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God's Country (N.C. Ia) | Have black cows mixed with a few white faces. From what I've read lightly on the charolais breed, it appears as though the calves may have higher weaning weights and more or less gain faster than some of the others. Kinda what I'm looking for moving forward. Just wondering what are everyone's opinions on the breed as far as crossing them with some blacks? |
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Fairbury, NE (Southeast) | What I've seen with char in herd for 25 years.
-Great growth
-can be a little high strung and push fence.
-difficult to retain heifers due to large size to a lesser extent temperament. That said have a few char x cows and have been very good mother's. Just have to go off their dam.
-Bottom line is heifer retention is a deal breaker over the long haul unless you have a large number of pastures. On a terminal cross where you might be buying most of your replacements it is a hard breed to beat. |
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SW, Missouri | I love char bulls on red Angus cows, makes some dandy calves IMO. |
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| Feeding hounds. Great cross
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SE ND | Years ago dad had 2 char bulls, swore would never have them again. Bought some red cows bred char and most goofy coloring and big hit at sale barn... Be awhile before I try a char again here... Long time
Fighting buggers, kill the other bulls from teaming up on them. Sure they are nice cattle but not here from past chances we gave them.
Edited by Helland 5/20/2017 13:11
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all over Iowa | I can't give any good feedback on the bulls themselves, but black nose Charolais calves are my favorite calf to feed, hands down. |
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Big Sky Country | Great terminal cross!
Char X heifers feed more like a steer than about any breed.
Will not keep any % of char for a cow.
Sell like hotcakes.
Get mine from second oldest herd in the U.S---Cobb charolais @ Augusta Mt. Linebred. Great people to deal with and just great people and cattle all the way around.
the bulls are way better to be around that avg black.
Edited by littlejo 5/20/2017 13:38
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| We had a Char bull years ago and I agree on the color thing. Most were pretty good but we had few that got kicked out for looking like skunks or having rat tails. Otherwise, they were good growing calves. |
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| would like to come visit our Holstein heifers. He would rip the five strand babrwire fence and posts right out of the ground and walk underneath the fence. He didn't care if it was hot either. Nothing phased him. They couldn't load him so the Amish neighbors shot him and butchered him in the pasture. Their cows would kill a dog too. |
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| our black nose char calves are probobly 100 lbs heavier at weaning than the straight up blacks born at the same time, we are going to try and run black and red ang bulls on char cows to mostly avoid the high dollar char bulls and pulling huge calves. will see how it works out |
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South Texas | Here charolais are the tamest cows ever, to the point it can be a pain to work them. Half char cows actually work out pretty good, usually brangusXchar and breed back to brangus. They don't seem to mind the heat much and last a long time. I do see decreased breeding rates in the char vs the brangus in real droughts. |
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| great cross on black cows! but they are a terminal cross. have had great luck with calving with char bulls
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northwest tennessee | I have some half char heifers that I saved and they are out of black angus cows and a char bull. I bred them back to an angus. Smart or not? My chars are more gentle than my blacks. |
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Eastern Ontario | Great terminal breed. Would not keep back char females . Have never had any temperament issues on any char bulls here.
Have run char bulls on Red Angus cows, the buckskin calves always sell very well.
I've always felt that if someone had a put together herd you could make a nice uniform calf crop by breeding the cows Charolais.
For many years we turned out the bulls to breed on the May long weekend for March 1st calving. Well March started to seem too much like winter so decided to hold back bulls for April 1st calving date. Had an older char bull who walked through a few fences to get in with the cows on the May long weekend!! |
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North Central Texas | I like the 1/4 char cross. We have some that the calves wean the 100 higher but we don't put them on the cab load. They end up selling for less per head. Weight doesn't equal premium. |
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God's Country (N.C. Ia) | Thanks to all for the replies. I'm kinda thinking at this point that I would like to feed out all my calves and not retain any heifers as I just don't have time or facilities to go down that road right now, so I'm thinking a bull with excellent gain characteristics is probably my top priority for the time being. Docility is my next one as I don't want anything that I have to worry about wrecking too much or raising heck with me in the pens. Are charolais a somewhat docile breed? |
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South Texas | Same with anything, just got to watch where you get them from. Take a walk through them, ask to see the mothers, and take a walk through them too. The only clue I've got thar chars arent docile is what some say on the internet. |
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SC. KS | I believe docility can be bad or good in any breed we have had Charolais cows and bulls and have had one bad bull in the ones we have had and that one was an urgent situation where are previous one hurt himself so needed one and didn't do much picking and choosing. We have some red Angus/Charolais cows and some black Angus/ Charolais cows and this year one of the black cross cows the about pure white calf that would have been 1/4 Charolais. |
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North Central Texas | I agree with 8. I have only read on the Internet where there was a docility issue. They are the easiest, sometimes to easy, working bulls that you can have. |
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Alberta Canada | We have used Charolais bulls more than 40 years here , Starting with my Grandpa . Have used Full French and Purebreds. White , tans and red factors . Its one of the best breeds to use for cross breeding . We had just about every kind of beef cow and some others come through this ranch and the char bulls have worked on all of them . We Have sold direct to Feedlots for 25 plus years . We have also retained ownership and fed them to finish and have many years of data on our calves . I would contact the American Charolais Breed Association to find a Breeder in your area , If you don't have a breeder already picked out .
