Favourite Beef Breed

Indubitable

What is your favourite cattle breed? I decided not to put in dairy breeds as i am not too familiar with them but someone else can. I also only listed a few of the more common breeds

reilig

Run a chaorlais bull with all limousin cows. Have 12 cows on an outfarm that I use AI on and all are black limousin cows and receive BElgian blue AI. Recently got into a few pedigree limousins as a bit of a hobby - so I guess I have a mixture of all types. Intend to keep any heifer calves from the pedigrees as replacements to run with my chaorlais bull. So I guess I have 3 favourite beef breeds.

wiggy123

as a pedigree breeder of angus's...it would be them!
Also, i like the BB....
but all beef breeds have good+bad points!
be a disaster if we all prefered the one breed,variety is the choice of life...

Min

Montbeliardes are nice animals.

whelan1

Min wrote: »

Montbeliardes are nice animals.

any one i asked about montbeliardes said they are very thick stubborn animals is that true ?

Min

whelan1 wrote: »

any one i asked about montbeliardes said they are very thick stubborn animals is that true ?

I don't think they are any worse than a friesian, I had no problem training them for the milking parlour and they have a good temperament when it came to milking them.
ok mine aren't purebred but I would have no complaints. My most contrary cows are of the friesian variety....

whelan1

whats their longevity like - would their udder be hanging on the ground after a few years ?

snowman707

Voted for Limousin,

keep 2 stock bulls LM and MO (dairying is our main enterprise) but also breeding some quality beef animals from mox & br FR cows,

also keep a couple of pedigree Lm cows

yessam

when breeding for comercial beef cattle, i think limousine cows crossed with a good charolais bull is hard to beat. they are always tops in weanling and store trade.

pakalasa

yessam wrote: »

when breeding for comercial beef cattle, i think limousine cows crossed with a good charolais bull is hard to beat. they are always tops in weanling and store trade.

Great weanlings alright but yellow colour is a mark against them for the export trade. The Italians are used to buying purebreds from France, so they will take some time to come around to the Irish way of doing things.

wardy1

Some strange maths in that poll - total poll is 133%?

bogman_bass

whelan1 wrote: »

whats their longevity like - would their udder be hanging on the ground after a few years ?

we got out of dairy 2 years ago but heald on to a couple of older cows to use as sucklers. One MO cross calved down on tuesday with her 10th calf

tismesoitis

belgian blue without question.. shippers will pay 30-40 cent per kg live more for blue bulls and they,re the only heifers they want too!

irishh_bob

my favourite beed is limousin , while not just as good for growth rates and eventual weight as the charolais , i think they are a more rounded breed , hardier ( especially when young ) and also posses more milk

irishh_bob

whelan1 wrote: »

any one i asked about montbeliardes said they are very thick stubborn animals is that true ?

it most certainly is true , montys had one hell of a PR team ( and money ) behind them for a number of years but have most definatley fallen out of favour with dairy farmers this past five or six years , they are extremley ignorant to milk and never stop ****ting in the parlour , as for the comment by a poster about how fresians are rougher , british fresians tend to be quite ignorant but holstiens are like lambs , if anything they are too placid and meek

Waddy

parthenaise s are lovley but d blues bring in the €€€. also like limousins. hate angus and charolais

Waddy

parthenaises all d way but blues will bring in the €€€ and limousin are smashing cattle too. charolais are slow and lazy when born so dont like them. i tink angus and hereford are poor enough also

snowman707

Waddy wrote: »

parthenaises all d way but blues will bring in the €€€ and limousin are smashing cattle too. charolais are slow and lazy when born so dont like them. i tink angus and hereford are poor enough also

how do the parthenaises compare to the limo for hardiness etc ? we tried some blues but found they need much more care , at the end of the day the limousins left similar profit

have done a little research into the parthenaises and must say I am impressed

Timistry

From a butchering perspective I would have to say angus or black polly (all heifers). Both can obtain great shape and good fat to meat ratios which lead to good cutting and flavour. The same goes for Limousins also but they have some kind of mad streak:rolleyes: so we advoid them! Crosses seem to be ok though. We do not kill any continental breeds because they are so hard to finish properly since they have a large bone structure which is not conducive to rapid fattening. Have a few lovely red whiteheads at the moment. Should turn out to be prize winning heifers

Min

whelan1 wrote: »

whats their longevity like - would their udder be hanging on the ground after a few years ?

I find they have strong udders, good and healthy udders too. My oldest - my first is over 10 years old now, she calved and was bulling 5 weeks later, very easy calvers too.

bogman_bass wrote: »

we got out of dairy 2 years ago but heald on to a couple of older cows to use as sucklers. One MO cross calved down on tuesday with her 10th calf

They should be nice suckler calves.

irishh_bob wrote: »

it most certainly is true , montys had one hell of a PR team ( and money ) behind them for a number of years but have most definatley fallen out of favour with dairy farmers this past five or six years , they are extremley ignorant to milk and never stop ****ting in the parlour , as for the comment by a poster about how fresians are rougher , british fresians tend to be quite ignorant but holstiens are like lambs , if anything they are too placid and meek

Honest to God, I never had that problem with Montbeliardes, as I said earlier mine aren't purebred so they have some holstein in them, some British friesian, maybe if they were purebred they would be different.

bogman_bass

Min wrote: »

They should be nice suckler calves.

have a beast of a blue from last year from her

Indubitable

Timistry wrote: »

From a butchering perspective I would have to say angus or black polly (all heifers). Both can obtain great shape and good fat to meat ratios which lead to good cutting and flavour. The same goes for Limousins also but they have some kind of mad streak:rolleyes: so we advoid them! Crosses seem to be ok though. We do not kill any continental breeds because they are so hard to finish properly since they have a large bone structure which is not conducive to rapid fattening. Have a few lovely red whiteheads at the moment. Should turn out to be prize winning heifers

the butchers on the continent tend to prefer the continental breeds

djmc

I like the Parthenaise but I never owned any I had aubrac which I think are very like them same markings and found them very easy calving and good to put on weight.
BB make the most money to sell but dont like the pure breeds as the cows have too much musle to calf easly and pb calves are very soft.
I think a saler cow x bb bull would have a smashing calf
Saler because of big size and pelvic bone should calf anything
Belgan blue for size and double musle

pajero12

whelan1 wrote: »

any one i asked about montbeliardes said they are very thick stubborn animals is that true ?

No i think there very docile well tempered animals...We got to 3 to feed calves and you can milk them in the field!

whelan1

kingofthe3rdyrs wrote: »

the butchers on the continent tend to prefer the continental breeds

doubt there are too many angus or hereford on the continent tbh:D