breeding thoughts

I have a shiver out of a maine/shorthorn cross and im thinking about breeding her to steel force in the spring she is not very feminine looking she is fairly stout and deep bodied this will only be her second calf.  The griswold sale catalogs are full of great looking heifers by steel force out of chill factor influenced cows.      Does anyone think that birth weight would be an issue.  To me money is not an issue, i only have four cows, and im breeding with the goal of only keeping six cows and i want to keep my best heifers .  I also have a grizzly out of a heatwave maine cross,  she is very feminine looking i was thinking of breeding her to lut for her second calf.  What are peoples thoughts on these crosses.  what bulls would other people use without price in mind im only concerned with quality and birth weight.

For femininity on your first cow, I can't help but think of Northern Improvement. I love the females that he makes and has always produced calves for us that are marketable. IF you want simmi there are tons of simmi folks on here. We liked our 3C Macho heifers on our clubby built females. You also might consider Irish Whiskey.
On the Heatwave cow, we used Jake's Proud Jazz son on both and had exceptional calves with no calving issues.

JMO- Goodluck!

I like the idea of Steel Force, maybe look at something like Strictly Buisness, great cows, will pretty one up in my opinion. One the Heat Wave I look elsewhere than Lut because frame and size can be an issue they will grow and grow before they ever really mature or at least that is my experience with him. I would look at something like Life line if she has enough middle and kind of softer made.

You said jakes proud jazz son on the heatwave i have some starburst semen in my tank and some optimus prime too ive got calves coming by them out of my limousin cows, im not too sure how starbursts bw would be for a second calf though.  Now what about frisky whisky on my shiver cow?  And what about hard whisky on either of the two cows mentioned.

Starburst would be good for a second calver and i like that idea! I am not so sure on either frisky whiskey or hard whiskey.

Starburst I think would be okay with your heatwave female. I have seen some Starburst calves in Michigan I really liked. Thick chunky easy fleshing look.
Optimus Prime- they seem to get BIG. We have a steer out of Optimus Prime son and he is giant. He will be in the 1400-1500 range. Big in general is what I have seen here. But local folks have used him on more common cows. Maybe with more moderate smaller frame?
I have not used any of the whiskey sons. But you mentioned $$ no being an issue that's why I mentioned Irish Whiskey. I like his females but you have to work around PHA.

What does irish whisky semen go for top sires told me 650 per straw does that seem average or high.  Now griswolds have a full brother to irish whiskey i think his name is the black russian.  Has anyone used him.  I was told by top sires that irish whisky a good bull but not worth the money does anyone agree with that or not

Last auction price I remember was around 500. My best cow is a Irish Whiskey. I would like a whole herd of them. I did not see a bad whiskey daughter when I was at Griswold's sale. But maybe I am just sold on him to much.

hedgesjp1985 said:

What does irish whisky semen go for top sires told me 650 per straw does that seem average or high.  Now griswolds have a full brother to irish whiskey i think his name is the black russian.  Has anyone used him.  I was told by top sires that irish whisky a good bull but not worth the money does anyone agree with that or not

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Black Russian works a lot like Irish whiskey. I own half of him. And his daughters click with pretty much everything just like whiskey daughters do.