Weekly, Oklahoma State University Extension Beef Cattle Nutrition Specialist Paul Beck offers his expertise on the beef cattle industry. This is part of the weekly series known as the “Cow Calf Corner,” published electronically by Dr. Derrell Peel, Mark Johnson, and Beck. Today, he talks about Matching Your Summer Stocker Supplementation Program to Production and Marketing Goals.
How we manage calves at weaning and during backgrounding doesn’t just affect gain in the short term—it can carry over into how those calves perform all the way through the feedyard. A two-year study from Auburn University (Justice and others. Applied Animal Science 41:363–376; https://doi.org/10.15232/aas.2024-02589) was conducted to increase the understanding of management options to add value to calves and the carry over effects through finishing.
Calves were weaned by one of three methods:
• Fence-line weaning
• Nose-flap weaning
• Abrupt weaning
After 14 days, all calves were brought together and placed on one of three 60-day backgrounding systems:
• Bermudagrass hay + supplemental dried distiller’s grains (DDGS) fed at 1% of bodyweight
• Cool-season baleage + DDGS
• Warm-season annual grazing + DDGS
Growth rate was monitored from weaning through the 60-day backgrounding period and then during finishing at a commercial feedyard through harvest.
Backgrounding Performance
Fence-line weaned calves hit the ground running with the highest ADG in the first 30 days, regardless of diet. Use of the nose-flap held no advantage over abrupt weaning. Diet also mattered—calves on the bermudagrass hay + DDGS diet gained the most early in backgrounding. However, in the last 30 days, calves on the baleage or warm-season annual grazing diets had greater performance.
Transition to the Feedyard
Shrink losses during transport were similar across all treatments, despite a long haul typical of southeastern calves going to Midwestern feedyards. Once in the feedyard, there were no major differences in body weight or ADG due to weaning or backgrounding strategy through the finishing period.
Health Outcomes
Health performance during backgrounding and finishing was consistent across treatments. Morbidity averaged 20% and death loss due to BRD was 2.2%—similar to industry norms for preconditioned calves.
Take-Home Message
This research has big implications on the effect of marketing plans on management decisions by producers. Low-stress, fenceline weaning has advantages in performance early in the post-weaning period over using nose-flaps or abrupt weaning. Producers selling shortly after weaning should consider using this technique.
Strategic weaning and backgrounding practices can improve early postweaning gain, but most of those differences disappear by the end of the backgrounding period. This gives flexibility to producers keeping calves through at least 60-days postweaning or retaining ownership through finishing.
