It is decision time for beef calf producers who plan on selling their calves as "pre-vaccinated" calves.

In the past few years, calves sold in "pre-vaccinated" sales have generally sold for higher than market prices. Of course, any increased value depends on the quality of the calves and where they are sold. If you are planning to sell in a special pre-vaccinated calf sale, follow the vaccination guidelines for that sale, including any vaccine recommendations. Some sales strongly encourage the use of modified-live virus vaccines and some sales require or recommend more than just a viral vaccine.

In the past two years, there have been several studies in the US and Canada looking at the impact when calves that are persistently with BVD enter the feedlot. Different studies have found different dollar values for the loss if these persistently infected (PI) calves go into a feedlot pen or into the pen next door, depending on how many performance parameters were measured.

Feedlots are interested enough in these PI calves that some lots are even testing calves on arrival to find out if they are PI. These lots figure it pays to test every calf entering the lot even if there is only one PI calf in every 200 calves they test.

For the same reason, more and more feedlots are interested in how the cows were vaccinated. They figure that properly vaccinated cows are less likely to give birth to a PI calf. Calf producers can take advantage of having a good vaccination program in the cows and by passing that information along with the calf’s vaccination information.

How you vaccinate the cows seems to be pretty important in the cow herd, too. Dr Cheryl Waldner, at the Western College of Veterinary Medicine, just completed a long term study looking at health and productivity in 200 western beef herds. She was mainly interested in any impact the oil and gas industry might have on beef production, but she was also able to look at the impact of some management practices. She was able to test these herds and follow up on health and performance data much more deeply than anyone else.

A couple of her findings showed the BVD in beef herds affects more than the feedlots where PI calves end up. In cow herds that had PIs, none of the calves grew as well as in herds that had no PIs. Like feedlots, it isn’t only the PI calves that don’t do well. Because the PI calves spread BVD virus to other calves that aren’t PI, when PIs are around, all calves tend to not do as well. The impact was pretty big, too; close to 50 lbs. in weaning weight for every calf in herds that had PI calves.