More Red Poll Pictures
Our Red Poll Herd
Our Red Poll Herd out on Pasture http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
One of our original Red Poll Cows http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Our Newest Red Poll bull calf. http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
A good looking Red Poll Steer out on pasture http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Our Red Poll Cattle Herd lounging in the field on a nice day http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Red Poll Cows in the field http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Filed under Red Poll Cattle
New Red Poll Heifer
Over the past week, I have been studying up on new animals to purchase for the farm. We have decided (thanks in part to a monetary gift) to add in a new Red Poll Heifer. We are grateful to Simpson and Norma Calhoun for selling us our original three Red Poll heifers in the fall of 2011. These cows are all doing well. We have four live calves out of them to date. The other two that have not calved yet this year, but both are successfully bred and pregnant with heifer calves. This means that by this time next year, we will have 5 breeding age animals (one heifer calf from last year, the new heifer calf, and the three broodcows). We will be selling the two steers this Fall for beef. The newest Red Poll Calf is also a bull. He will be our source of beef for next year.
Back to the story of this newest Red Poll heifer calf. I am so glad to be a part of the Red Poll Cattle Association. This is a great group of people, with a very active facebook page. We also have a very nice website, (redpollusa.org) which has many valuable tools. The one I like the best is the listing of animals, their genetics and EPDs. I did not realize that this information was available when I purchase my first three girls, but it wouldn’t have really made much of a difference. I also use the mating predictor tool. This is what helped me to select the semen that I ordered last year.
This year, I had the opportunity to go see Mardan Acres. That farm is run by Dan and Mary Jo Schmeising, who have a vast knowledge of the breed. Dan’s family has been raising Red Poll Cattle for three generations. I am rather certain that Dan’s daughter owns a few Red Poll cattle of her own, making her a fourth generation breeder. Dan is very active on facebook and has his ideas about breeding and genetics. He has imported some semen from both New Zealand and Australia. Anyway, he messaged me that he had several animals available. The first that he offered is a cow that is just fresh with a bull calf at her side. (Mardan’s Z 0105) I like that she had a bull calf at her side, but that increased the price. I also was not overwhelmed her EPDS. Each specific breeder has certain things that they like and dislike when if comes to EPDs. I like to see a higher yearling weight and a better milk number. I am also rather certain that she just sold to a herd in Wisconsin just the other day.
The second Red Poll heifer is one that is just reaching breeding age. She is a full sister to the cow I mentioned above. Again, I like the EPDs some, but am not totally thrilled with them. This one is Mardan’s ZZ 1121. The advantage to her is that I would be able to breed her right away. She would have a calf around this time next year if I time her up with our own yearling heifer calf and the cow that was just fresh. This would get us back onto a Spring calving rotation with three of our females.
The heifer that we decided upon is Mardan’s ZZ 2134. She has nice EPD numbers and good bloodlines. Her sire is out of one of the bulls that Dan imported Semen from. She is also of the MARC Raymond line. Our cows are all heavy on Marc Raymond, so we like those genetics. It will be interesting to see how things turn out, as we will need to move away from MARC Raymond in the future. I like the EPD numbers on this calf better than the other two, with a +11 milk. I like the milk production for two reasons. First is that more milk will tend to make a larger weaned calf. The other reason is that we may eventually look to keep one as a milking cow for our own use.
I hope to post some pictures once she arrives. Ironically, Monday is my birthday and that is the day she is scheduled to be dropped off. The money gift was actually from my mother and was intended to add a heifer or cow into the herd. I will hopefully be able to create some rough calculation of how long it will take to profit back on her. I think her return will be shorter than on the other cows, since we already have the lost rent factored into our equation. Check out the story below for our look at cattle profits for our farm.
Filed under Red Poll Cattle
New Red Poll Calf
Farmer Jake and Farmer Mom help to warm the newest Red Poll calf. heritagebreedsfarm.com
We are excited to introduce our newest Red Poll calf. The calf was born at 9:09 this morning. Being a vet…….Did not help one bit this morning. I saw that the calf was not going to be born, but I had to call one of my partners to help get hom out. I thought the calf would be dead, but he was born alive. He was very weak throughout today, but we are working on him to help get him standing. He takes a bottle okay and got colostrum.
Our New Red Poll Calf. This Bull calf is huge!
