Making a case for late season calving

I was recently on a farm speaking with a rancher and we were talking about the upcoming calving season. It was early March and we were standing in a sacrifice paddock near the barn in about 2 feet of deep mud. He mentioned that he was expecting the calves to begin dropping any day now and sure enough a couple of the cows were already bagged up and getting that restless look in their eyes. I then asked him a question that he was not expecting. I asked him why he calves at this time of year. He looked at me and said because that’s the way his father did it. Now I respect the ranchers that came before me with a reverence reserved for religious epiphanies or near death experiences, but at this time, in this weather, I couldn’t’ help but think that this gentlemen would be better off moving his calving date to later in the season.

The most common reason for calving early is to put more weight on the animal prior to selling it off in the fall. More time on the ground should translate to more weight on the frame and a healthy calf should be gaining between 1 and 2 pounds a day. But this additional weight does come with a price. The fact that you are calving in the middle of winter means that all the feed provided to the lactating cows and growing calves will have to come from your stored reserves. By calving later, when the flush of grass is in full swing, you can save both money and resources. Making and feeding hay or silage costs you money in machinery upkeep, fuel costs, storage costs, and labor. In other words, less hay to feed means more money in your pocket. The tradeoff in this situation is that you may have a smaller calf at finish time, but on the other hand, you have invested less time and resources into that animal. It may be possible to hold that calf over, ween it late, and have a heavy weight animal that cost less to produce overall and can command a premium price later in the year. This is especially true after most of the premium animals have already sold. Your larger animal will be very appealing to those who are looking for a high end Christmas steak.

Another reason that producers tend to calve later is that they may be busy with other aspects of farm production such as planting or harvesting hay. This can certainly be a problem but timing your hay production to begin right after your calving ends can alleviate this problem.

There are other benefits to calving later in the season as well. When you are feeding a cow in her third trimester of pregnancy, in the middle of the cold winter, you not only have to make up for the nutrient drains from the calf growing inside of her but the extra energy needed to maintain body condition in extreme winter weather. By moving the season later you can count on the hay that you are feeding to go further because the fetal calf requires much less nutrients in the earlier development stages, leaving more nutrition to keep the cow healthy during the most trying time of the year.

There have been some studies conducted by the University of Wyoming on late season calving (see link below). They found that not only are supplemental feed costs and overall labor costs reduced, but calves born later in the season have lower incidence of disease, scours, and rates of infection. They also found that there is less dystocia with late season calving. Not having to pull calves or preform cesareans can save a producer a lot of time and vet bills.

There are multiple reasons why late calving may provide these benefits. The fresh flush of grass does not only lower overall feed costs, it provides the most nutritious and beneficial feed stuffs possible to the growing calf and recovering cow. The lowered body condition score of our brood cows is quick to rebound on the nourishing and abundant green grass as opposed to stored feed stuffs.

Intuitively this makes sense. If we look to the other ruminants utilizing our pastures we would find deer calving later in the season when there is enough forage to support their increased nutrient needs. Granted there is always the possibility that the weather will turn nasty late in the season, but by calving later, your animals will be better prepared to ride out the storm.

As producers we need to analyze every aspect of our production model to make our particular enterprise efficient and profitable. When you sit down and look at your feed costs, labor demand, health and birthing issues, and grow back of the herd, it seems like late season calving may be something to consider in the future.

http://www.uwagec.org/farmmgt/PUBS/B1076.pdf