IS THIS POSSIBLE?????

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kfacres

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cowcrazy said:
But is it possible for a 4 month old bull calf to breed? You would think he is shooting blanks, if anything at all, at that age!

you don't think the riding, and sniffing, and following of a a cow in heat in accidental do you?  boys will be boys as i heard many times growing up...

 

GoWyo

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Two years ago my best heat detector in the pasture was a 3-month old bull calf.  That little dude was trying to mount and all you could see was the top of his head and ears.  All I had to do was find him and he was with whatever cow or cows were standing.
 

RyanChandler

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cowcrazy said:
But does a 3 month old bull have what it takes?

3 months would be highly unlikely but AGAIN its on a case by case basis.  Im sure your aware of the varying ages of puberty within humans.  The same applies.  5 or 6 months is not Unlikely- its more a case of you just don't realize that one of the calves bred the cow because hell, genetically the calves are very similar.
 

GoWyo

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The 3-month old calf was harmless, but he definitely started to get a staggy look early on.  At 6 months I would not have put it past him to get the job done if he could get there.
 

leanbeef

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When we first started using Simmental and keeping some bull calves back, we routinely had heifers that got bred to bull herd mates before weaning time. Before then, all our bull calves had been steered, and we kept calves on the cows as long as we could to get gain off grass and mama. Puberty IS a function of weight, and often heifers approaching 600 pounds will begin to cycle, regardless of age. And that's an average...some will certainly mature earlier and some later. I would have my doubts about a bull calf that young being able to breed a cow, but I'm sure stranger things have happened. We wean everything now when the oldest calves in the pasture get close to 7 months. We rarely have heifers get bred, but we've been known to split the herd and separate the cows with heifer calves from the cows with bulls just to keep that from happening. A shot of Lutalyse should abort any unwanted pregnancy if given at least 10 days after the heifer was bred and BEFORE 3 MONTHS after. After 3 or 4 months, 5 cc of Lutalyse isn't real likely to work.
 

TJ

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HAB said:
Very possible. We typically have many of our Galloway heifer calves cycling before weaning.  Have had a few calve at 14 months, if we didn't get bull pulled.
And we have had some Tarentaise calve at 14 months... until we started giving the shots.  We always gave 5CC of Lutalyse + 10 - 20 CC (depending upon weight) of dexamethasone just to be safe.  That combo will take care of anything over 3-4 months.  However, it is way better to do it before they get that far along if at all possible.  But, it's also better to play it safe rather than to have to baby sit a 14 month old heifer that is getting ready to calve any day. 
 
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