Farmerjan's journal - Weather

[Baymule]

Another set of twins. Do you ever try to keep the heifers or do you sell them because they might be free martians?
It gives you 2 calves, do they ever catch up, size wise to the other calves?

 

[farmerjan]

@Baymule , as a rule we do not bother to keep the heifer if it is a mixed set of twins. Too much time and money put into them to get them big enough for them to check them out... Plus they are worth too much now to keep as a "slight chance" of them being a replacement. If it was a last ditch attempt to get a heifer out of a favorite old cow, maybeeee....
The set of mixed twins on my one cow from last spring, that was the only open cow in that group because she had a uterine infection... will probably weigh a total of 8-900 lbs... so more total weight than a single weaned calf of about 5-600 in that particular group of cows...... plus they were later calves than some of the others... so each calf is smaller, especially the heifer is about 350-400... but the total weight is greater... Once weaned they will catch up weight wise as yearlings... but we hardly ever keep them that long.
Some of the cows might not make enough milk to raise the twins... My cow from last year was 1/4 holstein, and the cow that just had the little twins is a bought cow, but she has some holstein in her,,, she's got the big white udder and other color that makes you think part holstein.
The cow that had the twins a couple days ago... is hereford, and we are a little concerned if she will have enough milk, but so far they seem to be doing okay and growing.
I actually mentioned to DS that maybe we ought to put the ones with twins at snyder's (nurse cow pasture) so the calves will learn to come in the creep gate and get started on grain so they will not "stall out" on growth if they are not getting enough milk.. They are a week old and would be hard to get one on a bottle, even as a supplement since she is mothering them so well. You basically have to do that from the beginning...

"Stupid cow 1305" went around the barn a couple times this evening, got a foot hung in a part of a wire cow panel that got bent up and I hadn't moved..(but it was not right near the barn, she didn't need to be going through those junk tree limbs and stuff). then got out of it, and then refused to come in the barn because the jersey had already gone right in... and she did not want to come near me... I told DS that the next time he comes up there with a trailer, she can get on it and get shipped... Tired of dealing with her. I went back to the house and got the calf a bottle.... STUPID jerk.... She will probably come right in tomorrow with my luck... but it is a waste of my time mostly... I kept trying to be a little forgiving... but she really is a jerk. And she is getting old... 12 yrs... so ship her while she is in decent condition and not laying out there dead.

2 more new baby calves this morning.

DS went to the sale on the way home from the dr appt yesterday, and bought 2 calves, 1 bull, 1 steer... so we took the truck and trailer today to go to the other dr appt... had to go right by there again... and picked them up on the way back... he is going to try to start going to more sales and picking up a few of these singles... especially bull calves, that we can bring back and work through the chute; band and shots/vaccinate... and start making up some other groups to sell. He is saying that with the higher price of heifers, we probably need to sell more, and he can maybe get some of these steers/bulls put together and graze some of them this year instead of keeping more heifers... which I am fine with... pick out what we really want to keep... and sell more than we were thinking... especially since we do not have the WV place this year. We sold those 12 heifers in Dec for 2.30/lb I think it was... they weighed around 600... so 1350-1400/hd. And that was good money at the time for them.... He talked to a guy this afternoon that is interested in some... and DS told him 3.00/lb for the 4 wts; 2.85/lb for the 5 wts; and 2.70 for the 6 wts... that's about 1550 +/hd for the 6 wts. ... $.40/lb in 3 months time difference... We may take some time this weekend and look them over real good and see exactly what we would be wanting to keep, and what to sell. We did that preliminary looking a couple weeks ago after the steers were gone... but we were thinking keeping more of them...for putting out to pastures...
If DS can buy some of these "singles"... especially bull calves sold single or in pairs... for $2.25-2.50... and make them steers, that will increase their value $.75-1.00 a lb.... and graze them this summer.. It would be buying them at less than the heifer price is right now... and they will only gain on grass for the grazing season.....which is cheaper to figure cost of gain... put 2-300 lbs on them for 4-6 months... So if they brought exactly the same money per pound to sell them... there would be a $450 gain in price just from added weight gain of 200 lbs each....... that's like $100+ a month....

