the
BEEFMASTER Pay Weight
a publication dedicated to serving commercial cattlemen and produced by Beefmaster Breeders United FALL 2015
Vol. 1, No. 1
www.beefmasters.org
Artificial insemination increases profits for commercial cattlemen By Robert Wells, The Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation Calf prices have steadily increased for several years. Since spring 2014, replacement female prices have remained at record levels as well. It is only reasonable that bull prices would follow the trend. This has led many producers to explore options to owning enough bulls to cover their cows in a defined breeding season. Estrus synchronization and timed artificial insemination (AI) are an economically viable alternative to owning a bull if the producer has multiple bulls. There are many benefits to synchronization and AI, including a tighter calving season, increased weaning weights from older calves and better genetics. The tighter calving season is a result of estrus synchronization and timed AI, followed by natural breeding
for the remainder of a 90day season. Some scenarios are explored in the tables. Each of these assumes a 50cow herd with a 94 percent conception rate; calving In March and weaning in October. Compared to natural service for 90 days (Table 1), the synchronization/timed AI program (Table 2) can significantly improve subsequent calving distribution. It is not uncommon to see a 65 percent or higher conception rate in the first 30 days of the calving season when using timed AI followed by natural
bull exposure. More calves born early in the calving season will be older and weigh more at weaning. The value of the pounds of beef produced in each breeding system was estimated using the forecasting tool at www. beefbasis.com for
mid-October. Additionally, most producers will be able to buy better growth genetics from an AI bull stud than they could afford to purchase with the live animal for natural service. Therefore, the AI-conceived calves are likely to have better average daily gain (ADG) values than those conceived through natural bull service. During fall 2014, bulls with high growth genetics (weaning and yearling EPDs in the top 20 per cent) have been selling in the Continued on page 27
Focus on Body Condition for Most Efficient Females and Bulls Requested in-home September 14-18, 2015
By Dr. Whitney Whitworth, Lyssy & Eckel Feeds Ensuring a successful breeding season begins long before the bulls are turned out. Planning and some key management steps can make a difference in the number of calves born and also your bottom line. Areas where I see many producers can make improvements include proper conditioning of both bulls and cows, implementation of a vaccination program and fertility testing of bulls. In my experience, cattle-
men and women view proper condition differently. If we were to poll a group of cattlemen, we would get a wide range of responses as to what an animal in ‘good’ body condition looked like. Fertility can be greatly impacted if a female is not in proper condition, whether that be too fat (body condition 7 or higher) or too thin (body condition 4 or lower). To take this a step further, it is not uncommon for cattle in extremely thin or fat body
condition scores (BCS) to not be cyclic and fail to have standing heats, therefore never getting bred. Females are the most efficient in just about every production measurement: from breeding to calving to processing forage, when they are in a BCS ranging from 5 to 7 on a scale of 1-9. Even among people who condition score cattle every day there are subjective opinions as to what a cow looks Continued on page 26