Managing Beef Bulls During the Off-Season

Abstract

As approximately 94% of beef cow-calf operations use only natural service for breeding their cows and heifers, replacement bulls are a significant, necessary cost of producing beef calves. The value realized from beef bulls includes number and quality of calves sired, weight of calves sold, production value of daughters retained, and the bull's salvage value. Considering the importance of maintaining and recouping the cost of this significant investment, there is little information in peer reviewed literature about maintaining bulls in the off-season to prepare the bull for optimum performance in subsequent breeding seasons.

Keywords: Bull housing; Bull management; Nutrition; Social dominance.