How many people actually own a scale?

[aj]

For baby calves I use a sling and about a 8 ft bar. Sling the calf,hook the scale...plant the bottom end of the bar in the ground...lift the other end of bar and there you go....you have leverage. One time while bangs vaccinating my heifers I just used the vets scales to get weaning weights.I just read the weights off her chute. ;D

 

[red]

For baby calves I use a sling and about a 8 ft bar. Sling the calf,hook the scale...plant the bottom end of the bar in the ground...lift the other end of bar and there you go....you have leverage. One time while bangs vaccinating my heifers I just used the vets scales to get weaning weights.I just read the weights off her chute. ;D

we do the same thing AJ for calves. For the larger cattle I use the truck scales at the farm. It's accurate within 20 pounds. Not the best but gives me an idea. What's nice is that they now have an outside reader so I don't have to go in to see weights.

Red

 

[AAOK]

values are deflated, depending on how you look at it.

i own a scale, weigh birth, 205, year.  probably should weigh more as i made a feeding boo boo with my heifers.

what's the heaviest birth weight for a bull one would ever use?  is the average bw for the maine breed underreported and by how much? and what % does it go down on other breeds or low BW herds.

I have a small scale for weighing at birth.  Our school ag program has a rolling scale which travels throughout the district.  Sometimes I would have to hunt it down, but once found, I would just go get it.  I think all our schools around here own a scale.

Our first Maine-Anjou calves were born in 1990.  By 1993 I had good, accuurate rates.  The AMAA was only keeping EBVs at that time.  My average heifer weight was 88lbs. and bulls 95lbs.  The only calf I ever pulled was in 1994 with a heifer; real easy pull.  I have never been concerned about BW EPDs or calving ease bulls.  I always picked whatever I determined to be the best mating.  I did have a C-section (heifer) in 2004 because the calf was backwards and the vet said it would be much easier.  That calf was a heifer, 78lbs. 

Last August, when the herd was sold, my average heifer weight was 74lbs. and bulls 80lbs.  My weaning weights and yearling weights have both dropped approximatly 30lbs. and 70 lbs. respectivly in the last 10 years.  Cows will average around 58" at the hip and 1600lbs. open; JUST THE WAY I LIKE 'EM!

We had a Cachet' bull born from a Smithbilt daughter in, I think, 1992.  He weighed 95lbs. at birth, weaned off the cow with no creep at 812lbs. and weighed just over 1500lbs at 1 year.  I sold him locally to a friend of mine who owned bunch of Chiangus cows.  He sold the bull commercially in the Summer, at the age of 6, after having serviced cows in the Spring.  This bull weighed 2570lbs. on grass.  He had produced the Champion Carcass at our County twice, and one year sired 4 of the top 10 carcass calves.  Our county averaged 60 steers. 

I would like to see Maine-Anjou breeders make a slight turn back toward the roots of the breed.