MANAGEMENT...
Determining When She'll Calve
Veterinarian prefers ultrasound to palpation when estimating the date.
Some producers use preg-checking to predict calving dates. According to Jeff Hoffman, a USDA veterinarian who had a cattle practice at Salmon, Idaho, for many years, ultrasound is more accurate than palpation for determining stage of pregnancy. Hoffman backs up his preference with his own experience, noting that by using ultrasound he realized he's not as accurate in predicting stage of gestation using palpation as he thought. Read more.
Coming Soon
We'll soon be sharing your responses to our inquiry about ID systems.
Thank you, subscribers, for responding to our request a few days ago to share what kind of numbering system you use to individually identify your calf crop and herd. I'm still in the process of summarizing your responses and will share them shortly by adding them to this management page.
We'll post a notice to our Angus Beef Bulletin Twitter account (@ABBeditor) and send a global e-mail when we make the update to let you know. Until then, if you'd still like to share your ID system, you can e-mail it to me by clicking here.
Ranchers with a few decades of experience under their belt can provide some of the most practical management tips you'll ever learn. Lavern and Sue Koch of New Underwood, S.D., are one such pair. The couple has spent more than five decades together on their ranch, which has evolved from dairy, wheat and commercial cattle to their "retirement plan" of just cattle.
What has been key to this couple's journey as a beef operation with a focus on grazing management? Lavern and Sue share these lessons. Read more.
Ron Torell with his wife, Jackie
Cow Camp Chatter
Bull power
A Holstein bull by the name of Potter recently joined a small, but elite, group of dairy sires that have produced and sold more than 1 million units of semen. This elite group of bulls could be titled the "Bulls of the Century." Their genes roam herds around the globe. Some estimate a million-unit bull would have more than 150,000 daughters and 2.3 million granddaughters and would be responsible for 15% of the DNA in today's U.S. dairy herd.
The U.S. beef industry maintains a wide variation in its genetic pool, with several breeds of cattle being utilized. Grass is harvested by our four-legged employees from the arid rangelands of the West to the lush grasslands of the East and the hot, humid areas of the South. Read more.
Cowboy GPS Guides Ranch Planning
A GPS, or Global Positioning System, is a device used to help navigate from one location to another. Essentially, it helps direct one's way.
Nebraska ranchers Lynn and Marlene Myers, who run a commercial Angus herd on their Tippetts-Myers Ranch near Lewellen, Neb., have developed their own unique GPS to help guide ranch management decisions. They say every ranch needs G = Goals, P = Philosophy to live by, and S = System to operate — which adds up to a Cowboy GPS.
Myers suggests that by putting some thought into your own ranch decisions — or GPS — you'll develop a roadmap for success. Read more.
Kris Ringwall
Beef Talk
The future of beef, cows and grass
One fundamental point often is overlooked among all the charts, trends and rhetoric about the beef business. The beef business does not exist without the business of the cow. The cow business is the foundation of the beef business. Without cows, there is no beef or beef business.
Perhaps the more appropriate title for future discussions should be the future of the cow business. Having said that, let us return to the future of the beef industry discussion. Read more.
New Products
Industry affiliates provide a wide array of products and services to assist you on the farm and ranch. Here's an assortment of new products to hit the market recently.
• Disinfectant now approved for U.S. beef facilities
• New products and licensing partnership
• Compact tractors add features
Angus Advisor
Click here for January herd management tips from cattle experts across the nation. Advice separated by region.
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