On today’s BeefBuzz, Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays is talking with Mark Johnson, Oklahoma State University Extension Beef Cattle Breeding Specialist, about strategies for rebuilding the U.S. beef cow herd.
Johnson first established that the correct set of cows will breed quickly, produce calves early in the following calving season, and raise good calves that fit the production environment. The right set will do the same year after year.
He noted that the signs that the industry needs producers to rebuild their herds are present. “We are at a historical site in our cattle cycle – low inventory, extremely good prices, and it has helped a lot of us pay down bills,” he said. “We are at a point where our cow inventory is going to age out if we don’t begin to keep more replacement heifers back. We anticipate that is going to happen, and typically, when that happens is when we see the market highs for the cycle.”
Hays pointed out that the last time the industry had to rebuild, there was a “quantum leap” in the quality of cows. Johnson expects more of the same. He said, “We have more tools available to us now in order to know the genetic potential of these heifers that every time we go through a drought or stressful events in this business that causes us to liquidate cows, we can build back better when we eliminate the lower end of the cow herd.”
As a matter of fact, for the past year, Johnson has referred to it as a “historically unprecedented opportunity.”
He explained that when producers are deciding how many or which yearling heifers to hold back for replacements at this time of year, the ones that have reached at least two-thirds of their mature weight by 14 or 15 months of age are on target to breed quickly and calve early. However, Johnson admitted that the condition of wheat pastures over the winter may not have grown heifers to their full potential this year, so in that case, the heifers born earlier in the calving season tend to be out of more fertile, productive cows and may have a genetic advantage built in from their mothers.
“If we are in the situation to feel like our heifers are a little behind, maybe we hold back a few more than what we really need and hold them to the standards that the ones that breed up the quickest are the ones that we are going to retain. Those other heifers that breed slower or don’t get bred, we can still market as feeders as yearlings a little bit later in the spring or summer,” Johnson explained. “In this market, they will still have optimum value as yearlings.”
When considering EPDs and other tools available to producers making decisions about which heifers to keep, Johnson believes that there is still value in looking at the heifers and evaluating their structural integrity.
“The heifers that have a wider, deeper build and a structural base that we know will contribute to longevity,” he began. “Just knowing that EPDs are the genetic values on the sires of those heifers, we are at a point in time where that has value. If we’ve kept track of the EPDs on bulls we’ve used over the generations, we have a means to select for maternal traits – a lot of those are available in most registries now. We can also do genomic scorecards and DNA samples. There are some tools in 2025 if we want to send off a DNA sample; we can get a scorecard back that gives us a feel for genetic merit in terms of maternal fertility growth, potential carcass traits, and things of that nature.”
Alternately, when deciding whether or not to cull an older cow, Johnson mentioned his own eleven- and twelve-year-old cows that are still producing and said that some producers cull when the cow reaches ten years old, and it is an option that he can advocate for.
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and is a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR at the top of the story for today’s show, and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
