Kansas Farm Bureau®

  New Calving Report for BeefLink  Fawna Henke

March '09

The Beef Verification Solution would like to announce the arrival of a new management report.  Now available to producers is the “Calving Report”, which is a great tool you can use to track your calving season in 21 day increments.  This report creates a chart of the calving season for a particular herd and calving season, illustrating the portion of the calf crop that the calves were born in.  This is a report that should be available to any producer that is “age and source verifying” through the PVP (if they are providing individual birthdates) and provides a good argument for not only using the BVS Program for sales premiums but to more importantly use our program for data management and for making better decisions.  If interested, please contact your local Verification Center or the Beef Verification Solution.

WHY IS THIS REPORT IMPORTANT? Because the first step in reproductive management is controlling the breeding and calving seasons, and a key step is to monitor and chart what you are currently doing and then continue to monitor as you make breeding and calving management changes and improvements.  Whichever calving season (winter, spring, or fall) is chosen, the following reasons (source: KSU) illustrate why a controlled, seasonal calving schedule is desirable:

1. Calf crops that are uniform in age and size can be marketed to better advantage and thereby exceed returns over calves that lack uniformity in either age or weight. Calves born in the first 21 days of the calving season can weigh 30 pounds more at weaning than those born during the second 21 day period. Calves born 42 days into the calving season have been found to weigh as much as 70 pounds less than those born in the first 21 days and 42 pounds less than calves born in the second 21 days. Data from Cattle Fax indicates a $7 per cwt increase in the value of 7 like calves marketed together compared to marketing a similar calf as a single.

2. The culling of cows and selection of replacements is based on production records; however, accurate comparisons in the production of cows within a herd cannot be made unless a certain degree of uniformity exists among their calves. Decisions to keep or cull cows should reflect relative performance of calves within the herd. Acceptable performance implies not only weaning weight but also that a cow produce a calf every 12 months.

3. Shortened calving seasons provide a better opportunity to offer improved management and observation of the cow herd, which should result in fewer death losses at calving (a source of reproductive failure among any herd of cows). This is vital because percent calf crop weaned is one of the major profit determining factors in a cow calf operation.

4. Shortened calving periods facilitate improvements in herd health and management. Uniformity in timing of vaccinations and routine management practices result in decreased labor requirements and enhanced efficiency. Pregnancy testing and culling of open cows, which can reduce feed expense and improve herd efficiency, cannot be accomplished with year round calving.

5. Brood cow nutrition can be improved by grouping cows according to stage of gestation and feeding each group accordingly. When cows are strung out in their expected calving dates, it is difficult to provide cows adequate nutrition in a cost effective manner.

 Hence, monitoring and shortening the calving season results in: $ heavier, more uniform calves at weaning $ better use of available labor $ better opportunity to select for fertility in the cow herd $ greater income potential.

Above is an example of a chart generated using this new management report using some sample ranch data.  The chart below represents NCBA-IRM-SPA industry benchmark data.

Below is an example of how this information, used correctly to adjust your calving season, could impact your herd financially.  As you can see, the sample ranch could increase their value per head by $9.54 by compressing the calving season and have 14% more of their herd calve in the first 21 days. 

This is a great tool to make some good management decisions that could potentially increase your bottom-line.  The key is that you can’t manage data you don’t collect.  The Beef Verification Solution is the solution to your data management, collection and communication needs.