, because the bulk of the storm passed west of us in the NC and VA mountains. WE sure needed it though! Havent had a good rain for 3 months!

[Up North]

Drought can test the limits both emotionally and financially.
I have seen herds carried through drought periods by feeding them a small strip of rationed out green grass(or a small quantity of good dry hay) coupled with round bales of Cornstalks, Milo Stalks, or small grain crop residues for roughage and filler. Not an ideal diet, but hard times can require hard choices.

And now a question Agman...You have repeatedly shared that you prefer a roughly 1,100 pound medium frame size beef cow. What different position do you feel you would find yourself in now if your herd consisted of large framed heavy beef cows?
Things like maintaining enough body condition to carry pregnancies and bounce back to good body condition score after coming through a rough time?
Would the available feedstuffs have been sucked up by the Mothership brood cow or passed on to the calf by her side?
Sometimes it is telling to look at one's own herd *in comparison to* what other herds under other management systems in the local region under the drought stress are doing.

[agmantoo]

Up North, you pose a difficult question. Let me share parts of the coffee shop discussions. Some people ask " have you seen those cattle near the big lake? someone should turn the owner in the the humane society." These are large breed cattle. Another person says, "I was over on so & so road and those cattle appear to be staving and would blow out of the pasture in a big wind" Again large framed animals. I was at a Charolais producer's place and his feeder calves looked good but they had their head in a creep feeder. His cows were on low quality hay and they appeared gaunt. I had one producer to search me out to see how my cattle were doing as someone had told him I was still feeding grass but the grass appeared dead. I told him that was correct but I was close to running out. He had difficulty believing my cattle were eating the dead grass (dead and dormant actually). He said his cattle would not eat such and that he had been feeding hay for months. To answer your question.

With large framed animals I would have been forced to depopulated months ago.

Now I will attempt to make an unbiased evaluation on my herd. With the exception of the first calf heifers that have a calf nursing, the balance of the herd brood stock look fine. Actually they are still fat. My calves are not gaining weight as they should but I do permit them to graze ahead of the herd and they look fair. I would think these calves would sell in the top 25% of the calves produced in this area in good forage years. In good years mine sell in the top 10% based on price. The older herd bull (registered angus) is somewhat gaunt. He never came from a grass fed only herd and has demonstrated this characteristic when stressed (too many cows to service) previously. I remain with my original position that a moderate size beef cow that does not milk excessively is the optimum brood cow and that a low birth weight producing bull that can maintain condition on grass is the ideal beef animal. None of the producers in the area I am that feed hay will be making a profit this year IMHO. These men do not make much profit in a good year. The extension agent stated that they may make $75 profit per feeder calf. Bean hay from failed bean crops is $140/ton. Transportation of baled cornstalks is greater than the feed value rendered. There is no local good hay for sale. This afternoon I planted 24 acres of rye grass for anticipated grazing and I plan to continue the effort until the moisture is gone. The drought may not be over. The water we got was an anomaly. We have no rain in the 10 day forecast, I am still waiting for the fat lady to sing.

[Oxankle]

Agman, we'll hope that you get more rain soon. If you get the seed in the ground even a moderate rain will bring it on.

I agree with you on the small-framed cows. My little herd of Angus comes from my brother's herd. He in turn started with purchases from several breeders in several states, and some of those were large-frame cows. I have eliminated all those large cows, sold one at 1610 pounds a couple of weeks ago, in favor of moderately sized cattle. I am breeding AI to moderately framed bulls and should have a uniform herd in a few years. The most successful cattlemen around here prefer small cows. One fellow, generally regarded as the most knowledgeable cattleman in the area, says he wants small cows that breed young. He claims that over the years he has found that cows that breed to calve at 21, 22 months have been his best, healthiest, most productive and long-lived mother cows.

All these fellows are successful, but most of them will let a good cow live out her life on the range. While the accountants say sell any open cow and sell all of them before they get feeble and die these cowmen will allow a good cow a skip and a good old mother cow will die at home. I am not sure but that these fellows are just exhibiting a tendency to be considerate of their stock, the very quality that makes them successful cattlemen.

One of my neighbors, quite well to do, has two old bulls in his house pasture that can barely hobble to feed. I fed for him one winter while he was on a trip and so help me I held back feed for one old cow until she could hobble in to the feed ground, then drove off the others so that she could eat. another small cow man.

This has been our wettest year ever. After the killing freeze & ice storm that knocked down trees everywhere we got spring rains that brought up every weed in creation. With my wife in the hospital all spring I could not spray, and by midsummer weeds were everywhere. We got well spaced rains, none over two and a half inches, all summer and the weeds got higher than a man. I finally got to go after them with the shredder and cut high. Bermuda grass 8 to ten inches high under the weeds. Ten years ago this place was all brush.

Here's hoping that you get some good fall rains.
Ox