As cattle producers look to start rebuilding herds, selecting and managing bulls will be a big part of that process.
Professors at Texas Tech University say they need to be maintained just like athletes.
“Making sure those bulls are up to date on vaccines. General recommendation for bulls is that their vaccine status matches the vaccine status of the cows that their feet are in good working order, that there are not any cracks or potential for latenesses things like that. There’s no corns in between their toes that can cause blindness early on, so making sure that bull is physically fit. So I always think about that. We want our bulls to be like well-maintained athletes, right? They need to have a diet of them, and so really managing protein energy and as always loose free minerals is a really important thing to make sure that our pools are ready to go to work when we ask them to go to work,” said Jennifer Koziol.
Koziol says you can get some help planning. There are online tools to help choose what you can pay for a bull, and if it makes sense for your operation.
