Don't have a cow man! - Have two...
I went to the livestock auction again on Tuesday. The goal was to get some feeder pigs, maybe a calf, and whatever looked like a good deal for the freezer.
There were only three pigs. A feeder that sold for $61 (too much for an auction piglet, that's a breeder price) and two GIANT sows - 652 and 700lbs! Too big for me to deal with. Sure, I could have loaded them into my truck with the ramp at the auction barn, but how would I get them out once I got home?
There were no smallish critters that were selling cheap, and lambs were bringing big money (Ramadan shopping?). What I ended up trucking home Tuesday night were two bottle calves.
This one is a Holstein. He weighed in at 86lb and sold for $2.75 per pound. He's a fine specimen of a Holstein. I had about an hour before the auction began to wander around the barn playing with the critters and checking them out. There were several calves that really stood out as being robust, lively and healthy. He was one of them. As always, there were a few professional buyers for livestock dealers there who apparantly also felt he was a good animal, and that's what drove the price up.
Next in line behind him was this little guy, who appears to be a Jersey cross. He's shaped like a Jersey, but is a dark chocolate color. Kind of runty, he only weighed 50 lbs and sold for a whopping $11. On the way to the auction, I had stopped and picked up a bag of milk replacer (basically baby formula for cows) and a couple of 2qt bottles. The pair of bottles cost $11.98, the calf cost $11. If we can get him to adulthood, it will be $11 well spent.
Many calves come up for sale every week. Dairy cows need to be bred annually to keep them lactating. Female offspring are often valuable to dairymen, but males are just sold off fast. It's a sad state of things that baby cows are treated as an unwanted by-product of milk production, but we will do what we can to give these two a good life.
Wendy named the runty one "Rudolph" after his reindeer namesake on the island of misfit toys since he seemed a little lost at first. He befriended the dog before he decided to hang out with the other calf. Caleigh named the Holstein "Rockidu" (she likes to make up foreign sounding names...whatever!) so we ended up with a "Rudy" and a "Rocky".
We feed them twice a day, they are drinking a total of a gallon of milk replacer per day. Next week I'll introduce some feed as they drink to get them used to eating grain. Rocky was picking at hay in the goat's manger this morning, I don't know if he was actually eating it of just mimicking the goats.
A Holstein bull can get to around 1700lb at maturity. The Jersey might get to 1000-1200lb.
There were only three pigs. A feeder that sold for $61 (too much for an auction piglet, that's a breeder price) and two GIANT sows - 652 and 700lbs! Too big for me to deal with. Sure, I could have loaded them into my truck with the ramp at the auction barn, but how would I get them out once I got home?
There were no smallish critters that were selling cheap, and lambs were bringing big money (Ramadan shopping?). What I ended up trucking home Tuesday night were two bottle calves.
This one is a Holstein. He weighed in at 86lb and sold for $2.75 per pound. He's a fine specimen of a Holstein. I had about an hour before the auction began to wander around the barn playing with the critters and checking them out. There were several calves that really stood out as being robust, lively and healthy. He was one of them. As always, there were a few professional buyers for livestock dealers there who apparantly also felt he was a good animal, and that's what drove the price up.
Next in line behind him was this little guy, who appears to be a Jersey cross. He's shaped like a Jersey, but is a dark chocolate color. Kind of runty, he only weighed 50 lbs and sold for a whopping $11. On the way to the auction, I had stopped and picked up a bag of milk replacer (basically baby formula for cows) and a couple of 2qt bottles. The pair of bottles cost $11.98, the calf cost $11. If we can get him to adulthood, it will be $11 well spent.
Many calves come up for sale every week. Dairy cows need to be bred annually to keep them lactating. Female offspring are often valuable to dairymen, but males are just sold off fast. It's a sad state of things that baby cows are treated as an unwanted by-product of milk production, but we will do what we can to give these two a good life.
Wendy named the runty one "Rudolph" after his reindeer namesake on the island of misfit toys since he seemed a little lost at first. He befriended the dog before he decided to hang out with the other calf. Caleigh named the Holstein "Rockidu" (she likes to make up foreign sounding names...whatever!) so we ended up with a "Rudy" and a "Rocky".
We feed them twice a day, they are drinking a total of a gallon of milk replacer per day. Next week I'll introduce some feed as they drink to get them used to eating grain. Rocky was picking at hay in the goat's manger this morning, I don't know if he was actually eating it of just mimicking the goats.
A Holstein bull can get to around 1700lb at maturity. The Jersey might get to 1000-1200lb.
posted by MVTCoPete | 4:40 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home