But, like any female, having a big family has taken its toll. Her breeding days are well and truly over. The Kirby family and Dan Ryan in red with the cow and calves. Single birth. It really depends on management factors for how the cow is raised and the environment she lives in.
Most cows have their last calf around 9 or 10 years of age, but on several occasions, I have witnessed a cow or two survive in a herd well into her teen years under the best management. Do you have other questions about how cattle are raised? Feel free to shoot me a message on social media or leave a comment below. Want to receive updates on future posts from Beef Runner in your inbox? Click here to subscribe. Skip To Content How many calves can a beef cow have?
Home August 10 How many calves can a beef cow have? August 10, August 8, Ryan Goodman. Like this: Like Loading Although some producers believe that heifers calving at two years will have retarded growth and a subsequent reduction in productivity, a number of long-term experiments have shown that this is not the case.
For example, the results of an experiment using Hereford cattle are summarised in the following table:. It can be seen that calving first at two years had no effect on cow survival and life span in the herd, virtually no effect on mature cow size, but a large effect on productivity.
The 59 two-year-old calvers produced an extra 51 calves during their lifetime in the herd. Low pregnancy rates and poor calving percentages in mobs of heifers mated as yearlings are usually associated with inadequate liveweight at mating — as liveweight is the most important factor determining the onset of oestrus. Calving difficulty was commonly believed to result from mating heifers at too young an age. However, calving difficulty is now known to be a problem of first-calf heifers, whether they calve first at two years or three years.
Well-grown mated yearlings should have no more difficulty calving than heifers joined first as two-year-olds, despite the more mature frame of three-year-old heifers. This is because calf size increases with the increased frame of the dam, and older heifers tend be fatter at calving, both of which can lead to calving difficulty.
Use of these programs has the potential to induce estrous cycles in cows that are close to cycling. So, nutrition is very important, have cows in at least body condition score 5 at calving and don't skimp on the groceries after calving. Ionophores such as Rumensin or Bovetec have a positive impact on the reproductive axis, at least there are experiments using the heifer that demonstrate this, so consider using an ionophore in the ration after calving.
Expose cows to sterile bulls as soon after calving as possible. These considerations are all for not if the cows have not been managed properly from a nutritional perspective.
Open cows are usually due to mis-management of the nutrition program. Minerals are important, but I rarely see large reductions in reproductive performance due to minerals alone, especially in Nebraska. A review of these studies conducted over the last several decades along with new research indicates the association among BW, puberty and heifer pregnancy rate appears to be changing over time.
In general, research reports published through the late s have shown much greater negative effects of limited post weaning growth on age of puberty and subsequent pregnancy, whereas more recent studies indicate less of a negative impact of delayed puberty on pregnancy response.
Several factors likely contribute to this change over time. Initial research in this area of interest corresponds to the industry shift from calving heifers at 3 years of age to calving at 2 years of age. Thus, selection pressure for age of puberty was probably minimal in the animals used in the early studies. While selection intensity would have increased with the reduction in calving age of heifers, genetic progress would take time due to the long generation interval in cattle.
In the mid s, researchers identified the association between scrotal circumference in bulls and age of puberty in their female offspring. Since then, scrotal circumference has been used as an indicator trait for puberty. The change occurring in scrotal circumference from to the present indicates substantial progress has been made, and a similar response in age of puberty would be expected see breed association websites for changes over time in EPD for scrotal circumference.
Indeed, the inability of heifers to attain puberty prior to breeding may not be as problematic as heifers reaching puberty before weaning. There are data developed at the University of Nebraska were feeding replacement heifers to a traditional target weight increases development costs relative to more extensive heifer development.
We have recorded no negative effect on reproduction when beef cows are supplemented with distillers grains as a protein or energy source, or for both protein and energy. In a number of experiments, we have used a distillers grains based cube as a major component of the supplement that is fed to cows prepartum while grazing cornstalks or dormant native range.
Following reports provide examples of research where distiller was a part of the supplement and we recorded the impact on cow and calf performance.
We've developed replacement heifers using dried distillers grains. Heifers were fed distillers grains at 0. Distillers fed heifers had greater reproductive performance compared to the control heifers. Following is a NE Beef Report on using distillers grains in heifer development diets. In these cases, distillers was fed with low to medium quality forages. Subscribe to BeefWatch.
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