# new to cows and questions



## animalcrazy31 (Sep 23, 2009)

i'm looking into getting my first cow baby as soon as i find a peerson that selld them. What do i need for a cow? I've ordered one of those metel huts that you put pannels  what else do i need for it? And how much pasture do they need? can they go in with goats? i'm hoping to get a female one and raise her to have a baby twice then buchter her and her after 2 births and rasing the babies for the freezer.


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## Rence (Sep 23, 2009)

LOL, you'll probably never take my advice again, but here goes 

I would put that buck in with the bottle baby calf  I did that for a while, and they got to be best friends  Then you can put that bottle baby goat in with the wethers *and see how they act* before deciding you want another bottle baby.  You can also put all those bigger kids in with the calf, and get a bottle baby for the bottle baby. 

Cows and goats graze well together. The goats eat the brambles, weeds and briars, and the cows eat the grass. 

When I raise bottle babies, and I've never had more than two at a time, I used cattle panels to enclose them, and I built a wooden shelter because I couldn't afford those nice calf huts. If you have one of those, they're awesome.

Ok, this is just me. I just kept my bottle babies on milk, with access to pasture and hay and water, until they were six to eight months old.  In the winter, they got three calf bottles, in the summer, they got two. After six months old, they only got one bottle a day. They get no bottles when they're eight months old.  Again, they had pasture and hay. I never grained them while they were getting milk, they're condition was great.   Right now I have a holstein/angus 8-month old heifer that I just weaned. She's only on grass and hay now. And I have a 3-1/2 month old Jersey bull calf that is on two bottles a day with grass and hay. I plan to wean him when he's 6 or 8 months old...whatever is convenient for me.  I used to have the heifer in with a one year old buck and they were great together and it was the biggest drama when I separated them when I was moving animals around.  My "calf" pen is two 12-panel squares that I separate at times. So the calf usually gets about 12-panels, and when they get a bit bigger I open the partition and give the two sections until I put them in with the bigger cows.

I have about two acres for two milking cows, but I let them graze in other areas of the property in the spring and summer when the grass grows. They have a roll of grass hay in with them all year. You'll need a "magnesium block" for when the grass grows in the spring.  I keep another loose mineral out for them as well.  I like loose minerals better than the blocks for both the goats and the cows. It's easier for them to use and doesn't wear down their teeth.

I hope I didn't forget anything :/


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## WildRoseBeef (Sep 24, 2009)

animalcrazy31 said:
			
		

> i'm looking into getting my first cow baby as soon as i find a peerson that selld them. What do i need for a cow? I've ordered one of those metel huts that you put pannels  what else do i need for it? And how much pasture do they need? can they go in with goats? i'm hoping to get a female one and raise her to have a baby twice then buchter her and her after 2 births and rasing the babies for the freezer.


First of all, welcome.

Second of all, a "cow baby" is a calf. And a "female cow baby" is called a heifer calf. 

For a calf, you do need a calf shelter, which you have already purchased. Along with the shelter you need to have a pail (a heavy-duty one sold at livestock stores) for water and a pail for bucket-raising them, once she gets too big for the bottle.  She will also need hay and a little grain to help develop her digestive system.

A young calf only eats about 10% of a mature cow (mature female bovine) on pasture, but steadily increases as she gets older.  

She will be fine with goats.

It's really hard to say if you can keep her long enough to have bred and calve twice.  Bottle babies have a bit of a high risk of not surviving, because they are less immune to illness and diseases than older calves/cattle are.  So you have to be careful in how you raise her and treat (medically) her.

If I were you, since you are completely new to cattle, is raise the bottle baby if you want, but if you want freezer beef, get a couple weaner steers (castrated male bovines just weaned from their mothers) instead to raise then butcher for meat.  You got less risk for illness, and gain more experience with cattle than with a bottle baby.  The difference between a bottle baby and a weaned steer or mature cow is that the bottle baby is young and its behaviour as a "cow" is more subtle than with older more "experienced" cattle.  The disadvantage of having older cattle around is having to fence your property or pasture properly.  But even so, you eventually have to have proper fence once she gets older. 

All the same, good luck.


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## animalcrazy31 (Sep 25, 2009)

Thanks for the info . If i got one weaned how long do you grow them before butchering them?


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## WildRoseBeef (Sep 25, 2009)

animalcrazy31 said:
			
		

> Thanks for the info . If i got one weaned how long do you grow them before butchering them?


Assuming you get one that is 6 months old, it would take over a year to get one up to butcher weight (not feedlot wt.) of about 1100 to 1200 lbs, which takes about 14 months, more or less to feed them before butchering them.  Which is considerably shorter than waiting for a bottle calf to be ready to breed and then waiting longer for her calf to be ready for butchering.  If you go the bottle baby-to-mother route you're looking at waiting about 3 years before you get any home-grown beef in your freezer. Lemme break it down for you.

Purchase calf: 2 weeks old (approximately).
Puberty: 8 to 12 months old
Age to breed: 15 months old
Age to calve: 24 months old
Age to breed again: 26 months
Age to wean 1st calf: ~30 to 32 months old
Age to calve second calf: 35 months or almost 3 years old
Age of heifer when first calf butchered: ~44 months old (over 2 and 3/4 years)
Age to wean second calf: 41-43 months old
Age of now cow to butcher second calf: about 4 and a half years old.

Hope that helps.


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## animalcrazy31 (Sep 27, 2009)

do they have to be 1100-1200 pounds or can you butcher them sooner?


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## jhm47 (Sep 27, 2009)

You can butcher an animal at most any weight.  However, the combination of the best marbling, tenderness and taste seems to peak at around 1000 - 1500 lbs, depending on the breed and how they have been fed and handled.  For instance, a Jersey steer will be at his peak around 1000 lbs, and a larger breed, like Simmental, Charolais, or Holstein will be at their best towards the upper end.


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## WildRoseBeef (Sep 28, 2009)

animalcrazy31 said:
			
		

> do they have to be 1100-1200 pounds or can you butcher them sooner?


Like jhm said, this is the best or optimum weight that they can and should be butchered at.


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## goatboy13 (Nov 16, 2010)

We get calves butchered at 600-800 pounds and the meat is pretty good.


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