Gaucho calf processing

[ALLFARMER]

Doc just wondering about your calving system.
Do you ring, ear tag, selenium, a&d, iodine all
new calves in a calving pasture? Or wait untill
calves are older and run them through a handling
system? Also with 700 you must be breaking that
number up into 2 or 3 herds no?

Currently I am field processing new calves first
day they are born. Going to be trying out my
quad pulled shark cage calf catcher in a bit here
but I think I still been two guys one to hold calf
one to doctor. If I could figure out how to rig
something to hold the calf It would cut processing
down to one man. Maybe a sheet of plywood
with 4 holes for each leg???

[smcgrath76]

You could weld a pair of vice grips with
flat plates on the jaws. Just drop a loop
around the calf's back legs in the cage
and hang them up...

[ALLFARMER]

Pretty good idea SMC, maybe even some long
tarp straps made out of tire tube to tie the legs
up. Weld some chain links on the walls of the
shark cage to hook too. This route you get good
access to the naval & nuts.

[ALLFARMER]

Maybe rope and something to wrap around on
top of the cage would stop all kicking.

[gaucho]

The purebreds get tagged and weighed and that's it... the commercials nothing.

We vaccinate the 1st round at the end of June and booster sometime in the fall or winter depending on the year and the plans... Bulls that are not good enough get banded in the spring before grass.

Keep it simple stupid is the motto

[grassfarmer]

I'm not sure I understand your problem Allfarmer? -
if you have them caught in a cage on day one why
can't you handle them? either hold them against one
wall with your knee or set them on their butt to ring
them. Do your calves really need added selenium,
a&d and iodine on day one? mine don't.

[perfecho]

Perhaps a simple hinged gate on the inside with a chain on the end....swing gate around and squeeze calf, hook chain for hands free....have done similiar in my alley and seems to work fine.

[dluther]

What ever you do be carefull I was just on another website and guys were talking ,some people have lost their live at this time off the year.The tame old cows are the worse.JUST BE CAREFULL. I HAD MY LESSON

[smcgrath76]

I like our don't get off the horse method
and DNA your replacements that we use. If
you have to help the cow should likely go.

[ALLFARMER]

First heifer of 90 calved today, nice size heifer.
The vet here says we don't need to iodine but a
local producer with 400 head does. My neighbor
who doesn't was getting naval infections now he
does too. With green grass summer calving likely
not needed.

Grassfarmer, so of our newborn calves are
unbelievable lively. We had a newborn calf that
when we went to process it (few hours old) ran
through a barb wire fence 500 to 600' to the
creek, down and swam through the creek up the
other bank (25' down and then up again 6' wide
creek) he was then headed across an open field
about another 600' when I dove off the side of
the quad and tackled him. That guy was headed
for the Olympics! Black Angus vigor!

[Happytrails]

AF, that calf was spooked bad. Your fault not his. Try a slower approach. HT

[kato]

That happened in our pasture a couple of years ago, except the calf ran across the pasture, through a fence, down the dugout bank, swam across the dugout and ran up a hill, through another fence, and laid down at the edge of a hayfield to hide.

And the stupid part was that his mother had hidden him, and when we followed her to see where the calf was, he took one look at HER, and ran for his life! His own mother! He didn't even know we were there until we stalked him in the hay, caught him and brought him back to Mama. Then the light bulb came on in his head and he realized who she was.

Duhhh..... by fall he was a nice big strapping guy, so it all worked out in the end.

[grassfarmer]

Biggest thing with iodine is it prevents natures way of
drying off a navel. Sunshine, wind, outdoors heals
navels better than spraying with iodine which keeps
them soggy and raw.
We've all seen wild calves, I check and tag twice a day
and it's still sometimes a stretch to catch the odd
super fast one. If that kind of stupidity is an Angus
characteristic switch breeds.

[ALLFARMER]

Wifey says they don't do iodine in hospitals any
more on newborns like they used to.
I may have to agree with you on this one
grassfarmer. Man It was hard for me to say that!

Saw SMC in cattlemen magazine anyone else
catch that. Good lookin family, son's got a John
Deere shirt on all good. Cheers

[smcgrath76]

FWIW - we never iodine navels (not sure
we even have any in the cupboard
anymore). We have found the best
calving tool is an old/slow quiet horse,
but that is because our herd is handled
nearly entirely on horseback. In a quad
herd, a horse would raise a ruckus.
The cattlemen interview was fun, and
probably too flattering, although I am
proud of my kids. Billy bleeds green
and is under the full understanding that
he can buy whatever piece of new
equipment he wants as long as he has a
business plan to use it enough to make
the payments. (We pretty much all bleed
green here except for some of us the
paint is older and more faded)...