K9 wrote: » That’s not much use to the rest of us tho. Just say you used a bull to breed replacements, surely the sooner icbf can get reliable information re that bulls performance on replacement traits the better it would be for the rest of us
Dunedin wrote: » Listen, I subscribe to ICBF and agree to an extent what you’re saying re the data but if ICBF are relying on me in the first place to tell them about my cows performance, then you’d have to a kind of agree that’s it’s me that knows it in the first place......
K9 wrote: » As it stands icbf are reliant on you to put a score on your cows milk ability. Would you agree that if you were to weigh your calves at 150 days and after 3 years icbf would then have a far more accurate figure for your cows milk potential. Which in turn would improve the reliability of your cows euro star value. I’d agree that the star system has its flaws but icbf can only base it on the information that they have. Not much point criticising inaccuracies and at the same time giving out about measures that will improve reliability of figures
Dunedin wrote: » How do you assume that the worst one is a bad one? I kill all steers at under 30 months and they’d range between 420 - 500 kgs DW so I’d say that the ‘worst’ one is still worth keeping. We’ve talked on the other suckler thread about the amount of work with suckers so I won’t go into it here and this scheme just adds to the workload and for what? I’ve had bad cows in the past, everyone does. But sometimes there’s a reason we hang on to them for longer than we should - ease of calving, doctility, very easy to get into the yard and the others follow, etc. My weighing scales is the factory returns and only having circa 20 cows, I know them fairly well and weighing calves is not going to tell me anything I don’t already know. My current ICBF report shows 80% 4/5 Star in the herd. And I have two cows that are 2 Star and they are amongst the best I have.
Anto_Meath wrote: » Hi Bass, along with my few suckler cows I also rear about 20 AAx / HEx calves, I kill them as bullocks under 30 months, they generally grade O's at around 350Kgs and come into circa €1,300 - €1,400. There is a good bit of work with them for the first fee weeks and you have to buy a fairly good calf at around €200. They have to be fit to be killed before the 1st August off grass. Would an extra €200 - €300 plus €120 subsidy justify keeping the suckler cow, I don't think so and that is the the problem. The problem with buying calves now is the Jex influence has destroyed the AAx calf and HEx calf isn't much better either so an average calf now in the mart looks like a good one....
Hard Knocks wrote: » Personally I think it’s a better scheme to the BDGS, just a pity the money is less. I think dry stock should be included too & this would give a better understanding to the performance of bulls progeny. There are lots of great bulls out there with poor stars because they haven’t the latest big thing in their breeding. To me the 3 key times for weighing are birth, 100-150 days & 250-350 days. I’ve a scales, I bought because of first KT program & find it useful for lambs also, the cost of weighing was €40 for first 10 calves back then. If you had 10 calves @ €400 less €60 for ICBF & €40 for weighing, that’s €300 extra in your pocket Just 1 more thing (maybe dreamworld) if you had weights could you sell from the field/yard & save a day at the mart, commission & stress on the animal & you
_Brian wrote: » Biosecurity !! Cattle repeatedly drawn into the mart and all driven through scales over and over. Surely multiplying the chances for disease spread.
Farmer wrote: » I dont get the weight thing. Can't they use the mart sale weights, we'll give then a calf at birth size on a scale of one to three. Let them subtract the two and divide by the days in between whether it be 4 months or 30.
charolais0153 wrote: » Do u know which cows are performing worst, if so why do u still have them? Youd swear running the cows or calves over a weighing scale is a huge job. By right it should be done when dosing so that the correct dosage is administered.
coolshannagh28 wrote: » More jumping through hoops for peanuts.
tanko wrote: » Where is this 60% thing coming from, i cant find anything about it.
charolais0153 wrote: Do u know which cows are performing worst, if so why do u still have them? Youd swear running the cows or calves over a weighing scale is a huge job. By right it should be done when dosing so that the correct dosage is administered.
blue5000 wrote: » It looks to me like the Beep scheme is a 3 year programme crash course in getting rid of suckler cows that aren't capable of weaning a calf that is 60% of their own body weight so we that nationally we have a beef herd with a smaller carbon footprint. There's a couple of flaws with this; It's skewed in favour of smaller cows. Labour; weighing cattle, esp calves AND cows is time consuming. Are we going to have to weigh new born calves as well? I honestly can't see 'getting a lend of a scales from the co-op' working out too well.
Dunedin wrote: » If you’re relying on weighing weanlings to know which cows are performing best, then I’d have to question whether you should be in sucklers in the first place
Anto_Meath wrote: » If you look at it the meat factories don't want the big 400 kgs plus carcass from the suckler cow. They are using ever opportunity to kick it, sure they are paying a premium (bonus) on AA, HE & SH these are the carcass types they want, coming in around 350 Kgs if at all possible. I am guessing there is more profit in the 5th quarter than they would have you believe therefore they are looking for these smaller weights so that they get more heads but only pay for a similar amount of beef. They don't want the live shipping of good continental weanlings either as this is providing opposition to them. One way around this is to produce a good quality AA / HE off a continental cow that will kill around the 390 kgs at 2 year old grading an R3 and if timed right could be pay around €4.20/ kg coming in at €1,638. But the quality of AA & HE bulls with the AI at the minute is very poor.
Farmer wrote: » I don't know what all the fuss about the weanling is. He's not the finished product. The one of the milky cow may be passes out by the well bred beefy type next spring. It's like deciding the race winner half way through. It may work sometimes but often not