 

[farmerjan]

Anyway, went up to try to feed the heifer twin this morning, and she wants no part of the bottle, and had a good big "blob" of manure and all... in fact some was stuck to her butt so I took some dead/dry grass and got it off so it did not get caked on her, and cause problems with the next time she did more... She then peed and did a little more manure... I think she is getting some/enough? from the cow... she was not "rounded out" but was not real gaunt either... I will check her again tomorrow... They are both a little wobbly... and her knees almost bend a little backwards...and her back legs are not the greatest... but I imagine they were pretty crowded inside the cow... and I think they will straighten... Cow is being attentive to both... so the best thing to do is just make sure neither gets weak or looks neglected... Actually might ought to sell the heifer calves off both them and let the cow raise just one... with baby calves being worth so much... maybe in a couple weeks when they get some weight on them to close to 80-100 lbs? But the good thing of keeping them, should we have a cow have a dead calf or something, we can pull one off and graft our own calf right on a cow and not try to buy one... which I prefer to do...

We had to stop and do some switching around of money at a couple of banks with the money from the steers, and payments coming due... and found another bank that will pay 5.1% interest on a checking if you use their debit card at least 15 times a month...up to $15,000.... that's $75 a month interest as opposed to .1 or .2% otherwise.....instead of like $1.50 a month interest..... and a couple of 4 month CD's at 4% interest... which ties up "farm money" for only 4 months instead of 6 months....
DS uses the debit card for EVERYTHING... to make sure he gets at least 15 times on the account he has, At "my credit union" that I told him about ...... plus the account he shares with his father... who was not using it near enough to get the good interest rate... Got to make this money work while it is sitting there...
That is the nice thing though if you do some checking around at different banks.... and now DS is seeing the benefit of what I have been telling him about for years... with my original bank that has been paying a decent interest on their checking... even when I was lucky to have a 3 or 500 balance average for the month... that was still $2.50 interest as opposed to .02 or .03 interest.... When you have more money, it adds up in a hurry... and much better than sitting in a savings account at less than .01 % interest nowadays...

Anyway... I got home from going back up and feeding the jersey calf the bottle... and DS calls... friends of his said someone had dumped some chickens out and they were just sitting along side the road... did we want them... of course, they are roosters... and I said I really didn't see the benefit of driving 1/2 hour plus, to get some roosters, IF they could be caught... so a little while later, his friends called and said that they would bring them to me if they caught them... because they were just standing there alongside the pile of shavings and all... so I said okay... I would meet them partway since they had to come further south to drop off some stuff at a machine shop...
They called me a little bit later... they had found and caught 3 of the 4 he had seen.... within 6 ft from where he had seen them... he had driven by them 2 times in a couple hours and they were still right there...until dark when they went up in a tree right there... and they did not see the other one anywhere... but they were nice and quiet and looked well fed... So, I took a ride and went and met them at the machine shop where they dropped off some stuff to be worked on... The are young cockerals... look like game chickens... but very quiet and in very good body condition... feathers in good condition...no spurs just nubs so pretty young... don't know what their story is... but I now have 3 more roosters... for now they will get put in the big new pen..... they might just get to be "free range" .... He said he would check tomorrow since he drives past the place he found them, to see if the other rooster shows up... might have been gotten by something (dog? ) or just might have gotten into a different tree and they didn't see him....
They felt sorry for them just getting dumped (on purpose or accidently like fell off a truckbed or something) and them just standing around there like lost dogs waiting for the owner to come back and get them...
OF COURSE they couldn't have been some pullets.....

So. I am going to put them in the pen tomorrow...they are in a couple boxes in the car for now.... but am going to get after DS now to at least help get the roof panels on it so they will have some protection from hawks... and can't fly out either... 3 roosters are not going to break me... see what they look like in the daylight tomorrow. My little NH rooster will at least have some "poultry" companions finally... from the outside... I won't put them together until I can be here to watch them... and maybe they are young enough to not fight back yet so can be put together... The NH runs free during the day... he's lonely though... always right there where you are or near the cats when they are out there...

So, that is my exciting day.... Also did get a load of clothes hung out and a load off the line in the house too... trying to take advantage of the real nice sunny days...

Got the bottles in the racks for tomorrow... the meters are in the car but I have to change the brackets... I have to leave here by 8:30 for the massage therapist appt... maybe can get some relief in this hand and shoulder..... then come home, get the stuff and go to work.

 

[Ridgetop]

The roosters were probably dumped by city people that discovered they were not hens and didn't want to "kill" them. For some reason city people think it is more "humane" to drop unwanted animals in the country than butcher them. They don't think about coyotes or stray dogs killing them, and it is cruel to animals that have been raised to expect food, etc.