90 ■ ANGUSJournal ■ December 2006

T here’s no doubt about it, calving seasonon any ranch is a harried, hectic process

that can mean long days and nights ofminimal sleep. While the weather is a bigfactor that no one can control — no matterwhat time of year you calve — there are afew management protocols that can helpmake calving go somewhat smoother.

Angus Journal polled several breedersacross the country asking the question,“What do you do to help simplify calving on

your operation?” Here we share theirresponses as a means to offer ideas to othercow-calf operations. However, rememberthat what may work for a producer in oneregion may not work everywhere.

Start with selectionCollectively, the producers we visited with

all emphasized that calving is made easier ifyou’ve put some genetic selection emphasison calving ease and birth weight.

Coulee City, Wash., Angus breeder BillMcLean, whose herd begins to calve in earlyMarch, sums it up this way: “We’re certainlyaiming for calving ease, but not just usinglow-birth-weight sires to do it. It’s agenerations-of-cattle process accomplishedby culling cows and bull selection.”

To that end, McLean, who manages about200 Angus cows in the semi-arid region ofWashington with his son Dean andgrandson Lee, reports that 25 years ago theybegan the practice of culling any cow thathad calving problems.

He says they continue to put emphasis onconvenience traits such as udder and teatsize, and a cow’s ability to lie down and havea calf quickly. McLean says, “America’sranchers are too busy to babysit cows.”

As a longtime student of well-knownanimal scientist Jan Bonsma, McLean hasalso focused on the hip structure of the herdbulls he purchases. He explains, “I look forgood width through the hips, and the pinsplaced a little lower than the hip bones. Webelieve this helps heifers calve withoutproblems.”

McLean reports that he breeds heifers tolow-birth-weight bulls, but those sires arenot used on the mature cow herd.

As a result of these strategies, McLeansays, today their calving difficulty is mainlyconfined to malpresentation of the calf.

Likewise, Mitch Rohr, of the Lazy HRanch at Larkspur, Colo., believes a key tocalving success begins with strict culling. TheLazy H primarily manages Angus donorfemales and calves about 25 mature cowsand 15-20 first-calf heifers in January andFebruary and another similar-sized group inSeptember.

Rohr says they may have 40 replacementfemales to start with, but by breeding time, acouple will already have been culled.Whatever heifer is not bred by artificialinsemination (AI) after the first cycle is alsoculled. “Sometimes you lose some goodgenetics, but we believe our culling criteriaearly on helps with maternal and fertilitytraits down the road,” Rohr says.

Sort into groupsAnother commonality among many of

these breeders is moving the cows andheifers closer to the home ranch and facilitiesprior to calving, primarily due to weatherconcerns, and sorting the herd into smallergroups to minimize disease outbreaks.

At Woodhill Farms Inc., Viroqua, Wis.,Brian McCulloh says they calve about 250head beginning in mid-February. He saysthey have very little calving difficulty, buttheir biggest challenge is the weather. Hereports that their area gets an annualprecipitation of 36 inches (in.), so moisture@Above: Calving is made easier with genetic selection. Paying attention to calving ease and birth

weight helps ensure that calves are born without assistance.

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Calving SeasonSimplified

From Washington to West Virginia, we visit with Angus breeders to get their tips

on what makes for a less stressful calving season.

by Kindra Gordon

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can be a challenge — especially when calvingin March and April. “In this part of thecountry, the more we concentrate cattle,especially young calves at calving, the moreproblems we have with scours,” McCullohsays.

His solution is to split the herd into fourgroups of about 60 head each, and, he says,“If I had one morelocation, I’d even splitthem into five groups.”The groups are sortedbased on due dates.Each calving area isabout 10-12 acres, andforage is stockpiledthere beginning inmid-July until calvingstarts in February.

McCulloh has found that the small groupshelp minimize disease problems.

He admits that with his system ofseparating the herd into four groups he hasto have four sets of chutes and pens, and itcreates some extra work. But with theirlimited pasture space, it works. If the weatheris cold and wet, he can get newborn calvesinto some protected areas. “If it is 10 belowand dry, the calves do fine, but if it’s 35degrees and rainy, the calves have a toughertime,” McCulloh says.

McCulloh concedes that if he had openrangeland like producers in Nebraska andthe Dakotas, where they can move cow-calfpairs to a new location after calving, hewouldn’t have to manage his herd the way hedoes, but he doesn’t have the luxury of thatspace.

“I recognize that the easiest way to avoidweather problems would be to calve in May.But that doesn’t fit with the age of bulls wewant to produce for our customers,” he adds.