We went out tonight and got him up. He stood for about a half of an hour and then got tired. The little Red Poll calf passed his meconium while we were helping him stand. That is a good step in the right direction. I am hoping that he begins to get more lively as he gets his legs under him. This is our only Red Poll calf that is due this spring, as our calving interval got all messed up. We are looking to breed the mother cow back at the same time as our heifer from last year. This would be done in or around the beginning of June to try to get a late March early April calf crop.
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MORE RED POLL CATTLE PICTURES
These red poll cattle pictures were taken on our farm recently
Red Poll cattle picture
http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Our small herd of Red Poll Cattle lay down in the upper pasture, gently chewing their cud.
Red Poll Cattle in the Spring pasture
http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
We are on calving watch, as one of our cows is due to give birth any day now.
Red Poll Cattle laying in the pasture http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
Red Poll Calf. http://heritagebreedsfarm.com
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Red Poll Cattle Pictures
Our two bull calves standing with one of our original cows.
This is a picture of two of our original cows. The baby on the ground is hours old. I believe that this was a picture of our second bull calf that was born. You can see that the mama cow still has afterbirth hanging down and that the cow in the background has a calf behind her (count the back legs).
One of our 2012 bull calves standing out in the field.
The calf in the foreground of this picture is one we call Adam. He is the first born calf to our farm.
At the upper right is a picture of our first heifer born on Heritage Breeds Farm. She is nursing on her mom. The other cow-calf pair in this picture is one of our bull calves.
Finally, we included a picture of the herd all bunched up. This is a picture of them in our lower field, which is full of weeds at the moment. We will begin to tackle the fields at some point, trying to make for the best forages available.
Filed under Cattle, Farming, Red Poll Cattle
Red Poll Sire: EP Pinpur Prince Edward (Registration Number 87662) is perhaps one of the greatest Red Poll Sires of all time. Why make that statement? I have been researching some of the Red Poll pedigrees and discovered that EP Pinpur Prince Edward is in the lineage of two of the best Red Poll Sires of all time: MARC Raymond 26026 (Registration number 7125) and Dunroamin Premium GR32 (Registration number 5990).
Dunroamin Premium is believed to be the heaviest yearling Red Poll sire of all time. His gain from birth to weaning was 3.2 pounds per day. His gain from weaning to yearling was 4.43 pounds per day (This statement was borrowed from the Red Poll Journal advertisement by SPEGAL’S Red Poll Cattle, who own the semen rights to him).
MARC Raymond 26026 is one of the best EPD Red Poll sires that is known.
So bear with me a bit as I go through the lineage:
EP Pinpur Prince Edward
Rolling View Oliver GR27 Pinpur Prestige GR31
Pinpur Heritage GR34 Pinpur Principal Prestige GR27
Pinpur Baron GR27 MARC Principal 06098
Pinpur Walkin’ GR32 MARC Principal 122672
Pinpur Attitude GR30h MARC Hercules 76107
P-P Hoosier Prelude GR31 MARC Hercules 36041
Dunroamin’ Premium MARC Raymond 56006
MARC Raymond 76002
MARC Raymond 06068
MARC Raymond 26026
English: Red Poll cow and calf. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I am intrigued by this connection, though it is not totally unlikely that two top bulls would date back to a similar lineage. Ref Poll Cattle were line bred at Purdue University by Marshall Mohler. Having talked to several Red Poll breeders, it appears that genetics are somewhat limited, though hopefully the breed is getting more varied over time. We hope to play a part in this genetic variation, though we are off to a slow start. Most of our line traces directly to MARC Raymond 26026, and we are breeding with his semen this year and likely next as well.
Once our farm has the resources to add cattle or purchase more semen, we hope to expand some genetics as well.
Filed under Cattle, Red Poll Cattle
Our three cows are now all bred Marc Raymond 26026. Cow number 816 is confirmed pregnant on several occasions. She is about at the point of being able to get the calf fetal sexed.
Red Poll bull Marc Raymond 26026 is one of the best EPD Red Poll Bulls available. We purchased 25 units of semen and have bred these last two cows three times each. One of the cows was in standing heat. The other cow was not showing heat today, but she palpated with a good follicle and no corpus luteum. I suspect that she will be in heat tomorrow, which means that I will need to breed her again tomorrow, but I went ahead and bred her just in case.
