Reproduction

Cattle producers have known for a long time that wild cattle were probably less profitable than their calmer contemporaries, but there wasn’t a great deal of hard data to back up this suspicion.

Delivery of a live, healthy calf is a complex process. Thankfully, in a high percentage of cattle this process proceeds uneventfully and new generations of calves are born with little or no fanfare.

The task of raising useful seedstock comes with many hurdles. Outfits must forge a path in a competitive industry where creating the right product in the 21st century is just half the battle.

Dale Sauls was no stranger to “fixed-time” artificial insemination. The Florida native had used the reproductive management tool in his commercial dairy operation. So when he and his wife, Connie, moved with their daughters to Mountain Grove, Missouri three years ago, it was only natural for them to incorporate fixed-time AI into their beef herd.

When technology is mentioned for computers, medicine or media, it is roundly applauded by society. But when a breakthrough is made in livestock production, technology is unfairly labeled a factory-farming ploy that’s harmful to the consumer, said Gary Sides, a beef cattle nutritionist for Pfizer Animal Health.

Currently, beef bulls are worth a lot of money – at least based on the relatively high prices paid by bull buyers for virgin seedstock bulls this past fall. As a result, strategic management of bulls, particularly during the winter months, is becoming even more important to a producer’s profitability.