66 Days Away

It seems like if you are a seed stock producer the hunt for your next herd sire, never ends.  In fact the day after you buy your next herd sire you had better be looking for the next one.  Oh there are lots of bulls for sale and between now and the end of April thousands of them will change hands and find a new home, but herd sires are few and far between.

Everyone has there own check list of requirements and no two buyers will have the same list.  He has to be the right size, color, polled or homozygous polled, birth weight, performance, pedigree, soundness, testicle measurements and the list goes on and on.

We would like to introduce a new exciting young bull that will claim a spot in our breeding program for 2012. This youngster is bred for calving ease with some performance in the package as well.

RJY First Time 18Y.
Here's the list of credentials that he brings with him:

• Homozygous Black
• Homozygous Polled
• Low Birth weight - 80 lbs
• In the top 5% for Birthweight and 20% for calving ease.
• Sired by - HTP SVF In Dew Time
• Backed by strong cows families like - First Date, Dream Date, Ebony's Joy 123 - L, Ebony's Antoinette, Honeydew and CNS Sheeza Dream K107W.

RJY First Time 18Y has recently sold to BS Ranch.  He will walk in their pastures, but we believe so much in this young calving ease bull that we have retained 1/2 semen interest in him.  We are currently getting ready to send him to stud. He has recently been added to the Bouchard Livestock "Genetics That Make A Difference" 2012 catalog.  If you would like the opportunity to share in this new young sire, contact Bouchard Livestock or us at High Country Cattle.  Breeding season is only 66 days away

Christmas Comes Early

Wow what a weekend.  This past weekend was the 17th Annual Checkers Sale.  This sale has built a name for it's self as one of the top sales to purchase Simmentals genetics from.  This year in addition to the 60 lots of Red & Black Simmentals 25 top end Fullblood cattle were added.

We had 3 lots consigned - a herdsire prospect - RJY Rival 13Y, a Donor female - SS Ebony's Dreamdate S27 and a bred heifer - RJY Dream's Promdate 16X.

The sale started with Lot 2 - a herdsire prospect from Meadow Acres.  They purchased his dam from the sale in 2010 for $25,000.  A big investment.....that looked very good when the hammer came down at $83,000 for her first calf. Congratulations Kirsten and Dustin.

Lot 47 followed - our bull calf - he commanded $40,000 from Kopp Farms and the semen syndicate of Willow Creek, Barclay Smith, South Seven Simmentals, Hanna Simmentals and Bonchuk Simmentals.

Sale Time - Rival selling for $40,000

Thank you to this group of progressive breeders for their commitment to this young bull.

Continually throughout the afternoon females sold for top dollar.  The high selling bred for $18,000 and the high selling open heifer for $20,000. 

We are very excited to see what our females can do for their new owners.  Thank you to Scott Gosnier, Nebraska for purchasing Dreamdate and Bar L7, Calgary AB for their purchase of Promdate.



Dream Date 27S
Her new home is in Nebraska

Promdate is now owned by Bar L7

Not only was the sale fantastic, but we enjoyed seeing so many of our cattle friends, enjoying some Christmas cheer with them and all the laughs that we had over the weekend.  The people in the cattle industry are the best gift of all.  The sale averaged $8273 on 61 lots of Red and Black Simmentals and $7630 on 25 Fullblood lots.  Congratulations Simmentals breeders on the great cattle you are raising.  Merry Christmas.

Favorites

It seems like not matter what you talk about everyone has a favorite something.  Favorite coffee, way to spend a weekend, favorite relative and here at High Country we have our favorite cows.  If you have followed our blog for awhile you will know that Harmony and Fantasy were Crystal's favorites,

Fantasy

  Ruffles was the favorite for Stacy

Ruffles

and Rob just likes them all.  Although I think he is a bit partial to Elle and First Date

Elle

First Date

This weekend we are selling 2 of  my favorites, Dream Date and Prom Date. 

Dream Date

I've been banned from doing the sale cattle chores as every time I do, I tell Rob "Do you really think we should be selling Prom Date? 

Prom Date

She's going to make such a great cow?  How are we going to replace her?  This is where he tells me that we have a full sister to her in the herd and 3 additional daughters from Dream Date so all will be fine.

He must have been thinking yesterday that I might not be 100% convinced.  So he made a purchase at the Shades Sale in Manitoba.  MRL Miss 644Y - soon to be named MRL Obsession 644Y is on her way to High Country Cattle. 

Obsession

We haven't met in person yet but from all that we have heard about this Wheatland Predator 922W daughter she could very well be my new favorite.  Might make selling Dream Date and her daughter Prom Date on December 17 just a little bit easier.