Go Charolais or No Charolais

[charleyman39]

Only time we ever had calving problems with a blue bull was if the cow had a touch of blue in her. ''Twas a recipe for disaster.

A neighbour of mine keeps a herd of 3/4 bred simmentals to which he put a blue bull on last year. I've never seen a nicer bunch of calves from them and he tells me he never had a rope near one of them.

 

[Northeastfarmer]

A neighbour of mine keeps a herd of 3/4 bred simmentals to which he put a blue bull on last year. I've never seen a nicer bunch of calves from them and he tells me he never had a rope near one of them.

Be plenty of room in them simmys

 

[Bossfarmer]

what are peoples thoughts on running simmy bulls to keep replacements and put a lim to the heifers?

 

[Bossfarmer]

what are peoples thoughts on running simmy bulls to keep replacements and put a lim to the heifers?

a big sim makes good money through the store ring too

 

[Northeastfarmer]

what are peoples thoughts on running simmy bulls to keep replacements and put a lim to the heifers?

a big sim makes good money through the store ring too

Talking to yourself now...

 

[charleyman39]

a big sim makes good money through the store ring too

I was doing just that for a number of years. I was rotating between a sim and lim bull every 2 years. It's great in theory but sometimes I question weather it's better to bring through terminal calves and source either good quality springers or calved heifers from outside of the herd. The wait for heifers to come through bulling and then calve is a long one. They need to be kept seperate and if a neighbour's bull happens to jump in to them it's a nightmare. I have produced some great cows through that method though but it's a lot of waiting and work.

 

[hendrebc]

Only time we ever had calving problems with a blue bull was if the cow had a touch of blue in her. ''Twas a recipe for disaster.

The man i helped had a herd of mostly charollais and ch cross cows that he was grading up to blues and putting blue on them agsin. The older charollais cross cows were fine but the younger blue cross ones were bloody awful. Even worse when they went 3/4! He has since given up farming.....

 

[Bossfarmer]

I was doing just that for a number of years. I was rotating between a sim and lim bull every 2 years. It's great in theory but sometimes I question weather it's better to bring through terminal calves and source either good quality springers or calved heifers from outside of the herd. The wait for heifers to come through bulling and then calve is a long one. They need to be kept seperate and if a neighbour's bull happens to jump in to them it's a nightmare. I have produced some great cows through that method though but it's a lot of waiting and work.

the way i see it say you have 200 cows and put simm to them all bar say 25 heifers you keep back then it gives you 50% of say 160 calves to pick from just keep choosing the best growers/looking/temperament/ones that were easier calved etc, if you buy them in your guessing plus paying a premium?

 

[juke]

I was doing just that for a number of years. I was rotating between a sim and lim bull every 2 years. It's great in theory but sometimes I question weather it's better to bring through terminal calves and source either good quality springers or calved heifers from outside of the herd. The wait for heifers to come through bulling and then calve is a long one. They need to be kept seperate and if a neighbour's bull happens to jump in to them it's a nightmare. I have produced some great cows through that method though but it's a lot of waiting and work.

if you have sim n lim cows a charolais is the perfect bull to use, only time a charolais is no good to use is when you use one of them blondes they just don't cross well at all in my experience, plenty of easy calving charolais bulls about now if you know where to look

 

[GTB]

a big sim makes good money through the store ring too

Not in Wales. Not running Sims down but they don't sell that well here. Usually £100 less than a similar char x

 

[juke]

Not in Wales. Not running Sims down but they don't sell that well here. Usually £100 less than a similar char x

Not in England either , sims do best in Scotland for some reason.. northern England is dominated by charolais n limousins

 

[Renaultman]

One thing I don't like is shoulders the same width as the arse end, I've been very lucky with limmy bulls so far (touch wood) two coughs a fart and they're out

We're on our second charolais from Nesbits Staindrop. Both have been faultless calvers with good thriving calves. The bonus being they aren't mental raging psychopaths like some of the Limmys we have had through. Saying that our home bred Limmys weren't too bad, just the bought in ones.

 

[juke]

We're on our second charolais from Nesbits Staindrop. Both have been faultless calvers with good thriving calves. The bonus being they aren't mental raging psychopaths like some of the Limmys we have had through. Saying that our home bred Limmys weren't too bad, just the bought in ones.

Is that from one of spikes French polled bulls ?

 

[MJT]

Saw some polled charolais bulls from herd in Shrewsbury not so long ago, nice growthy good shaped bulls but without the massive front end and coarse bones of a lot of charolais, also a bonus when don't have to dehorn calves ! Sensibly priced too.

 

[Northeastfarmer]

We're on our second charolais from Nesbits Staindrop. Both have been faultless calvers with good thriving calves. The bonus being they aren't mental raging psychopaths like some of the Limmys we have had through. Saying that our home bred Limmys weren't too bad, just the bought in ones.

I've never been a fan of the charalois, cows lack milk, eat too much and I hate white cattle....it's all down to personal preference though

 

[charleyman39]

I've never been a fan of the charalois, cows lack milk, eat too much and I hate white cattle....it's all down to personal preference though

If u get the right ch cross cow, with the cross bringing the milk they make an excellent cow. They do eat a lot though, but you can say the same for a big lim or sim cow aswell. If you're looking for high feed conversion I'd say a native cross cow is the way to go

 

[CharcoalWally]

what are peoples thoughts on running simmy bulls to keep replacements and put a lim to the heifers?

Used to do that back in the 90's, but just bull everything to the Simmental now and have done for years.

Used to lose an odd calf to the Lim at calving. Now, I have plenty of good herd bloodlines to choose my cows from and a good quality, high health heifer to sell to customers as a breeder.

 

[CharcoalWally]

I was doing just that for a number of years. I was rotating between a sim and lim bull every 2 years. It's great in theory but sometimes I question weather it's better to bring through terminal calves and source either good quality springers or calved heifers from outside of the herd. The wait for heifers to come through bulling and then calve is a long one. They need to be kept seperate and if a neighbour's bull happens to jump in to them it's a nightmare. I have produced some great cows through that method though but it's a lot of waiting and work.

TBH, if you calve at 2 - 2.5 years, then the time flies past

If you breed them yourself you get control of what you're using, can choose from your best cows and take as much control as you can over herd health.

Yes, they need to be kept separate, but the neighbours bull can also jump in with your terminal heifers too

Like you say it can give you great cows. For me it's all worth it.

 

[charleyman39]

TBH, if you calve at 2 - 2.5 years, then the time flies past

If you breed them yourself you get control of what you're using, can choose from your best cows and take as much control as you can over herd health.

Yes, they need to be kept separate, but the neighbours bull can also jump in with your terminal heifers too

Like you say it can give you great cows. For me it's all worth it.

I completely agree with you, only thing I'd add is that really even if you're calving at 24 months, it's basically 4 years before you get a return on the initial cow you bulled to produce the heifer you kept. It's a long time without anything to sell and a lot of feed being gobbled up.
If, and I know it's a big if, you can find a reputable source of quality replacements I think it works out more profitable.

 

[harperfarmer]

Select your bull carefully and I would say as a commercial animal the charolais is hard to beat. Weight for age can't be bettered across the average. I used my charolais bull across all blue x dairy cows and calving wasn't an issue. One ceaserian in 3 years (covering 25 cows/year) purely down to the cow being over fat (my fault). I wasn't sure if I could afford to replace him with another charolais this time but I've decided I'm going to try damn hard.