The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Cattle => Topic started by: SallyintNorth on February 23, 2014, 03:15:59 pm
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At last! Finally I have a Red Devon x Jersey heifer. I know it's a long way to her first lactation - but finally I am on the journey :)
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Congratulations, she is beautiful, lovely time of year with the spring and summer on the horizon hopefully!the months and next couple of years will fly by. Best wishes to you and yours including Cherry
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Any reason for the name "Cherry"? Thinking back to "Two's plenty" ;D
She's just beautiful - I think she'll be a stunner when she's grown.
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Rosemary, she's the Cherry on Top :excited:
Plus she's cherry red, a jolly good sucker (groan) and a cheery little person.
And yes, I think she will be very striking. She's a friendly wee soul too ;D
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Rosemary, she's the Cherry on Top :excited:
Plus she's cherry red, a jolly good sucker (groan) and a cheery little person.
And yes, I think she will be very striking. She's a friendly wee soul too ;D
Love it ;D
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She looks gorgeous ! You and her mum must be very proud of her!
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She is beautiful - lovely colour, great name.
Got any pics of the sire?
Sue
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Congratulations, Sally. She is gorgeous :love: :love: :love:
Love the idea behind her name :D
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I love the colour!
What's so special about this cross? Good house cow? (I am almost totally ignorant about cows/cattle...)
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I love the colour!
What's so special about this cross? Good house cow? (I am almost totally ignorant about cows/cattle...)
I have a bee in my bonnet about this cross being a superb house cow, yes. The Red Devon used to be triple purpose - meat milk work - but in recent decades has been more and more a beef only animal. Still a milky suckler though, and a laid-back temperament. A good do-er, very hardy.
I think there's no doubt she'll be a grand addition to the suckler herd - in fact BH is rather annoyed that she'll be in my herd not his! :D I think that with a more beefy conformation, and a bit hardier than the straight Jersey, not quite such high performance, she could be an easy-to-manage smallholder / house cow. And good for crossing for a beef calf of course. (Yes, I know - they could just get a Shetland! Probably right there, but I have wanted one of these for ever. :))
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Got any pics of the sire?
Dad (https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=ai+straw&hl=en-GB&rlz=1T4SVEC_enGB399GB399&tbm=isch&imgil=0_AXd-j4tQSYeM%253A%253Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fencrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com%252Fimages%253Fq%253Dtbn%253AANd9GcQSGRtPzykL1XL7oRiEbLIhq2E0OzsPey6loIXqBo_66QTKEFS-%253B481%253B362%253BXNLMUiC4mfwoxM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.vet.k-state.edu%25252Fmedia%25252FImages%25252Ftherio%25252Fai%25252Findex.htm&source=iu&usg=__xCIwPeZ1kz7EJBL8cOk6sT6fU38%3D&sa=X&ei=aksKU7qQI-Wg7AbY54HQDg&ved=0CDcQ9QEwAg&biw=1366&bih=566&dpr=1#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=0_AXd-j4tQSYeM%253A%3BXNLMUiC4mfwoxM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.vet.k-state.edu%252Fmedia%252FImages%252Ftherio%252Fai%252Fai-26.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.vet.k-state.edu%252Fmedia%252FImages%252Ftherio%252Fai%252Findex.htm%3B481%3B362)
Sorry, couldn't resist. ;) At the time of writing, her dad is the top bull on this page (http://www.genusbreeding.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Devon-Sires.jpg)
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She is gorgeous Sally :thumbsup: and I love the name
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Like it - the pic of Atlas is nice - a good straight back and a lovely bully hump and that great curly bit on the face.
As a Shetland breeder - another multi purpose breed - I can see where you're going here.
One of the commercial cattle breeders here has admired our Shetland cows milkiness and wonderfully broad pelvises. He wondered if we wanted to cross with a commercial bull to breed good suckler replacement heifer which would probably make good money at the mart.
At the moment we're sticking with pure bred - we can get a reasonable price for the beef - but making the heifers more acceptable to the wider market could tempt us in the future.
Good luck with your 'house cow' project - it's great to follow your dreams.
Sue
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Thank you everyone :hug:
Sue, as I understand it the Shetland is such a fab crosser that that's how come they nearly lost the breed! So for the moment, the breed soc is very much against crossing for breeding. Which is completely understandable while numbers are so low - but hopefully the breed will recover to such a point that using them to produce good crossbreed suckler cows is again on the agenda :fc:.
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She's beautiful !! :)
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She's gorgeous! Congratulations, will be interested to hear how she grows up.
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Congratulations!!! She looks gorgeous! How many days did she go before calving? My Jersey is due mid april, put her to an Angus and hoping for a heifer. Need to get her closer to my house before calving and was going to leave it till the end of this month but dont know if that is pushing my luck.
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Thanks everyone for all the admiration :D Must take an up-to-date pic, she really is a stunner :)
Hillie has now produced hers, a half-brother-cum-uncle to Cherry. He's the same colour but has black-rimmed eyes and a black nose. Unlike Cherry he's not very active, in fact I nearly called him Dopey. (But decided on George - Dad is Atlas, lol. Hope he grows into that heritage!)
Plenty cooked Cherry for a whopping 293 days, trish.farm. She needed a bit of help - by hand - to push her out and you wouldn't have believed she was a newborn the following day, she already looked 5 days old, let alone she's half Jersey :o
Hillie is much more sensible, she popped George out with no fuss at all, at 286 days. A much smaller calf at birth, much more like a newborn!
The shortest gestation I've had with my Jerseys has been Hillie's last year's calf, a British Blue, which was about 282 days I think. I always calculate on 279 days (for the whole herd, this is, mainly Angus X and Hereford X) and have never had one early on that. Some bulls and some breeds are much longer, I would think our average is probably about 285 days. Some of the British Blues have been 279 and 280 days - they are supposed to be shorter gestation and therefore easier calving and that has been our experience.
I can't predict how your Jersey would do, but if it wouldn't be too difficult to fetch her up quickly if she started altering then end of the month sounds fine. If it's not easy to fetch her up when she starts altering then maybe you shouldn't risk it! My Jerseys start bagging up a good 10 days, often more, before they calve, their ligaments slacken over a period of days before calving, and their bags get really full and 'springing' when calving is imminent, so I'd have plenty of notice to fetch them in. But I don't know if that's all Jerseys or just mine.
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Ah thanks Sally, my Jersey is halter trained so can catch her up at a minutes notice so no problem there, just didnt want to move her too close to calving (nearly put lambing then!) incase it upsets her or causes any problems. Fingers crossed i have a stunner like yours! xx
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Congrats - Hope she's doing well! We have pedigree Devons here, love the red rubies and yes, very docile and quiet. We are planning on multiple suckling ours as they are quite milky, but that'll wait til next year when more organised! Jersey x sounds a cracking cross for a house cow... :thumbsup:
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Thanks Nina, she's doing really well!
Here she is with Mum this morning:
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Wow, Cherry is growing fast, she looks a little stunner.
Aahhhh :love: Plenty, what an angel :hugcow: