Wannabe Cowpunchers

[a2396]

The parents of one of my darlings have decided to make money (they assume) by purchasing two cows. The cows cost a total of 15,000 bht. I understand that the cows take 9 months to produce a calf and they can have one per year. Assuming all goes well, they may be able to recoup their initial investement in about one year & after that it's all profit - right?? This is a family that hardly has 2 bht to rub together. How much would they have to pay for the bull to "visit" the cow and how much per month would it cost to feed them?? I have already been asked to "loan" them 2,000 bht, which I respectfully declined. Any comments from the old cowhands out there.

[bina]

go to farming section and search : cows: all info already there: we've been discussing that heavily the past few weeks

bull to breed: 300 baht

feeding cows, depends

making ends meet: maybe

making big money: doubtful

having something to eat in a year: probably

bina

israel

how was that for succinct?

[billaaa777]

I have a friend of mine who happens to be a bar girl that has bought 23 cows for her family. She is a successful bar girl, I must say. I have question her in detail about how they make money with the cows. Such as milking them, slaughter them or having calves. They don’t milk them and when I ask her if they slaughter them and sell the meat, her being a Buddhist almost gags in disgust at even the thought of killing one of her cows. I still can figure out if they make money or not. I really don’t think so.

It is more like a status symbol in the village or a form of a savings account one might have before there were banks.

She buys the cows, and her family feeds the cows, waters the cows, takes care of the cows and spends money on the vet bills. But the only way them seem to make money is when one of the cows has a calf. Other than that they sell a cow when they need money and buy a cow when they have money.

This not a very good investment opportunity.

Edited February 6, 2008 by billaaa777

[sbk]

moved to farming forum

///MOVED///

[a2396]

go to farming section and search : cows: all info already there: we've been discussing that heavily the past few weeks

bull to breed: 300 baht

feeding cows, depends

making ends meet: maybe

making big money: doubtful

having something to eat in a year: probably

bina

israel

how was that for succinct?

Very good. Thank you. I think this move (buying the cows) was made with little or no forethought. As I mentioned, they do not have much reserve cash, if any. The daughter put up 10,000 bht of her money, which is also minimal, since she is a college student & not working. As the next poster states, the only probable way they might make some cash is if they sell a calf and that is at least 1 year away. Another example of the quality of the local rational thought process. I am sure I will likely be asked for "donations" in the future and I am not to be so inclined.

[Maizefarmer]

go to farming section and search : cows: all info already there: we've been discussing that heavily the past few weeks

bull to breed: 300 baht

feeding cows, depends

making ends meet: maybe

making big money: doubtful

having something to eat in a year: probably

bina

israel

how was that for succinct?

Very good. Thank you. I think this move (buying the cows) was made with little or no forethought. As I mentioned, they do not have much reserve cash, if any. The daughter put up 10,000 bht of her money, which is also minimal, since she is a college student & not working. As the next poster states, the only probable way they might make some cash is if they sell a calf and that is at least 1 year away. Another example of the quality of the local rational thought process. I am sure I will likely be asked for "donations" in the future and I am not to be so inclined.

Bearing in mind what you have said regards the circumstances of this family (i.e. very limited finances) it sounds like these animals are not even likely to be fed properly - decent forage costs money, and for someone who hasn’t got much cash in hand to start with, the forage costs will soon start to bite into those limited finances.

The alternative will be to graze them long side the road on whatever is available, which can range from good quality overgrow of cultivated forage (not likely because if it exists anywhere round you bet you someone else has laid claim to it), to poor quality stray grass and weeds (more than likely). Come the dry season there won’t be much of that available either, and what there is will be pure roughage (i.e. little to no nutrient value) Add to that water availability, or shall I say limited water availability, come the dry season ponds and natural run-off will also have dried up.

Last but not least, someone is going to have to spend time every day watching these 2 cows because livestock have no respect for neighbours’ gardens.

…. and then, as if the above is not enough to discourage one from keeping a cow or 2, at some time the vet will be needed, the bull will be needed, or AI will have to be done – which all costs. The more grown the livestock are the more they cost to keep.

It’s a recipe for more problems than its worth.

Many Thai’s (and ex-pats) like to keep a cow or 2. For Thai folk sometimes the motive has little to do with profit – they are kept as a status symbol as billaaa777 correctly says.

