Prime steer in 1904, role of implants?

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librarian

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Joined
Jul 26, 2013
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1,629
Location
Knox County Nebraska
Thinking about the increase in average hanging weights pointed out by JIT.
A neighbor pointed out to me that some of this is accomplished with more aggressive implants.
Also by longer feeding, etc, and not by instantaneous increase in frame size of the national herd.
Being a simplistic thinker, I was asking, How are you supposed to instantly increase size?

But, I was surprised to read that in 1904, a prime Shorthorn steer, at 3 years old, weighed 1675 lbs, so he would have hung over 900 lbs at 55%?
In the picture, it is not what we would think of as fat-unlike pictures of fat cattle in England.
https://books.google.com/books?id=vCNGAAAAYAAJ&lpg=RA3-PA20&ots=mDHVo7R_Pf&dq=butterfat%20and%20marbling%20in%20beef&pg=RA32-PA2#v=onepage&q=butterfat%20and%20marbling%20in%20beef&f=false
If that animal had been implanted and fed out as we do today, I wonder what the hanging weight would be? Seems like the implant just buys time, not size? Maybe this is all obvious and I am just catching up on common knowledge.
I also see that what the grass fed producers are targeting is essentially baby beef. ?
Maybe a super dumb question, but do they implant show steers?
My neighbors also implant their heifers one time to recoup the pelvic dimension the lost by using calving ease bulls? Kind of scary.
 

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justintime

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May 26, 2007
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4,346
Location
Saskatchewan Canada
Anyone who implants heifers is totally nuts IMO. When we were feeding cattle we did implant both steers and heifers for a few years, but finally decided to stop doing it to both. One year, we had over 300 heifers on feed, most of which had been implanted, and the market took a huge drop. As this was a great set of heifers, and we would lose a fair chunk of money if we sold them then, we decided to breed them and try to sell them as bred heifers. One set of these heifers had been implanted two times, another set had one implant and a third group had not received any implants at all. The heifers that had 2 implants had a 40% open rate. The set with 1 implant had about a 15% open rate and the set that had not received an implant had a 1% open rate. I have seen similar results in some other herds as well.
I know of a well known breeder who regularly implants his heifer calves and then sells them. The problem breeders that he produces are much higher than most other herds. This guy raises some very good cattle, but I don't buy from him for this reason.
I think implants do have a place in the industry but like most everything else we have, they must be used properly.
 
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