Adjusting birthdates on Purebred cattle

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husker1

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I have always been apalled by the fact that so many breeders feel it is necessary to adjust birthdates on calves.  I know of breeders calving in December and even November, but they never sell any calves born earlier than January 1st!!!  They have some whopping weaning weights due to these adjustments also.

I've been told that this has been going on forever, but it is so discouraging for the people that do it by the book, and for those trying to compete in the showring.

Have any of you confronted a breeder face to face about this?  Do some of these guys actually believe that no one suspects them of manipulating dates? 

I've been tempted to compose a "Jerry Maguire"-type memo and send it as a letter to the editor of the national magazines, but haven't found the kahunas to complete that yet. 

Any thoughts? 



 

Okotoks

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aj said:
Look out....jit will be after you.
I guess some people on the planet think you are funny AJ but actually comments like the above have nothing to do with the thread and you must be extremely jealous of JIT's success because there is no other reason for your silly comments. ( oops I'm posting this without running it by the  speech writer you think I have!)
 

rackranch

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I'll never forget the first time we showed heifers in San Antonio... 1 year old division with a heifer baging up in our class... IMO it is up to the judges to state the obvious and place the class accordinly if its ever going to stop...
 

cowz

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Great comment!  Or the same concept holds true with bull "calves" that are building a crest on their neck!  Those are usually about 7+ months out of their actual class!  What was that really old commercial?  YOU CAN"T FOOL MOTHER NATURE!
 

kanshow

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It happens.. that's fact.    We don't do it but know plenty who do.   I was talking about it this weekend to someone on here.  

Sometimes you see a class at a show that it is so obvious..  not because of size but because of the maturity of the animal.   While I didn't agree with all the placements this weekend, I will commend the judge on leaving some heifers go lower in the class because they weren't as 'fresh' as some of the smaller ones.  
 

Okotoks

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Other than mouthing which isn't always accurate I don't know how you deal with this. I know we used to show against a breeder whose calves were always huge compared to everyone else's in July but just a little ahead by the November shows. These people hurt their own reputations with other breeders but unfortunately sell to unsuspecting buyers something that can’t reproduce what they are representing to the buyer. It puts a judge in a pretty difficult position to actually accuse an exhibitor of lying with nothing but a good hunch and gut feeling to back it up.
 

HAB

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I showed against a breeder that had summer born yearlings (July 3rd birth dates) that had frozen ears.  They didn't seem to think it was that big of a deal.  It gets cold here, but in July...  The judge commented that they appeared mature for their age, and placed them at the bottom.  The breeders actually whined about the placings.
 

justintime

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I have always thought that if I question the birthdates of a person's animals, what else should I be questioning?  I had two ET heifers born on January 1st this year. They were unfreezable embryos that I had put into recips and they were due on December 28th. I was certain they would arrive before the New Year but both held out until January 1. At the time I was very happy they made it to the New Year, but I am now thinking it may have been better if one or both had been born on other dates than January 1. I am certain there will be a few people who will believe I fudged their birth dates.
A few years ago, I had another ET calf born on December 19th. She grew into a pretty decent heifer, and I had several people tell me I was crazy not to be moving her birthdate to the New year. Some said things like " not moving her birthdate is going to cost you a bunch of money" or" you have a real shot at having Heifer Calf Champion if you date her birth as January'. I know lots of others would have done so, but I didn't. It ended up not costing me any money, as she is still in my herd, and the fact that her registration paper states her Birth date as December 19th has not affected her producing ability.

I think this is another issue that has been around since time began. Almost 30 years ago, a couple of friends of mine, showed up at a well known breeders farm unannounced on a Sunday morning between Christmas and New Year's. The family had gone to church so they decided to stop at the barn to see if they could see a particular bull they were interested in. What they found was over 20 calves in a pen behind the barn, some of which already had two inch belly hair. They grabbed a camera from their vehicle, and quickly snapped pictures of as many calves as they could and especially pictured the ones with any markings to identify them. The next fall we had great fun at the shows as we sorted through the pictures and then checked the birthdates that were reported. I remember one calf in particular, who was born sometime before mid December for sure, that was reported as an April 3rd on paper.

Like Dan said, there is really no real fool proof way of policing this. They used to mouth cattle at some shows here, but there were too many errors made. I remember having a good May bull that was disqualified at a show because they said he was older than he actually was. There was no use in protesting too much as it would not do any good. I happened to have witnesses who were here when he was born,but the decision was final. The next show we went to, he was mouthed again and there was no issue.

Unfortunately, there have always been people who believe that " if you are not cheating..... you are not competing."  From the stories I have heard, the problem has been around for a long time. I have a complete set of Canadian Shorthorn Herd Books dating back to 1876, and in the front of these books they always printed the minutes of the last year's Annual Meeting. I have read many of these, and I have often thought they could be confused with being the minutes from a recent annual meeting, if the names were changed. Even at the start of the century, there was a pile of discussion on how to handle breeders who reported wrong data when registering cattle. Many times a letter warning them was sent by the Association President, and if there was a second offence, they would be barred from registering for periods of 2-5 years. I cannot see many breed associations of any color cattle having the gonads to take this kind of stand today.
 

