The Old Folks Home

[Wickedchicken6]

I had a whole day "coaching/mentoring" purgatory mandatory class to attend today. At the end we had to role play. Someone had to have a problem, a coach attempted to coach them through it and then there was an observer in the group to take notes on what went well and what didn't.


The group next to me went before me. Their problem? "I think I want to get goats."

I'm sad I wasn't in that group.

I did volunteer to deliver both Pip and Caramel tonight.

(purgatory)

Here come the Beverly Hillbillies!

Penny I enjoyed the few auctions I have been to.
All our grass is greening up and my large pear tree is budding out. The Robbins showed up yesterday. I took a couple pics but it was in the shade so it's to hard to see it.

That's EXACTLY what they called us at the gate to pay! (How did you know?)

 

[Wickedchicken6]

Awe, I'm sorry. I do understand the noise and being annoying. Sometimes I feel that way about our cows.
Maybe you could room a pig in with the goats?

They'd probably get along ok. Goats over/through the fence...pigs digging under the fence. My grandparents had pigs, then I had pigs...and then I worked at a hog barn...lol. DH...not so much for hogs.

 

[Kusanar]

Quote:

My dh won't sell him. I've asked him to so we could get a Charolais bull to go with our Charolais cows. He won't I guess he figures it's money in the bank since he's a Angus bull.
Here are our girls one of the heifers is old enough she might jump the fence this year.

From what I've heard, Charolais bulls can get pretty nasty and they jump too... but usually when chasing someone....

 

[Wickedchicken6]

My dh won't sell him. I've asked him to so we could get a Charolais bull to go with our Charolais cows. He won't I guess he figures it's money in the bank since he's a Angus bull.
Here are our girls one of the heifers is old enough she might jump the fence this year.

Do you ever get any baldies with the Angus cross? That's all I want...some baldies. We get solid's; tan, white and smoky.

We have three (not necessarily from our angus)...two with the hour glasses and William Wallace. I'm hoping

Joe henry the calf (now a bull) will give some white faces.

He's such a sweetie little bull.



We've been really fortunate. None of our bulls challenge anything. But the neighbor shares a fence with us (and they won't share in costs etc) and their cattle have gotten into our pastures.

Our bulls throw 60-85lb calves...theirs throw 100+. So DH electrified their side as well as ours.

 

[perchie.girl]

Our next door neighbor when I was still living at home bought a Cow at auction. They had five kids so the idea was to milk her. They boarded her at an old dairy barn turned horse boarding stable... They found out she could jump a five foot fence.... They couldnt keep her in...

Solution? They put a chain on her around her neck. It was about her body length and a few feet. On the end they fastened a six by six tied right in the middle.... Kind of like a watch fob. When she jumped the fence the fob would tangle in the wire and she was left standing on the other side with a few feet to move around in....

Iknow I know how strong bulls are.... seen one use his horns to pry open pipe panels so he could get in the next pen... but it might give a person time enough to get him under control.

But then if it were your own place you could use hot wire.

deb

 

[Wickedchicken6]

From what I've heard, Charolais bulls can get pretty nasty and they jump too... but usually when chasing someone....

Depends on the breeder. And what he's selected for breeding stock.

We've got...3 Charolais, 3 Angus and Joe who's a Charolais/Angus cross. All total sweet hearts. I walk amongst them. BUT several years ago our employer bought a bull from a "respected" breeder (don't even get me started) and he was a freak fest! Went at me on my horse (broke my tail bone) wouldn't herd just a completely wild _ _ _. His heifers were freaks too. Over the chute onto us...couldn't vaccinate them. Ugh.

Our black Angus comes from a sale consisting of two separate breeders. You can watch the change when the bulls we buy from...the guys all stay in the open when in the ring. OR the other guy...where everyone suddenly stays behind the guards. On that alone I'd never buy one of HIS bulls. No different than roosters really.

 

[chickadoodles]

Quote:

My dh won't sell him. I've asked him to so we could get a Charolais bull to go with our Charolais cows. He won't I guess he figures it's money in the bank since he's a Angus bull.
Here are our girls one of the heifers is old enough she might jump the fence this year.

