The condition of your bull before and during breeding is just as important as the condition of your cow herd. Remember that he is half of your reproductive equation. For optimal success in your breeding program, your bulls should achieve an Ideal Body Condition of 6. Please reference the Body Condition scores for cow - descriptions are similar for bulls.

A bull in a body condition of 6 or higher will achieve optimal sperm production, motility and breeding effectiveness. Since sperm development and maturity takes 60 days, this condition should be attained and maintained for at least 60 days before maximum use. This means you should evaluate what each bull looks like 120-150 days before maximum bull use so that you have time to feed him correctly to ensure an Ideal Body Condition.

 

Traditionally, bulls have been developed and conditioned on conventional feeding programs. These complete diets supplied a total nutritional package that bulls would normally consume at 3 percent to 3.5 percent of their body weight. This type of program was designed to maximize gain and condition. Though maximum gain and condition sounds good initially, what happens to bull condition and breeding effectiveness once breeding begins? The term "melt" has been used to describe what occurs when bulls have been conditioned on complete rations and then placed out to breed. Generally this includes a rapid deterioration of body condition, reduction of libido and an overall negative impact on breeding soundness and effectiveness.

Accuration/Cattle Limiter in combination with your forage is Purina’s 4-Square Feeding Program for developing and conditioning bulls for greatest reproductive success. How much you feed is based on your forage quality.

Controlled Intake Systems Featuring IM Technology™ Breeder Products for Bulls For Developing and Conditioning Bulls
Accuration®	Protein	NPN	Fat	Fiber	Ca	P	Vit A
Cattle Limiter LW	12.0	1.5	4.0	7.0	0.40-0.90	0.5	3,000
Accuration GS 400	12.0	2.0	5.0	5.0	0.50-1.00	0.5	7,500
Cattle Limiter 1	12.0	2.0	5.0	7.0	0.50-1.00	0.7	3,000
Accuration GS 500	14.0	4.5	6.0	5.0	0.75-1.25	0.6	8,000
Cattle Limiter 2	12.0	4.5	5.0	7.0	0.50-1.00	0.5	3,000
Cattle Limiter 2.5	13.0	4.8	5.0	7.0	0.50-1.00	0.5	5,000
Accuration GS 600	14.0	5.0	7.0	5.0	0.60-1.10	0.7	9,000
Cattle Limiter 3	14.0	5.0	7.0	5.0	0.60-1.10	0.7	9,000

 

Developing Bulls with Accuration
Excellent performance can be achieved when developing bulls at feeding rates of 1.5 percent to 2.0 percent of body weight (dependent on forage quality) along with unlimited access to pasture or hay.

Table 1 shows the results of a research study to quantify some of these advantages in developing bulls.

Item	Confinement	Accuration®/ Cattle Limiters
Daily Gain	3.65	2.66
Final Wt.	1072	967
Hip Height	134	131
Scrotal Circ. (cm)	33.80	32.60
Motile Sperm (%)	91.0	93.0
Normal Sperm (%)	82.0	88.0
Libido	10.9	13.4
Daily Feed (lbs.)	31.4	14.2
% BW	3.61%	1.75%
Feed COG	$60.00	$37.50

Table 1: Forest, et al. (1994)

Table 2 shows the results of feeding over a 120-day period.  Note that the average performance was excellent with bulls gaining over 3.5 lbs/head/day at a cost of $.39 per pound.  Also notice that all bulls responded in a very tight range of results, indicating the effectiveness for all bulls utilizing Accuration/Cattle Limiters.

Item	Accuration	Range of Result
Head	179
Starting Weight	666	654 - 681
Ending Weight	1084	1065 - 1141
Daily Gain	3.51	3.30 - 3.95
Daily Feed Intake	16.0 lbs.	15.1 - 17.5lbs.
% of Bodyweight	1.85%	1.7 - 1.90%
Feed Efficiency	4.54 lbs.	4.32 - 4.83
COG/lb.	$0.39	$0.38 - $0.42
$ Per Bull	$165.17	$148.78 - $199.55

Table 2: Purina Mills, Field Performance Data

As you can see from the data presented in Tables 1 and 2 above, excellent performance can be achieved when developing bulls at feeding rates of 1.5 to 2.0 percent of bodyweight (dependent on forage quality), along with unlimited access to pasture or hay.

Conditioning Bulls with Accuration
If forage quality is lush, feed 0.5 percent of body weight, 0.75 percent of body weight on transitional forage and 1 percent of body weight if forage is mature.

Example: If your bull weighs 1,000 pounds and your forage is mature, feed 10 pounds per head per day. (1,000 pound bull X .01 (1%) =10 lbs.)

Following is a chart to help you establish feeding ranges of Accuration/Cattle Limiter from 0.5 percent-1 percent body weight dependent on the estimated weight of your bull.

Forage Quality	Intake (% of Body Weight)
Lush - (10% Crude Protein & Higher)	0.50%
Transitional - (7%- 9% Crude Protein)	0.75%
Mature - (<7% Crude Protein)	1.00 - 1.25%