Diversification proved to be key in evolving the ranch. What began as an Angus-based commercial herd, the trio took signals from the data and sought new avenues for revenue. The Woolfolk men have a target: creating more high-quality, profitable cattle. As for how to get there? They’ll continue to follow the numbers.
First-generation seedstock producers Kevin and Lydia Yon, along with their children, Drake, Sally, and Corbin, have been continuously improving their farm since they drove the first fence posts on what was a 100-acre abandoned peach orchard in 1996.
Ross Humphreys’ adept gait tells of many days in and out of the saddle checking his herd, fence lines, water tanks, and grass availability. Yet at 72, he can still drop down and roll under the barbed wire fence quicker than most men half his age. But Humphreys is not your typical cowboy. He’s a chemist, book publisher, family guy, conservationist, and rancher.
A passion and an entrepreneurial spirit started CK Cattle in Alabama. The Madaris’s were chasing a fantasy but now support three households through their Angus seedstock business.
The subject of herd improvement is more nuanced than, “Buy better bulls.” Yet, that’s a pretty foundational place start. This Black Ink column explores the idea of buying better.
The pastures at Dalebanks Angus near Eureka, Kan., hide the plants’ challenge well. Native big and little bluestem adapted over the ages to thrive in the shallow soil, only a few inches deep in places, that blankets the underlying limestone. Shards of flint mingle with the roots.
Two fishing cabins stood on the edge of the San Marcos river in 1919. Sixty years later Bodey Langford connected the two, as brick-by-brick, he built a home where he and Kathy would raise daughters Anna and Callie. There on his late father’s ranch near Lockhart, Texas, he also built his herd with purpose.
It’s a call to serve, the same that led John Grimes to run for the American Angus Association board of directors. The sun now setting on his second three-year term, he reflects on his leadership as Certified Angus Beef® board chairman. The head of Maplecrest Farms in Hillsboro, Ohio, says there’s no instant gratification in the cattle business, with constant change cattlemen have to be nimble.
“Value” in feeder calf marketing is a relative term. All calves have some and the trick is to capture your share, said Paul Dykstra. Success is rooted in your customers he said. Customer changes through the supply chain from feeder, to packer to consumer.
When the industry was going one way, Matt Perrier saw his parents and grandparents going another. That dedication to quality, to the Perrier family and Dalebank Angus’s goal of “practical, profitable genetics,” was rewarded with the 2020 CAB Seedstock Commitment to Excellence award.