Hopefully this round will produce two pregnancies and we can be done with this breeding thing until next year. I have to say that this has been a bit of a saga. Even tonight, I went to breed the cows and I grabbed the wrong rod. I grabbed an infusion rod rather than a breeding rod, so I ended up wasting two units of semen. Luckily we purchased enough to last us quite a while.
English: Red Poll cow, Temple Newsam. Home Farm, Temple Newsam, is the largest Rare Breeds Survival Trust (RBST) Approved Centre. Significant breeding groups of livestock from the RBST Watchlist are kept at Home Farm. This is one of a herd of Red Poll cattle, and there are 8 other breeds of cattle kept here. See http://www.leeds.gov.uk/templenewsam/farm/farm_live.html (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Until Next Time
Filed under Cattle, Red Poll Cattle
A Red Poll calf on a farm in Suffolk, England. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This is the link to the ALBC website for Red Poll Cattle. You can find more information about Red Poll Cattle on various topics on our webpage. There are some additional links below.
American Livestock Breeds Conservancy: Red Poll Cattle.
This is the link to the American Red Poll Cattle Association
Filed under Red Poll Cattle
Grass Fed Beef Benefits
Grass fed beef seems to be a hot topic. There are many benefits to grass fed beef. While researching the yopic, I stumble across the article that is highlighted below. This is a very interesting article that I happened to stumble upon among my blog reading. It brings up interesting
carbon footprint (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
points that grass fed beef programs have a lower carbon footprint than other methods of farming. The other interesting thing is that organic practices lower that footprint even further.
We would like to try to take things a bit further by trying to eliminate some of the machinery in our gardening. Unfortunately, we are unable to totally eliminate the use of machinery all together.
We may look into horses for farming at some point in the future. That sounds like enjoyable work.
Thanks to the author for the article!
Research reveals that grass-fed beef is better for people and the environment.
While it seems that grass fed beef and organic practices seem to go hand in hand, organic practices are not a requirement for raising grass fed beef. Moving past the environmental impact, grass fed beef has been shown to be beneficial to the humans that consume it as well. Grass fed beef is higher in omega three fatty acids than traditional beef. Grass fed beef also boasts a leaner product, with some good CLA ratios. Grass fed beef is also much lower in saturated fats than conventional beef. The largest hurdles for grass fed beef are overcoming the thought that grass fed beef is not a tasty as conventional beef and the production scale, since grass fed beef requires more land than a feedlot operation.
Eye fillet of grass-fed beef. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
We encourage everybody to consider grass fed beef and to look into its benefits.
Please check out some of the relevant articles and search our site for more about the benefits of grass fed beef.
Until Next Time!
Filed under Free-range, grass fed beef, Grassfed, Organic, Red Poll Cattle, Self-Sufficiency, Uncategorized
Well another installment of the Red Poll cattle breeding project that seems to be ongoing. Tonight, we captured the cows in order to administer another lutalyse shot to get this last cow bred. In the process, she was palpated and had a viable corpus luteum, meaning that lutalyse should be able to help her come into heat. A quick check of the other two cows confirmed one pregnancy. One you may note? Well that is right, the third cow has lost her calf, which can happen on occasion. This emphasizes the importance of double checking and rechecking those cows. She was pregnant on ultrasound at day 31 and palpated pregnant (and ultrasounded again) on day 38. We are now on day 46 and she has no fetus and a good follicle. It is likely that she will be in heat within the next 36 hours. This is inconsistent with a normal 21 day cycle…..evidence that she likely aborted the calf. I actually believe that she reabsorbed the fetus, as the 38 day ultrasound was less than remarkable. She had a decent fluid pocket in her uterus, but no fetus was seen at that time. I made a mental note and rechecked her tonight.
Well, the silver lining is that I caught her now rather than next year when she does not have a calf. We still have time to breed her back, but the time table is pushed back and our calving season next year is going to be late. I am sure that the Red Poll Cattle Breeding project will be ongoing.
The lesson that I learned this year is to take good notes and keep good records. I also learned that I should likely just start the cows on a timed breeding program on day 50 to 60 after calving. Hopefully I will be able to move the calving season to earlier, rather than later in the year.
Until Next Time!
Filed under animals, Heritage Breed, Red Poll Cattle
