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Central Texas | Over many years have noticed most every week there are new, never before seen, inexperienced buyers show up with their mind made up to buy cows. Due to their inexperience and lack of patience they typically go home with overpriced, ill tempered and/or bad udder cows. If you are going to buy cows at the salebarn, strongly suggest you go and sit thru the bred cow and pair portion of at least 3-4 sales so you understand how it works. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of decent cows at salebarns but one has to be able to quickly identify the one with ill tempers, bad udders, etc as most individual cows are sold in less than 1 minute. You will get an education, it's only a matter of what it costs you. Some prebuying, learning trips to the salebarn can be time well spent if you pay attention and do your homework.
As we approach green grass, good cows will be more scarce and expensive. Fall is usually when there are more cows for sale at better prices. Also a word of caution, there are periodic special replacement cow sales. These events are what I refer to as "Mad money magnets" as everyone who thinks they want to buy some cows will be there. If you choose to go to one of these sales, sit on your hands for about the first 2/3 of the sale and let everyone else spend their money. If there are enough cows, the money will run out before the cows do and there can be some decent buys near the end. This also applies to regular sales where the better buys are in later stages of the cow sale.
Bottom line is it takes patience, study and experience to buy the right cows for the right price. Do your homework and take it slow and easy and you can get a good set of cows.
Just another 2 cents worth. | |
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Buying mid-aged bred cows at sale barn.. questions..