From what I've heard, Charolais bulls can get pretty nasty and they jump too... but usually when chasing someone....
When our neighbors Charolais bull jumped our fence to play with our girls he watched how things were done and he did great! Every afternoon when I took the garden scraps out to feed the cows by hand I gave each one a bite. After a few days of him watching he got in the circle and let me hand feed him to. It was pretty awesome. Then when a Angus bull jumped into our pasture from the other side the Charolais bull gave that Angus a woopin all over our entire pasture from one end to the other. LOL our young Angus at the time stayed back and watched while the two went at it. My husband and I and the Charolais bulls owner all came running trying to figure out who was going to die! Then the neighbor brought some help and they all ran the Angus off and they took their bull home. Awe I miss him he was so sweet! I would rather have a Charolais they are massive.

 

[chickadoodles]

Quote: That's right. Our Angus bull and the Charolais were fine with me hand feeding them. And the Charolais was never treated like that before. Honestly I think the neighbor took him off because he did not want him that tame or else having to worry about him having to fight with the Angus bulls from the feed lot on the other side of us. I am kind of glad that our bull is not here, we lost 2 cows and calfs due to the size difference. He is to big for our girls.

Deb our cows and bulls and the neighbors all jump the fences around here. We had a man that lived somewhere on the back side of the creek behind us over 200 miles come by looking for his bull and calf.

 

[chickadoodles]

Quote: Yours are so cute I love that calf!

This is what I said above our Angus bull is to big he cost us 2 cows and calf's the calf's were to large for our cows we could not get them out even with a winch. I'm glad you can.
I kind of think our bull knew it and left. Now he's with all Angus. Even though is a feed lot that's all they deal with for the most part.
Our bull really sulked for a couple weeks after we lost the last cow and calf. He kept close to her for a couple weeks and then he was gone. Maybe they are smarter than we give them
credit for. Who know's?
Our fence is separate from our neighbors and the feed lot and the cows and bulls tear them all up. We fix our and they fix theirs.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

I've sourced three good breeders who believe the same thing I do...the whole 'survival of the fittest' idea.. So they cull everything that gives problems. I like that because we're getting too broken down to do the whole hands on thing. Our employer kept animals from animals that were...less than ideal and he made some poor choices in bulls and it created a huge amount of headache and make work projects. 150 cattle herd was too much work like that. I remember DH going to the vet twice in one night for cesarean sections. Not fun.

We only bought the herd in 2011 but we no longer trim hooves or have udder issues. We only had one feeder that had horns when we sold them 2 weeks ago so we've eliminated the horns and we haven't had to help a cow/heifer since spring 2015 and then it was only because it was twisted twins . It's been a process...lol. Pretty much doing the same thing to the cattle herd that we did with our sheep.

Most people around buy larger producing bulls, the exceptional heifer bulls around here are about $4000+ more money.

This guy sold for $8100 only because I stopped bidding.

Crazy! I think $4000 is heart attack area for me.

He sure was beautiful!

And a sweetheart! He's a Limo, being a Limo he should produce a larger carcass. He's just a yearling in that pic.



His breeder told me one of the most profound things I've heard a breeder tell me. They select for the entire package with their cattle and docility is an important trait. But he told me that they actually went too far at one point and were finding the calves to lack vigor when they were born. I've really taken that to heart and I'm watching really closely; not only with all our animals...but also with the chickens. I select for the whole package and keep the best and brightest but I'm not discounting the more aggressive roosters (and I'm not meaning aggressive towards humans) but the top roosters.

I wonder if that also affects the hatching vigor of the chicks? Food for thought for sure. And I'm experimenting with this to find out. I certainly see a trend with what I've been doing so far and with what I've been getting with the old egg setting.

Thank you...Joe is a such sweetie! He was a twin and that's our son feeding him...lol. He's exceeding my expectations in all respects! He was already sniffing and trying to breed early summer. Wow.