Agricultural News
Systematic Early Breeding of Heifers Pays Dividends that Keep on Coming
Tue, 11 Sep 2012 16:01:47 CDT
University of Nebraska beef reproductive physiologist Rick Funston takes a systematic approach to helping cattle producers develop replacement females for cow herds. In the second of a three-part series for the Beef Buzz, Funston says the most profitable cow herds are are those where the cows are breeding sooner rather than later when the bulls are turned in.
"One of the best indicators of profitability on an operation is those operations that have a high percent of animals born early in their breeding season. Now, in saying early, I'm not saying early in the calendar year necessarily, but whenever your calving season and breeding season is right for your operation, we want to have as many animals born on the front end of that calving season as possible."
Funston says the benefits to the producer of systematically breeding cows early in the season are cumulative. Cows that are bred the earliest and bear earliest will have calves with higher weaning weights, better carcass characteristics, and higher carcass weights. He said heifer calves will also be better performers as well. He said they will breed earlier in the season, their first calves will be heavier, and they will breed back earlier the next season.
Breeders who use artificial insemination have long been able to take advantage of this understanding, Funston said, and producers who use natural service are now trying to frontload their calving season with a similar, synchronized, systematic approach to breeding.
"We have systems that are pretty simple. For example, turning bulls in and then, five days later, giving a shot of prostaglandin is a system that we found very effective in cycling animals."
He said the key is to develop a herd of early breeders through a good heifer selection process.
"I'd advocate having a very short breeding season with your heifers unless you have a market for those later-bred animals and let the vet determine those animals. And don't keep them for yourself because you'll create a problem going into the cow herd if you have later-bred heifers."
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Network- but is also a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR below for today's show- and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
Click here to listen to Part I of our interview with Rick Funston.
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