The 2019 weanlings are all housed at this stage of the year. Looking over their weaning weights, I am pleased with how the calves performed this year.

Male and female calves averaged 1.26kg/day up to 200 days of age. This has resulted in a weaning percentage of 44.47% of mature cow weight, and is an increase on the 2018 calf crop which averaged 1.2kg/day and 43.14%.

Overall, this year’s calves are a very even batch apart from a small group that calved late in the calving period.

For example, the bottom 5% of male calves gained on average 1.07kg/day up to weaning, which isn’t bad, but can be improved on

Milk

My cows generally have a good milk supply and to ensure they retain this trait, I am planning to keep a percentage of dairy-cross suckler cows in the herd, with the aim of producing replacements from this group.

Dairy cross cows coming into the herd are Limousin and Belgian Blue breeding.

Across the cows over the past couple of years I have used AI sires such as Auroch Deuter (Simmental), Gazelle (Limousin) and Fiston (Charolais).

This is now showing good results in terms of calf performance. Going forward I hope to use a lot more AI.

Post-weaning

While calf performance on the cow was good, since weaning overall weight gains have been under target, with some calves only gaining 0.6kg/day.

Since housing, these calves have been offered the best silage available on farm (75.2% D-value, 25.4% DM, 12 Mj ME) along with 2kg/day of maize gluten and barley, mixed 75%:25%.

In hindsight, I think the calves may have stayed at grass too long after weaning. The weather was poor, and when combined with the stress of weaning, these calves basically stood still in terms of weight gain.

Meal has been increased to 2.5kg/day and weanlings will be weighed in early January to review weight gains, before planning for an early turnout to spring grass.

There are currently 102 cows and heifers scanned in-calf for the spring, from 113 animals put to the bull and this represents a scanning percentage of 90.27%.

Going by scanning dates, all cows should be calving within 10 weeks, with 86 calving in the first six weeks (84%).

Breeding went well this year and I had all bulls removed from cows by the end of July.

Out-wintering

Although conditions have been less favourable for out-wintering this year, cows are currently in ideal condition and are fit, but not fat.

There are two cows which were housed and being fed concentrates to build condition. The rest of the cows and in-calf heifers are being out-wintered on either forage rape or kale. Silage is also being offered as a buffer feed.

Before the cows can be housed, I need to get most of the beef cattle sold by February, at 24 months old, to free up housing for cows coming in to calve.

The cows are currently running in four separate batches of 25 animals, with heifers in a separate group.

Cull cows

Outside of the 113 animals put to the bull, there was a group of 12 cull cows with calves at foot that ran separately from the bull.

As a group, these cows were over 10 years of age and I had noticed their performance in weaning weights falling.

Cows are grazing in four groups of 25 on forage rape and kale, before housing ahead of spring calving.

If they had run with the bull and scanned in-calf, the temptation would be to keep them. Once their calf was weaned, the 12 cows were culled on 26 September. They averaged 340kg deadweight.

The 11 animals which were bred but scanned empty, are on slats and being fed silage plus 4kg/day of barley. These cows are coming fit and will be sent for slaughter as soon as withdrawal periods are covered.

Beef

Out of 57 beef steers, 10 have now been slaughtered. Cattle are performing well and I will be drafting animals for slaughter regularly over the coming months.

I weighed the steers on a monthly basis and across all animals, liveweight gains averaged 1.5kg/day.

Steers are on 5kg/day of home grown barley along with the first cut silage. There is also 23 beef heifers being fed to slaughter on 5kg of barley and silage.

So far, it has mainly been Angus cross steers slaughtered. The continental steers will are coming fit now and will be slaughtered in early 2020, under 24 months old.

Angus steers averaged 366kg deadweight at 22 months of age. There is significant Angus breeding in my cows, hence the move to more continental breeding to maintain growth, conformation and hybrid vigour.

Cattle health up to date

Cows received a fluke dose after weaning and before they moved on to the out-wintering crops.

Cows are also getting a general purpose pre-calving mineral through lick buckets. However, unlike other years, they have been slow to use these buckets.

For peace of mind, I have decided to bolus the cows with a high-iodine product in the run up to calving.

The beef cattle all received an anthelmintic treatment with broad spectrum of parasite control.

They are now covered for liver fluke, stomach and lung worms, as well as biting and sucking lice.

A follow up treatment with a pour on for external parasites has also been applied. Unfortunately, cattle are starting to scratch again and they may need a further treatment.

Weanlings were vaccinated to cover pneumonia before weaning. They have had the same parasite treatments as the beef cattle since housing.

All housed stock have been clipped at the tail head, along the back and head. I find this helps keep cattle cool and helps with parasite control.

I reviewed some of the older buildings on farm through the summer months and decided to alter ventilation in the main beef house. Tin was removed on the gable ends of the shed and replaced with Yorkshire boarding.

I used a 6in board with a 3in gap. The boards are staggered so that draughts and rain, sleet and snow is deflected. To date, I can see a big improvement in the shed with less stale air.

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