milking questions and more..Dexter

[darbyfamily]

I found a guy selling off his Dexter herd.. not registered, and selling them fairly cheap... $500 for cows and $300 for the calves... selling in prs for $800.

He didnt really sound like he knew much what he was talking about, but at that price, Im interested


So, my hubby started asking questions and I wanted to be sure Im giving the right answers.

How long can you milk them?

how long do they usually live?

At what age do they stop being productive (approx)?

what do you do with older cows once they arent breeding or milking anymore? Im assuming once they get that old, they arent good for meat anymore as they'd be tough? but I dont really know.

[Dexter_Cattle]

Hi There,

They have the same lactation that other cows do, they are usually productive 16-18+. There are some cows as old as 22-23 that have had calves in the past. The main thing is just don't bank on them being productive past 16-18 years old, and then you will be suprised when they are productive longer than that.

Actually old cows and bulls in Dexters can still be used for meat. Atleast Hamburger. That being said, We have processed some old breeding bulls and the meat was great, the steaks need to be cooked in the crock pot, otherwise turn them all into Hamburger.

On the price, that is about the going rate for unregistered stock, but great for you if you don't care about resale value or having registered stock.

Hope that helps.
Thanks
Dan

[darbyfamily]

Thanks Dan I check your site regularly for stuff for sale I have talked to the Evans and Mike Dulaney in my area about purchases.. the Evans havent given me a price yet, but Mike wanted $1600 for one of his but thats just too high for us right now.

we had to be 'cheap' about it...but when we have to put out the whole start up costs, shed and feed and such, we have to consider it all.

we have another option from someone on the board here who offered me a cow for a great price... we're just not sure how we can get to Missouri to pick it up, we dont have a trailer yet, so we'd have to borrow one.

[ebook]

Yeah, what Dan said! But, I thought I would add in this thought. I think, from reading your other posts, that you are basically looking for a family milk cow and possibly something to produce beef for your family. But, you are not looking to grow or establish a herd because you don't have the land. If that is the case I think it might be wise to really consider registered stock. If you are planning on keeping a cow around for say 5 lactations (let's just throw out a number) you can expect to sell any extra offspring for about the price that you paid ... which is okay. But, if you have a registered cow and breed to a registered bull (either naturally or by AI) and let's say you get lucky and have 3 heifers and two bull calves, then you can possibly sell your heifers as weanlings for around $800 (of course market factors in your area would matter). So, having registered stock gives you a chance to recoup more money over time.

All that being said there are down sides. One is the need to breed to a registered Dexter. Another is that if you are planning on eating the offspring no matter if it is a bull or heifer ... if that is the case you are probably better off with unregistered stock.

Just a couple of thoughts. We had thought about buying some unregistered Dexters because we are mainly interested in beef. But, since we want to building or herd by keeping back heifers we realized that we would eventually be building a rather large component of our herd as unregistered and we didn't like that idea with so few Dexters in the US.

[Dexter_Cattle]

Not a problem. If you do want registered stock, don't give up if one is out of your price range, as the next breeder may not be.

There is nothing wrong with owning unregistered Dexters, as long as you know the price of the calves is not going to yeild you much.

Hope that helps!
Thanks
Dan