New Venture

Over the years we have marketed our gentics through a number of ways.  Consignment sales like Checkers, Red & Black, Agribiton, Farm Fair, Private Treaty  for the Females, embryos and semen at the North American in Louisville and most recently at the New Years Resolution sale.  On the bull side of things we marketed them directly off the farm for a number of years  and then joined the consignment sale of The Red Deer Bull Sale for the last few.  For 2013 we are really excited to be a part of the Simmental Bull Summit on February 25, 2013 at Bentley, AB

Our good friends and fellow Simmental breeders John and Stefon Beechinor have built a beautiful and big sale facility at their farm just  south of Bentley.  They have been feeding our bulls along with theirs and those of Eagle Ridge Simmentals since weaning.  Sale day will be stress free (at least for the bulls) as they only have to move from one side of the farm to the sale barn on the other.

We will have 10 bulls in the sale.  Here is a sampling

  Most from our walking bulls McIntosh Sweet Meat 32X,

3D Mr Red Sure Fire 449X

and IPU Revolution 172U. 














Along with  ET calves from LFE Rochfort 3013T and Black Joker.  68 lots are catalogued and we invite you to join us for an Alberta Beef lunch at 11:00 with the sale starting at 1:00.

If you would like to check out the sale offering before sale day, the catalog link is on our website at High Country Cattle as well as  a video of some of the bulls.  If you are unable to join us that day but something catches your eye give us a call, we always love to talk cows or just have a visit with our fellow cattlemen and cattle women.

Most Stressful Day of the Year.

We all have some stress in our lives.  Those that raise crops and livestock have many factors that are out of their control.  Market fluctuation, and weather are two of the big ones.  But as a cattle producer there seems to be one day that adds even a bit more stress - Semen testing of the bull pen.

We spend over a year raising these bulls to develop them for breeding stock.  If they make the bull pen there are the extra costs of feed, registrations, time, promotion, and semen testing.

Bull pen in the fall

So you can see why the stress level goes way up on the day of testing.  In a moment you can be told the bull that you thought might be one of your higher sellers has just had his value decreased considerably and you still have all of the extra management costs into him.

We have sold a few bulls off of the farm and we have 6 that are consigned to the Red Deer Bull Sale on Monday March 19.  They were checked in for their semen tests last week.  The verdict was.......They All Passed! 

All of the bulls had excellent mobility scores and they measured up very well, ranging from 36 - 39 cm.

Now we can breath a little easier and spend our energy on getting them ready for sale day.  Watch for pictures of our consignments.  5 sons of IPU Revolution and 1 Black Joker son.

Sale Time

Wow the week has been a busy one.  Just got home from our National Show and annual meeting in Edmonton at Farmfair International.  Great week for our breed and for High Country Cattle.  But more to come on that in the next few days.  Today we are focusing on the North American Select Sale that is being held in Louisville.                                                                                          

CAJS Elegant Force when purchased
at Louisville in 2010

CAJS Elegant Force as a 2 yr old.

HC PowerDrive 88H

PVF BF 26F Black Joker

We have a very exciting lot - Lot 9 embryos out of our donor CAJS Elegant Force and your choice of either HC Powerdrive 88H or PVF BF 26F Black Joker.  These embryos are currently in Canada but are exportable world wide.  Elegant Force is a Steel Force daughter and a grand daughter or the strong H25 cow family.
Our daughter Crystal will be representing us at the sale.

 You can watch and bid on line at www.edjecast.com or contact sales management Doug Parke at  859.421.6100     For more information on Elegant Force check her out on our website at www.highcountrycattle.com  The sale starts at 5:00 pm est.

All I want for Christmas

Some of you may remember that about this time last year Rob came home and said "I know what I want for Christmas."  Now this is not an unusual statement for most people, but Rob never asks for gifts.  What he really wanted was Lot 3 at the NAILE Simmental Sale in Louisville, KY.  I think my reply was - you and a lot of other people.

Fast forward and with a partnership formed with our daughter Stacy - CAJS Elegant Force W24 (Lot 3) found her new home at High Country Cattle Services. 

CAJS Elegant Forc

Elle - as a 2 yr old - Summer 2011

 "Elle" as we have fondly named her has exceeded our expectations.  She has turned  into a beautiful young cow and produced one of the best heifer calves to date at HCC. 

RJY / SLY Southern Elegance

Her BMR Explorer daughter will be a part of our show string this fall.  "Elle" has entered into our embryo program and due to the success we had flusing her this year, we have decided to consign 6 embryos (that are exportable worldwide) to the NAILE sale on November 14.  Lots 9A & 9B are embryos by CAJS Elegant Force W24 (Steel Force daughter) and your choice or HC Power Drive 88H or PVF-BF-BF26 Black Joker. 



HC Powerdrive

Black Joker

The genetics that the Elle embryos present are quite unique.  To date, there is no SVF Steel Force semen available in Canada, her  3/4 brother  - Mr. HOC Broker is the current Reserve Champion Bull at Denver,and there is an extremely limited amount of both Powerdrive and Black Joker semen available.  Maybe it's time to do a little Christmas shopping for yourself.

Treasure Hunt

A few years back we thought that we would try to find a Simmental heifer in the US and flush her to HC Power Drive 88H as there was no qualified semen available to come to Canada.  We contacted a fellow that had some Power Drive semen for sale, (better get the semen before you buy the heifer).  After visiting with him for a while he said" Why don't you just buy the semen and flush one of your donors to him?"  We explained the situation with the semen not being qualified for Canada.  He suggested we contact his semen distributor.  After several phone calls we discovered a reasonable amount of semen that was available to come to Canada.  Jackpot!  Within a few weeks we had secured the remaining amount of semen that was Canadian qualified.  Fast forward a few years and we now have several outstanding HC Power Drive daughters in our herd. 



HC Power Drive 88H





We're looking forward to flushing our new donor's  CAJS Elegant Force W24 to him in the near future.  There was Power Drive semen sold in the Denver 2011 sale that brought $800/straw.

In the spring of 2010 I suggested to Rob that we buy a few straws of PVF-BF Black JokerS36.  

Again an older Black Simmental bull but one that is leaving some tremendous daughters, and 2 of our best bull  calves this year are Joker sons.



RJY First Date 1W - Black Joker Daughter



We checked our inventory and had 4 straws in the tank.  We thought that was enough for our smaller herd.  And there was lots of semen available so we didn't make the purchase.  Again fast forward to the spring of 2011.  We were browsing through he AI catalogs deciding on which sires to use this year.  We added Black Joker to the list.  When we phoned in our order we were surprised to hear that Joker was sold out and we were about the 10th person to call looking for some.  Now what?  Again we started our search on the web and began making some calls.  The treasure hunt had started again.  I'm not sure who has been looking out for us, but again we were able to find 30 straws of Black Joker........qualified for Canada.............the last in existence.  Jackpot! 

Through lots of phone calls and some very cooperative staff at the semen distribution centre our semen arrived 18 hours prior to breeding 3 of our donors, SS Ebony's Dreamdate SS27, CAJS Elegant Force W24, and CDY Signature Black 2N. Nothing like cutting it close. We now have 33 Black Joker Embryo's, a few were implated fresh, a few will be the start of Crystal's US Simmental herd, and the rest we'll just have to see what happens with them. It's nice to know you can get lucky once in a while.