Charolais cattle

[12 point]

Anyone on here have any interesting experiences with Charolais. I've never owned any myself, but know some folks that have and some that still like them. A friend of mine used to raise them, but said that some of his were pretty mean and ornery, even though he tried to spend time with them everyday. He mentioned that after the last incident with one cow ramming the door of his pickup with his grandkids inside, that it was time to try a less temperamental breed. One of them kicked his knee cap and almost crippled that leg. After he changed to Angus and Polled Herefords, he hasn't had the same type issues.

An uncle of mine raised a lot of them in Oklahoma, but I'm not sure why he preferred them.

Some friends in Corsicana like them too, and I can testify to just how ornery those bulls can be. One of the bulls was having a disagreement with another on the other side of a fence and kept digging a hole in the dirt while they staired at each other. At first as I drove by, I wasn't sure if that huge bull was gonna charge my truck, but he was too busy wanting to fight the other one.

Anyone have any close calls with Charolais or experience similar behavior issues with them?

[JeffJ]

Owned a bunched that were angus crosses. NEver saw anything out of them I didnt like temperment wise. The angus x char cross steer we butchered was awesome.

[Apullin17]

No experience here but a friend of mine has a dexters and the neighbors have Charlois'. The bull hopped the fence and now they have 2 dexter/charlois calves

[d_e_smith]

No behavior issues; pulling them jugheaded calves out would be a different story.

[rubydog]

I worked on a registered Charolais ranch as a kid and have seen some of the temprament problems that you speak of. I didn't like em but then again I am not fond of the french..

[Low Fence]

My neighbor has thousands of them, has my whole life and then some. When we ran stockers we had a few, but now we are straight dairy. Worked them a lot growing up. Like any breed if you handle enough you will run into some "high headed" ones. Never seen a problem with them calving either.

[ClayW]

We've raised/showed exotics (charolais, maine, chi, etc...) for years and never experienced any problems with a particular breed. We had some individuals with attitude problems, however.

[stxhunter]

We had a Charolais bull for several years and never had a problem with him. In fact, he was the gentlest bull we've ever had and would eat right out of your hand. As someone mentioned before they do throw some big headed calves.

[Sparkles]

We had some for a while never experienced anything but some stubborn behavior occasionally. Then we switched to Santa Gertrudis they had some mean streaks in them from time to time.

[Ryan M.]

If you're looking for show cattle then stay away from them.

[mikemorvan]

Growing up we had a Charolais bull and angus cows. The mixes were great. The bull was very gentle. That's all i got...

[cosmiccowboy]

I can't speak for a purebred charolais herd.

I do know when I was in my late teens we experimented with a charolais bull on our black angus cow calf operation and it was a nightmare.

That bull would just go wherever he wanted and fences and gates were just a challenge and he always won.

And then the calves came.

I think we had to pull every one and and I got so dang tired of being up to my armpit trying to help our cows survive and turn those jug headed calves that I definitely got a bad taste in my mouth from that experience...

[tiny's taxiderm]

We've got 2 charolais bulls and most of the cows are cross, our bulls don't fight neighbors bulls nor do they dig wholes. We do have 2 problems with them tho, 1 when they hear the jd gator coming and see the cubes they will literally try to eat out of the bag and 2, the bulls are so fat that it is hard to get them through the chute, usually have to back up to a main gate and load them that way. Honestly best cows and bulls we've ever owned, can lead them through 500 head of other cows with the vator and a empty feed sack and wont lose any amongst the other cows. (That's only when water gaps go down)

[12 point]

I guess my friend's misbehaving cattle were maybe an exception. He was probably worried about the grandkids being injured more than himself. Never had any of the bulls or cows try to chase me at either place.

I've heard lots of stories about other breeds of cows with horns that have gored other cows to death.

[Osceola]

We run Charolais bulls on everything but heifers.The calves are very easy to handle and grow off better than angus cross calves.We've had one cow get after us when we got too close to her new born.haven't had calving trouble out of them but our cows are 1300 to 1400 pounds.