Either way some homework needs to be done before “investing” in cattle. Whatever the motive the cow couldn’t care one way or the other. It’s going to want clean water, decent quality forage and a roof over its head (at least part of the time) as the basics.

If it’s a financial exercise with profit in mind, 2 cows are going to offer little to nothing in the way of profit when looked at in terms of what will go into keeping them.

If it’s a decent income by Thai standards you desire – and by that I mean enough to run a household, support the family of say yourself, the other half and 2 kids, plus car running expenses, schooling and the occasional holiday, mortgage, rent etc etc ….., I would think you would be wanting to milk around 50 head twice a day (on 10 – 12 litres p/head/p/day), and for a Western type income? – not less than 150/200 head p/day.

Beef – the problem is the capital outlay and the 14 – 18months you’ll have to wait before you can start slaughtering and generating an income. Say 7 head a month min (70 – 100 head p/year) that means 120 -130 pregnant head per year and 300 rai land needed (growing your own forage/feed)

…… I’m drifting of the OP’s question and could go on all night, but those are the sorts of numbers one is looking at to make a realistic go of keeping cattle.

A couple cattle? – for some quick hard cash somewhere down the rod – yes. But there’s going to be little profit, if any, when looked at against the time/effort and money outlay from the time you purchased them (as calves I would presume) till the time they are sold or start calving.

[chownah]

The availability of pasture varies alot from place to place. A poster from Isaan said that the pasture there had dried up and so cattle were being sold cheap while here in the north where the soil holds water better the pasture was still green and growing inspite of the long period without rain. Here in my neighborhood in the north there are three people who keep cattle and feed them only with pasture and rice straw. They stay with mixed breed cattle which (from what I've read) do better with a lower quality pasture and are less prone to disease...they do each provide a roof where the cows are kept at night and during rain. These people live close to the rice fields and so it is easy for them to pasture their cattle there when rice is not growing since nothing is grown there at other times of the year. They do have to hustle around during the rice growing season to keep their cattle fed but they manage. Two of these people have daily jobs and they tend to their cattle (they each have about 4 adult animals with varying numbers of young) before and after work and during the lunch hour.....it is a good way for them to make some extra income. The third person doing this has 3 adult animals and two calves. This man has lost a leg in a motorcycle mishap so has no daily job and so this is an especially important source of income for him....it is difficult for him to move his cattle around but he manages....we don't complain too much when his animals get into mischief....he does a pretty good job at keeping them out of trouble.

For rural villagers to keep few cows can be a good way to supplement income if the situation is right. If the forage is really poor I recommend they check into keeping water buffalo which can do better on poor forage.

Chownah

[squiged]

I thought it was 'cowpoke'

[Issangeorge]

The year we got married my wife bought 3 cows fro 30,000 baht, that was 7 years ago and cows were more expensive and I guess I should say two cows and one bull. She bought them to give her brother who only has one arm something to do and a purpose in life. It has worked wonders for doing this, her brother now looks after the cows every day and feels he is worth something. Before he just got drunk whenever he could find the money to buy a bottle of laokhao. After about six months my wife sold the bull for 15,000 baht and through the years she has given her brother some cows and she herself no longer has any but did get her full investment back and a small profit plus the cows she gave her brother, so there is some money to be made, but very little and unless there is a purpose like giving someone something to do I would not get involved with it unless you were to buy a lot more than two to three cows and then there is a large capital investment needed. Issnageorge

[bannork]

We had some bad luck yesterday when the one month calf in the photo suddenly keeled over in the fields and died instantly. Previously it had seemed in perfect health. some say it may have been bitten by a snake or even a centipede but would that have killed it instantly? I think it may have been heart failure. Its father was a mystery because we had the mother artificially inseminated by a long-eared dark red bull (according to the vet's catalogue), but with the mother jet black the calf came out white, and very attractive it looked too!

Anyway after it died, a greedy and grasping elder brother's ex-wife quickly appeared in the fields and armed with a skylab transported the calf to her table in the market in Ban Dung, but she'll dry the meat first! The mother didn't see the calf taken away,( too busy eating grass) so now she's calling out and looking for the calf all the time, plus she has a full udder that must be hurting.

My question is if we had left the calf in the fields and its mother had realised it was never going to get up again would this have stopped the constant calling out and searching? Does nature have a way here?

