Thoughts from the Middle of Nowhere

Some cows laying around content early in the morning. The cows have been much happier this year with the feed and are more content than last year. I take this as a good thing. Taken 8/21/2007.

I brought up the fact that there is some dairy blood in my cow herd and it seemed to take quite a few people by surprise so I thought I would talk about it a little. Like I said my dad decided to try and breed some milk production into his Angus cows and used Brown Swiss bulls to do it. Whether it worked or not is debatable but I think it was an experiment that worked.

In the very late 60's my dad decided he had enough of the Hereford cattle he was using and decided to start moving to the Angus breed. He thought that there size was too small and they did not produce enough milk so he decided to cross breed some dairy into the Angus to try to increase the size and milk production into them. Now there are a lot of people out there that think my dad is not a very smart person. Barely passed high school, no advanced education of any kind, just proves to them he is not smart. To me this whole scheme shows his native intelligence that the school system was never able to elect from him. He studied which breed of dairy he wanted and decided on Brown Swiss because they have a higher butterfat content in their milk than most breeds, this is what he told me, and he figured the fat concentration would help grow larger calves.

To implement this strategy my dad went back east to Michigan or Wisconsin to get his dairy cattle. He found a whole Brown Swiss dairy herd a guy was selling and bought the whole thing, around 30 cows and 3 bulls, and brought them back to the ranch in Montana. This sure looked weird, having these dairy cows around the place, but that was the plan and dad set about making it work.

My Memories of these Dairy cows. Size!! The cows were quite a bit bigger than the beef cows around here at the time but the Bulls he bred from these cows, they were Monsters. Dad always called these Swiss bulls Ferdinand. When fully grown they were larger than any horse on the place and they were mean. The cows and bulls both were mean deep down in their bones and were very hard to work with. They did not do one thing that they didn't want to do and they weren't afraid of a human in the slightest. That made them very dangerous to be around, both their size and disposition.

This didn't make them smart though. They were about the dumbest critters around. No concept of the hazards of living on thier own or taking care of a calf. I remember you really had to watch them when they calved. They would just get up and walk away from their calf after it was born if you weren't right there to keep track of it for them. For the first couple of months of the calves life the cows had to be kept in a very small pasture or they would lose track of their calves. If they lost track of them they walked away and would never look for them again. The calves were so stupid you had to teach them how to nurse. They didn't have enough smarts to stand up and do it themselves for a while. They had to be helped. A coyote? They had no concept and didn't care. In a lot of ways though, can you blame the dairy cows for this behavior with the calves. Dairy cows usually have their calves pulled from them shortly after birth and mothering instinct is not stressed by producers. This made things really hard on my dad as a cowman who wanted the cows to take care of there own calves but he kept on for his idea.

After getting his Swiss bulls and was breeding more Swiss bulls he got some Angus cows to start his experiment. He still ran Hereford cows for quite a few years and just ran around 100 Angus cows and bred them to his Swiss bulls and then kept Replacements from them to breed the swiss down to about 1/4 for his idea. He kept this up for quite a few years until one year a late spring snow storm, May, caused a very large number of sun burned bag in the remaining Hereford cows and he sold every last one of them that fall and bought some more Angus cows to make up the difference and we have had an Angus base ever since. He kept breeding some of the Angus cows to the Swiss bulls to keep adding replacements to the herd and all the things he was working for worked like a champ.

The cows size came up, calf weights came up and it appeared the cows milk was up. Downside to this experiment though. Some extra color in the calves, and disposition. The Angus carried their maternal instincts through very well but they picked up the mean dispositions of the Swiss with a passion. The other downside was the buyers didn't like the idea of dairy in the beef cows. To this days the buyers hate it if a guy has some dairy in his beef cows. It's really looked down upon.

Don't get me wrong, any guy who ended up buying the calves turned out to like them and how they performed but getting past the idea of the Swiss in them was too much for some of them. I took some of these crosses as fat animals in 4H. I never did very well when judged because I would tell the judge about the Swiss ancestry when asked so that immediately got them downgraded but you should have seen how I did when they slaughtered them and judged them solely on the carcass quality. If mine didn't get first it was in the top fivwe every time. They did yield out well, grow good and do good for my dad and the feeders. They just didn't like the idea of what they were.

