As grass leases continue to get harder to find and more expensive to acquire, and drought continues, cow/calf producers are showing more and more interest in feeding pairs in a confinement system.
Even with nighttime feeding, a few calves still will be born in the coldest nighttime hours. These wet newborns may become hypothermic or cold stressed.
March could be the hardest month of the year on beef cattle according to Eldon Cole, field specialist in livestock with University of Missouri Extension.
Many producers will castrate their calves when they are two or three days old, which is my preferred period. Castration should occur when the calf is rather young.