Reproduction has the greatest effect on profitability of a cow herd. If cows don’t breed back, there isn’t much else they can do that matters. One of the main drivers of fertility is body condition score (BCS).

I was raised in the southeastern U.S. (Appalachia, to be more specific), and most of my professional career has been spent in Mississippi and Tennessee.

The majority, at least two-thirds, of cattle producers are spring-calving operations, with calves being born during the months of February through May and some producers having calves hitting the ground as early as late January and as late as May.

The ideal season for calving has been a hot topic for ranchers over the last several years. The traditional time of year for calving season stretches anywhere from late February to early May.

It’s what they call “10-40” country; there are varying stories depending on who’s telling it but, essentially, a cow has to have a mouth 10 feet wide and run 40 miles an hour to get enough feed.

Beef cow production in much of the western U.S. relies on forage from semiarid perennial grasslands. Efficient use of this resource is crucial to the sustainability of ranching operations.

Regardless of your regional location in the U.S., stockpiling has a place in pasture management and forage sources for beef producers.

Shipping stress is the result of inadequate processes in the complex beef cattle production system. When talking about shipping stress and associated illness, we are really talking about bovine respiratory disease (BRD).

Anyone associated with feeding cattle understands that performance factors influence feed costs of gain (feeding margins), and the impact on razor-thin margins can be big.

You can’t pick up an ag publication these days without finding a story on how drones will revolutionize the cow business. Supposedly, they’ll do everything from checking on float valves to spotting a trespassing hunter.