My dad finally got tired of fighting the buyers over the Swiss in the calves and got rid of the Swiss cows and bulls and let the Swiss component breed itself out of the herd. It's still there as the picture shows but you don't see it like you used to. I think the breeding helped get the herd where it is today. Good cattle that do well on grass or on feed.

We Preg-checked the replacement heifers yesterday. I wish I could say it went well but that wouldn't be the case. It is normal for me to have 10-12% dries on my replacement heifers. This time they went, I hate to admit it, 23% dry. Almost twice what is normal. When the vet checked the first one he said, "this isn't a good sign guys, she's dry."

The question now is why were there so many drys? The first thought was trich. The vet has had some experience with this and says he really doesn't think that is the problem for three reasons. A herd being infected with trich for the first time will normally run right around 33% dry and we were well off that figure. Second, if the herd was infected with trich he would expect to find some bred early and almost everything else bred real late with almost none in the middle. He said the pregnant ones were well spread out through the breeding cycle so it just didn't feel like trich. Lastly we used all virgin bulls on these heifers and since the bulls carry the disease from year to year they couldn't have infected the heifers.

Next he said any other disease that could realistically be a problem, bvd, ibr, we vaccinate for and have for years. So he said he would question the bulls. Truthfully I would to. I did use one less bull than I would normally use in a pasture of this size and roughness and then one of the bulls got foot rot that I didn't catch a ways into the breeding season so he didn't work the full season. I would bet this is the problem but I'm just not sure.

The only way to double check this would be to preg check the whole herd after weaning. If there were a disease problem with then heifers it would also more than likely affect the cows so they would come in with a high percentage of drys too. If they don't that would more point towards the bulls situation. I haven't decided yet if I want to preg check the whole herd or not. That's quite a bit of money and work to do something i normally don't do and I'm not sure it is necessary. I will have to think about it and decide.

Damn the bad luck. I hate shit like this.

It is innocence that is full and experience that is empty. It is innocence that wins and experience that loses. Charles Peguy

I found this article interesting.

Family ranchers fighting growing meatpacking industry

Eric Nelson, a fourth-generation rancher and farmer who operates a feedlot here, isn't looking for more government cash like many farmers are. But he's still hoping for a little help when the Senate debates a farm bill this fall.

Nelson and many other family ranchers in the Midwest and West are hoping Congress can help them fight the gradual consolidation of the meat industry, which they say is hurting their business. A handful of large meatpacking companies slaughtered 80 percent of steers and heifers in 2005, up 30 percent from 20 years ago.

"We just want a level playing field, an environment in which we can be profitable," Nelson said. "Give us true competition and we'll take care of ourselves."

Ranchers who own smaller operations have long sought changes in the law that would help their operations stem growing competition from the larger companies. And with new political dynamics in Congress, that could happen this year.

This is interesting because its all about packer ownership of cattle. I've talked about this before and the Packer and Stockyards act passed almost 100 years ago prevents packers from owning cattle before they slaughter them. The government has never enforced this law since the packers have gotten really big and diversified and have other arms that "own" the cattle instead of the packer themselves and the law never took into account forward contracting which the packer do now. I feel the Packers and Stockyards act could have included these items but the packers paid off the government to not do that which has led to the situation now.

So, should Congress expand the law to include some of the new ways the packers have found to own the cattle before they slaughter them? I don't think it will hurt but I'm not on the end of the business that sells to the packers. I haven't talked to enough feeders about this to really understand the situation from their angle. The story talks about one guy that says it would hurt his bottom line if the law were changed so he couldn't sell when he wanted to the packers. I have to at least acknowledge this point and wonder if there are more out there with this opinion or is it an isolated one.