John and Terri McCoy of BrookwoodFarms at Franklin, W.Va., keep their first-calfheifers separate from the rest of the herd sothey can be kept closer to the barn andcalving facilities if the weather is bad or oneneeds assistance. The McCoys have a herd ofabout 100 purebred Angus cows and calve inNovember and December.

In Washington, McLean separates his first-calf heifers from the mature cow herd,primarily to give the younger females anextra boost in nutrition and to minimize thesocio-interaction that can occur when oldercows are with younger females.

At Springfield Angus, Louisburg, N.C.,farm manager Matthew Cox says that assoon as calves are born, they are moved withtheir mama to a different pasture. “We’vefound that fewer calves in the calving areaseems to make it less confusing for heifers,and it makes it easier to check the herd. If wesee a calf, we know it is a new one,” he says.

Cox believes moving pairs out shortly aftercalving also helps keep the calving area moresanitary and disease-free.

Tapping technologySeveral of these breeders are also firm

believers in using the available technology tomake their calving season more manageable.

West Virginia’s Terri McCoycounts synchronization as aninvaluable tool that makes theircalving season easier. She reportsthat they synchronize and AI theircows so they can “get as many tocalve in as short of a time periodas possible.”

At Woodhill Farms, McCullohuses synchronization to get 70%of his herd’s calves born in the

first 45 days. McCulloh even goes so far asstaggering the synchronization of his herdover a four-week period to match the fourgroups he splits the herd into at calving. So inMay, they’ll synchronize and AI heifers thefirst week. The second week they’llsynchronize 2-year-olds, etc.

Ultrasound is also a popular tool topinpoint calving dates.

Chris Earl of Sunny Valley Farm LLC,Yorkville, Ill., says they ultrasound everythingin order to have a good knowledge of wheneach animal will calve and what she’s having.He says this also allows them to sort the herdinto some smaller groups. Sunny Valley Farmcalves an 1,100-head spring herd from lateJanuary through March, and a 180-head fall

herd that calves from late August throughDec. 1.

Other tipsFollowing are some other calving

strategies that these producers shared.Nutrition. McLean emphasizes that

proper nutrition and exercise among thecows prior to calving has a big influence onthe health of the calves.

Rohr feeds alfalfa hay to his cows andheifers before and after calving for thevitamin A it provides to help boostreproduction. He also likes his calvingpastures to have some slope so cows —especially his donor females — get someexercise and tone.

Earl says he has found it is important tointroduce silage to the herd and get themaccustomed to it before calving so it doesn’tchange the concentration of the cow’s milk.

Disease management. McCulloh saysonce the weather is nice they don’t let calvesuse calf shelters because he’s learned thoseareas harbor bacteria. He has also avoidedbuilding a large, central calving barn, saying,“That’s capital-intensive in my mind, and it’slike a giant day-care center harboringpathogens.”

Earl says they vaccinate against scours andtry to keep calves stress-free.

Editor’s Note: If you have a calving philosophy ormanagement idea that you’d like to share for afuture story in the Angus Journal, contact KindraGordon at office@gordonresources.com.

December 2006 ■ ANGUSJournal ■ 91

Favorable on fallGordon and Christine Stucky of Circle S Angus Ranch at Kingman, Kan., say one of

the most productive changes they’ve made has been the move to calve a largesegment of their cow herd and all of their first-calf heifers in the fall duringSeptember and October.

Gordon says, “It required several years of analyzing our available forages and thetiming of grazing, but it has resulted in a tremendous labor savings during thecalving season.”

He adds, “We traditionally calved most cows and heifers from January throughMarch and fought the weather on many occasions. This resulted in more labor tomanage the heifers, with confinement needed during most of the calving season andespecially during severe weather,” he adds.

With their annual production sale also in March, Gordon says their labor wasalready stretched in January and February with sale preparations.

For their fall calving program, the Stuckys use heat synchronization with their AIand embryo transfer (ET) programs at breeding to get cows to calve in a relativelyshort period of time. Ultrasound pregnancy testing is also done, which allows them togroup 40-50 females into separate calving pastures of about 80 acres of native grass.

Using pasture rotations during the summer, Gordon explains that they try to usegrass that has not been grazed for the previous 30-60 days.

“This size pasture will allow the female to select her own special calving area andget away from the rest of the herd, but it is small enough that we can use a four-wheeler to check the pasture for new calves fairly quickly,” Gordon says.

He reports that they normally only check pastures once a day, saying, “Ourexperience has been that even first-calf heifers will select their calving area and calveeasily if proper bull selection is used, and if humans stay out of the way.”

“America’sranchers aretoo busy to

babysit cows.”— Bill McLean

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