COWgirls

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We had a breeder tell us as we were looking for our first show heifer ~ this one "could be" a Jan ~ It was a nice "life lesson" for our children as we left the heifer behind and assured them we would not sell our soul to "win".  That was the first and last time we dealt with that breeder.  In the past three years of showing, our children have learned a lot about cattle and even more about life.  They have drawn a line in the sand and said they want to do what's right ~ win, lose, or draw.  I'm proud of 'em for that!
 

cowz

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COWgirls said:
We had a breeder tell us as we were looking for our first show heifer ~ this one "could be" a Jan ~ It was a nice "life lesson" for our children as we left the heifer behind and assured them we would not sell our soul to "win".  That was the first and last time we dealt with that breeder.  In the past three years of showing, our children have learned a lot about cattle and even more about life.  They have drawn a line in the sand and said they want to do what's right ~ win, lose, or draw.  I'm proud of 'em for that!

That one reminds me of the the breeder, who when I asked him who the heifer was out of.....replied......"Who do you want her to be out of?".  Oh, man!  It was over for me right then!  We said, thanks for letting us look at your calves and we were GONE!    YIKES!   
 

Show Heifer

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Husker - Just do a search, and you be quite amazed at the number of people on this board who have all but admited to cheating to win, because (of course) if "you ain't cheatin' you ain't trying hard enough" (not my quote).
You will also be amazed at what many people on here consider "cheating".... a few days, a week, a month, wrong sires, and use of drugs.... apparently the gray area is quite large in some circles.

I figure I am not smart enough to keep two sets of books, so I write them down as is. But, as some on here know, I am not much of a "gray area" person.

By the way, if you ever do get the kahunas, I would be interested in seeing the "good read"!! ;)
 

TJ

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I once saw a SP post that listed a later DOB for a weanling calf than the actual posting date of a previous SP post, made by the same poster, which showed a pic of baby calf marked with the same unique color pattern.  Makes you go hmmm...
 

shortyjock89

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TJ said:
I once saw a SP post that listed a later DOB for a weanling calf than the actual posting date of a previous SP post, made by the same poster, which showed a pic of baby calf marked with the same unique color pattern.  Makes you go hmmm...

Good to see you post TJ. Hope all is well. Give me a call sometime if you get a minute.
 

TJ

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Olson Family Shorthorns said:
TJ said:
I once saw a SP post that listed a later DOB for a weanling calf than the actual posting date of a previous SP post, made by the same poster, which showed a pic of baby calf marked with the same unique color pattern.  Makes you go hmmm...

Good to see you post TJ. Hope all is well. Give me a call sometime if you get a minute.

Things could be better & they could be worse.  That's life.  I'd been thinking about calling soon anyway.  Probably taking Doc up to Cindy's old place this Wednesday, so I may call while I'm on the road.       
 

JSchroeder

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I'm a broken record on this but there are actually court documents that prove they lied about the birthdate of Legacy Plus.

In court, where you go to jail if you lie, he was a March calf.  With the AMAA, where you show in a younger division after May 1st, he was a May 3rd.

There were some pretty big names in on that bull.
 

Freddy

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North central -- Nebraska on highway 183 - 30 mi
There is a long list of these abuses if you look around an the one guy had proof of  some of the breeders doing this at turn of the century ...BIRTH WEIGHT,BIRTH DATE, WEANING WEIGHT ,YEARLING WEIGHT ,SIRES AN DAMS , THEY EVEN ADVERTISE that some crossbred bulls are sire of Angus, Hereford an other breed champions, it looks like to me were training people to do this rather than any  Solutions to it , an like they say 'You must not
be tryin if your not cheatin '     I guess I just wonder how long this kind of Logic can exist .....  Something to laugh about though, had a hired man that was real worried about if the calf was born  before or after midnight to get  correct  birthdate , an he really thought we should spend more time in Febuary calving to make sure this was right...  I  have enough problems that time of the year with  out getting that crazy ...
 

Bulldaddy

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Had a kid show one of my heifers a couple of years ago.  Heifer was clobbered by an obviously much older and heavier heifer.  I asked the other kid's ag teacher if there was a mistake since his kid's heifer was obviously in the wrong class.  He told me no, she was just "early maturing." 
 

Torch

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I always laugh when I look at one of those classes where some calves learned to walk a month or two before they were "born."
 

Aussie

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It happens over here alot to. My hfr was jnr at one royal and in the next, two months later, she was a day to old to be a jnr.I got many comments about finding her a day to early but a few and many commercial guys actually admired my honesty and made it worth it. Seeing 20 month bulls angus bulls over 1000kg is not the norm here but it is for about 3 breeders showing.
 

chambero

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Breed associations are always so cash strapped, they can't afford to do anything to make people mad that would stop revenue streams from registrations.  Only thing I could think of would be to require date-stamped photos and registrations for show-eligible heifers to be submitted within 30-60 days of birth. 

Basically, its not worth getting that worked up over.  Cattle are so much smaller framed now anyway age-fudging doesn't make that much difference as it used to.  I rarely see good ones get beat over it.  At the top end of classes in tough shows, its usally too close to call anyway.

For those totally indignant about it, how many of you live in sports-oriented towns who have friends (maybe even yourselves) who hold kids back a year from starting kindergarden just because they aren't "quite ready" yet.  In Texas, there are hardly any "late spring or summer born" kids who actually start Kindergarten when they are 5.  It sure helps those future hopes for making the football team (or other sports) later on to let those kids get a little more age on them.  Same difference.  That stuff drives me way more nuts than anything to do with cattle.  It's kind of funny in Sunday school class when most of the kids my boys were in class with were all of a sudden a grade below them.  The girls are always "ready", the boys seldom are.

For the record - we kicked our "May baby" out the door and on the bus to school when he was actually 3 because he needed to go speech.  He's now an 11-year old 6th grader - probably the youngest kid in his class (and the tallest). 
 
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