I always like when my preconceptions are challenged like this. I'm not saying this article has changed my mind but it has opened me up to hearing another opinion about this situation. I can't imagine not allowing the packers to own cattle before slaughter would hurt but there is another side to this story, as most stories have and i enjoy opening my mind and hearing it.

Ignorance is the primary source of all misery and vice. Victor Cousin

The wild plums are ripe again and there is a lot of them and they are very sweet this year. No, My Darling Wife doesn't make jelly out of them. We eat so little jelly that it's not worth the time nor effort. Taken 8/16/2007.

S.Korea to resume US beef inspections

South Korea's Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry said Friday that imports of U.S. beef can resume as it will restart quarantine inspections suspended since earlier this month.

South Korea had again effectively stopped all U.S. beef imports in early August after discovering shipment containing a vertebrae.

The ministry said in a statement it made the decision following U.S. inspections of beef export procedures that found four meat-processing facilities mistakenly sent beef with banned substances to South Korea.

"The export shipping ban on the four facilities will remain until new import sanitation regulations are issued to prevent a relapse," the ministry statement said.

I guess this is good news. I am so tired of this South Korea situation. If the meat packers would just do the job right, we wouldn't have these problems. I guess doing the right thing would be too hard for the meat packers.

Isn't it sad to go to your grave without ever wondering why you were born? Who, with such a thought, would not spring from bed, eager to resume discovering the world and rejoicing to be part of it? Richard Dawkins

Matt over at Left in the West asks a question of the Montana farm and ranch community about some editorials that are running around. Since i can't comment at Left in the West i would leave my thoughts here.

First we have Rep. Kendall Van Dyk giving us his opinoin that the Montana Stock Growers Association (MSGA) doesn't represent its members. Then we have Errol Rice, executive vice president of MSGA, and his defense of the issues Van Dyk brought up. Matt then says that Rice didn't have an adequate defense for his issues and the MSGA has a lot of explaining to do.

To start with, why didn't I bring this up when Van Dyk's original editorial come up? Because it was blatant, partisan politics and I don't respond well to them. Anyone with half a brain would realize this and not give it the time of day but since Matt asks I will give my take. Van Dyk and the Democratic party are just trying to peel off some members of the MSGA in front of the elections to try to maintain their majority in the state house. Thats all this is about since it is well known that MSGA leans Republican. most cattle producers that are Democrats are members of the Montana Cattlemens Association since it is organized and run as part of the Democratic Party. Trying to peel off MSGA members is obviously a Democratic strategy this time around.

The MSGA is a member driven organization. They vote on how they are going to stand on an issue if at all possible. HOW CAN A VOTE DRIVEN, MEMBER ORGANIZATION BE OUT OF TOUCH WITH ITS MEMBERS? It can't be. The stances it takes are what the majority of its members want. I am not a member of the MSGA but I do know how it works. Did they represent their members. Yes. Did their stance make the Democrats happy? No. So the Democrats, Matt being one of them, attack. So Democrats don't think that members of an organization can vote to run it like they want? Just because the MCA follows in lock step with the Democratic party doesn't mean the MSGA needs to. That might be what Matt and the Democrats want but that is not reality. The members of the MSGA have a choice and are exercising it.

You will note that I have not talked about any of the issues Van Dyk or Rice brought up. That's because anybody who reads my space here knows how I feel on almost every one of these issues. That's what I tend to talk about, issues. Not which political party is better than the other or which organization is supporting what. I talk about issues because that is whats important. There is no political party or organization that I completely agree with so I stay away from commenting on them to the best of my ability. Sometimes things force my hand and I talk about it but for the most part I don't. Also I didn't comment on the issues because i knew most of the MSGA position on them and Van Dyk misrepresented most of them but that's politics at its finest. Misrepresent your opponents position.

So Matt, you heard from me on this issue. A member driven organization that is vote driven does by definition support it's members and can not be out of touch with them. You might not agree with the policies they support, but its their right to support them if that's what they want. The people that don't agree with the MSGA position have all ready left and joined the MCA so what is the problem. Quit playing politics with this and let people have their opinion. That is what this country is about and what you claim you are fighting for.