Steer with winter coat

[Fen Farm Dexters]

We have a 1year old short leg steer still retaining his curly winter coat - the only steer we have. All other cows and heifers have shed theirs. Are steers different in this way, please?

[Broomcroft]

Over half of mine still have quite a winter coat retained, dexters and crosses. Still quite cold at night sometimes, maybe that's why?

[Mark Bowles]

With all the problems you can have with cattle, loosing their winter coat has to be right down there at the bottom of the list. Don't worry about it, i have cattle as sleek as silke and odd others with 50% winter coat, it will come out in the end.

[tinkerbell]

Heyaa,

I still have a few dexters with their patchy winter coats on, out of the 12 dexters I have, only about 3-4 still have a winter coat, One being my heifer. Hopefully they will loose them soon, as I do think they look rather rough with half a winter coat still on in June!!

[SteveM]

Dont have much evidence to go on having only two red cows and around a dozen black, but the reds seem to never suffer from this problem, an I right?

[Broomcroft]

Just looked at mine again today, and there's no difference between heifers and steers, a lot still have a winter coat. I'd agree that reds don't retain their winter coat, or is it that you just can't see it. With my black cattle, their winter coats are red so it stands out.

[tinkerbell]

I have found that my Red heifer lost her winter coat fairly quick, But again i think it may have something to do with most of my blacks having red in them!! However out of my two show heifers my red heifer has lost most of her coat apposed to the black heifer having more winter coat than summer!!

[Anthony Henman]

Hi, a few of my dexters regularly keep their winter coats. It can be down to Copper deficiency and I also believe Selenium and Molybdenum too. I copper bolus them every year which alleviates the problem but they still seem to keep their coats. I wouldn't really worry too much. The only way to find out for sure is to have bloods taken. Some cows also are more susceptible to copper defiency than others and I think I have read a publication somewhere which suggests culling the problem cows but this I guess is unacceptible to most dexter keepers.

[Ian]

Hi All
I've been reading for a while so I thought I'd come in from the cold.

Black cattle are more succeptable to copper deficiency than other colours. So I guess there could be a link between copper deficency and winter coat retention in black dexters. I'm a firm believer in feeding the Pat Coleby Mix. I aquired two heifers once that took a long time to loose their winter coats, but the next time around was not a problem after being fed the Pat Coleby Mix.

Regards