Weight Gains Of Calves

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30811, 24 July 1965, Page 8

Weight Gains Of Calves

A Poll Hereford breeder, Mr W. M. Gilbert, of Coldstream, Springston, believes that the weight gains recorded by bull calves born on his property last year compare favourably with the performance of the calf bom on the property of Dr. Rowland Rees, of Pahiatua, which was the subject of an article on these pages last week. Dr. Rees’s calf gained 5281 b in six months at an average of 2.561 b per day, and this was reported to be well in excess of the production figures recently given for Charolais cattle. Six calves were born on Coldstream in July, August and September last year. AU were out of North Island cows and four were by the herd sire Waihuka Argo 2nd and two had been mated with different bulls in the North Island before reaching the property. The calves were

reared during a period when there was a severe drought and for a part of the time the cows and their calves were on no more than sheep feed and the only additional feed they had was some threshed ryegrass straw. When the calves were weighed on May 23, under the arrangements of the Meat and Wool Boards* sheep and beef cattle survey, one of the calves, then slightly over nine months of age and weighing 8801 b (it was born on August 14), showed a daily weight gain from birth of 2.901 b. Another of the calves, which weighed 7431 b at between eight and nine months after birth, recorded a daily weight : gain of 2.591 b, and the other four showed daily gains rang- ; ing from 2.121 b to 2.39 lb—the i lightest calf’s mother being unwell in the early stages. Mr Gilbert said that the average gain for the four calves by the herd sire at an

average of about eight and a half months after birth was 2.521 b per day, and the average for the six, including the calf that had suffered through running with a cow that was unwell in the early part of the period, was 2.421 b. The best performing calf was out of a five-year-old cow, another of the calves was Out of a cow of the same age, three were from four-year-old cows and one from a three-year-old cow. For the purposes of the calculations Hereford bull calves were assumed to be 651 b at birth, and where the mother was a three-year-old cow there was a 10 per cent addition and where it was a four-year-old a five per cent addition. Mr Gilbert, who is relatively new in the breeding game, having been breeding for only four years, believes that the performances of the calves might well have been better had the season been more favourable.