[Maizefarmer]

I'm sorry to hear that this has happened - and I hope it does not put you or yours off your efforts. It happens to the best of farmers - so don't throw in the towel.

The calf doesn't look as though it was short of any food - or quality of food: its well fleashed out and the coat is in good condition.

There could be a 1001 reasons why it has died so suddenly, so I am not going to speculate - but some facts will go a long why to helping establish the cause.

Come back with the following info - if there is objection to do the following (photos if possible if the animal has not alreayd being chooped up and eaten).

Eyes - what colour are they (close up photo will help)?

Stomach - when it gets chopped up, take some pics of the stomach contents and whats in them (them - because there is more than one stomach to a cows digestive system) - please dig around in the stomach/ruman contents: specificaly you are looking for any plant matter that has the roots or root parts still attached - and just where from the digestive system did you take them from.

Lungs - take a picture of the lungs and a picture of one lung disected in half.

Liver - a picture of the liver and again disected in half - specifically we are looking for a discoloured, or partly discoloured liver - with tinges of purple, yellow or green to it.

Kidneys - as above again.

Just where was this animal feeding - on natural grass/field, or a cultivated field?

It is possible it could have eaten something that will cause the animal to drop dead in litewrally a few moments - yes, it can and does happen, and untill the casue has being established DO NOT ALLOW ANY OF YOUR REMAINING LIVESTOCK TO FEED IN THE SAME AREA..

Un fortuneatly I am in Europe at the moment, so i do not have access to my digital pics of plants in Thailand that can cause cows to keel over in seconds - but they do exsist and they are very very toxic indeed - especially to calves.

Off the top of my head - without any evidence one way or the other I am going to say its eaten one or other of the toxic plants, but information along the above lines will help a lot.

Edited March 13, 2008 by Maizefarmer

[Khonwan]

Hi bannork

Snake bite is a very real possibility (I lost a few calves for this reason over the years). This would be my first thought for cause of death. It is now too late to test but for future occasions, check the carcass after skinning for signs of discolouration and possible bite marks around potential bite sites, particularly the ankles.

Whether the dead calf is left in or removed from the field, the dam will normally be just as upset in my experience.

Rgds

Khonwan

[fruity]

Snake bite a definate possibility, probably too late, but a check for puncture wounds around the feet / legs would verify this. What is now important is the mother cow. She will be highly susceptible to developing mastitis. There are milk suppressing drugs available, which need to be injected over a period of days, in the meantime, keep her off grass, limit her water intake to a small drink midday, give her only straw to eat, if she is quiet, it is important to try to milk out a little in each quarter, only enough to stop her udder getting hard. Milk production is based on a supply & demand basis, once the demand ceases, so will the milk supply, however, not immediately. If you can get hold of some Epsom salts, great; add this to her drinking water, a great aid to drying off.

We had some bad luck yesterday when the one month calf in the photo suddenly keeled over in the fields and died instantly. Previously it had seemed in perfect health. some say it may have been bitten by a snake or even a centipede but would that have killed it instantly? I think it may have been heart failure. Its father was a mystery because we had the mother artificially inseminated by a long-eared dark red bull (according to the vet's catalogue), but with the mother jet black the calf came out white, and very attractive it looked too!

Anyway after it died, a greedy and grasping elder brother's ex-wife quickly appeared in the fields and armed with a skylab transported the calf to her table in the market in Ban Dung, but she'll dry the meat first! The mother didn't see the calf taken away,( too busy eating grass) so now she's calling out and looking for the calf all the time, plus she has a full udder that must be hurting.

My question is if we had left the calf in the fields and its mother had realised it was never going to get up again would this have stopped the constant calling out and searching? Does nature have a way here?

[bannork]

Thank you for your helpful replies- no chance for an autopsy, calf already cut and dried as it were. He was in a paddy field but I don't think the calf was eating foliage yet, perhaps absently licking grass. The mother's udder now reduced in size and calf seems to be forgotten, interestingly she's showing signs of being ready for mating again!

[Maizefarmer]

If a cow unexpectadly looses her calf, her body will absorb what is left in the udder and will stop producing - thats nature.

In dairy farming our challenge is to keep the animal "artificially" producing milk - despite having taken her calf away - and even with a good milking regime the need to recalve sometime in the 2nd year to keep her producing is essential.

Milk producing cows (and goats, and buffulo) are the hardest working farm animals - by a long long way.