In My opinion the best feeding animal in the feedlot is a Black nose Charolais followed by the Buckskin steer or heifer . I know for the 2 feedlots that I order buy for , The char calves don't have a money limit on them . Why ? Because they make money On every turn !! |
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Alberta Canada | You can get Bad bulls in every breed . Most good Reputable Breeders have weeded out the bad ones but that doesn't mean you cant get one turn bad later in life . Just have to remember NEVER TRUST A BULL !! That's why its important to find a good breeder and walk his herd . You can tell a lot by the way they react around there own herd . I have even asked for references from a breeder before I bought from them . |
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Northwest Missouri | Never had a char bull, but bought some black cows 20 yrs ago that had some char cross calves. Couple heifers bred early so ended up keeping them. Some of the best cows I've ever had. Have kept several black nose char heifers from them and their daughters. Have quite a few black nose char cows now and I like them more every year, great mothers and always breed. They aren't real big, actually most are smaller than my average herd weight. Wouldn't mind having a whole herd of them. Dont really notice their calves out growing my straight blacks tho. |
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North Cental Mo. | Great cross on black cows, maybe the best. Cows need to be big, calving issues are real. But as far as feeding, it doesn't get much better.
Roy |
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| Feeding your own calves is a plus in my eyes for breeding char. Smaller groups tend to get picked apart at a barn and discounted. But once they're fat they bid the same regardless if they have the skunk tail or rat tail. They also are pretty flexible in the finish weight department. You can pour the coals to them and have them finished at 1200 well before their black hided siblings, or take your time and get those 15-1600lb monsters.
As far as docility, definitely ask around and go walk through before buying any bull no matter what breed. Char calves handle different though imo. They look for a way out instead of milling in front of a gate. I've loaded pot loads of chars without so much as a whisper and they single file it on and don't usually care to come back towards me. If you are going to be the one handling them from birth you'll be pleased with the docility when they hit your lot in the fall. Most of the wild chars I've seen have been singled out and ran around a pen until they have blood coming out both nostrils. Those are the kind I try to avoid as they blend into a group, but if you get them alone again they remember. |
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just a tish NE of central ND | Char with a blacks make good growthy calves but you get some "rat tailed calves" and the dang buyers pick them out and you end up giving them away at a sale barn ever time.
My experience with chars on mixed cows is I got to be freinds with a calf puller in the middle of the night quite often....... (hated that part of them) |
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NWIL | Dad always had an Angus based herd, as he started winding down and I had the opportunity to essentially start from scratch I settled on a Charolais herd. Now 13 years into this I'm still quite pleased. I sell several purebred bulls each year, mostly to guys with stock cows of every breeding you can think of, and they have been successful. Docility and calving ease are two things I pay attention to, the growth kind of takes care of itself. I would consider my cows tame, maybe have a couple you watch when tagging a calf, but nothing like what we used to have where you really didn't want to work around them. My cow size is moderate, the huge ones that people remember from the 80s are no more. Calving ease involves spending time watching the shape, making sure bulls with big shoulders don't get used, etc. Overall birthweights have been smaller then the black cows used to have, generally 75-80lbs. Calf growth speaks for itself, I've had to move the weaning date forward 1.5-2 months from where it was traditionally. Even with my purebreds I sell the ones that aren't saved as heifers and the steers for the same price as black calves are going for and always have ready buyers. As I've built my herd and hope to continue to do so I continue to be pleased with the direction I chose to go. |
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Charolais bulls good, bad?
