Calving Season Is Here

It's already calving season in the foothills.

Some ranchers prefer to wait until the spring but Jim Evans says he likes to start at the beginning of the year. "I'm set up for it, I have a barn close to the house and the facilities for it and I haven't got a real big herd, so I can maintain it," He adds "I'd rather calve in the cold than in the rain and the slop."

Evans says when he sold is calves in late October they were about a hundred pounds heavier than many of the others there and he feels he made a little extra money doing it that way.

Evans says it's also a matter of risk. "If it's warmer at night you don't have to worry so much about frozen ears and losing tails and calves dying and you calve them out on the green grass not to worry near as bad."

He believes the reason many ranchers go in January and February is that they're getting older and they don't want to have to get up in the middle of the night and check when it's cold out and for some it's just the size of the herd.