Angus Seedstock
Our primary business and breeding focus has shifted from selling angus seedstock to selling grass finished beef directly to consumers. Though we have done both for a number of years the time came to choose one direction because it proved difficult to serve two masters. Orienting a breeding program towards selling bulls had proven counterproductive to our beef business. I also found breeding cattle for the primary purpose of selling bulls focuses trait selection on chaotic and moving targets – harmful to traits important to our grass fed beef customers. Further, a focus on those who buy the beef and serve it to their family was more gratifying than a focus on producers who were primarily concerned about pounds, visual appraisals (each person’s was different) and traits convenient to themselves. In a properly functioning market, traits important to consumers should have been nearly identical to those of cow calf producers. Somehow producers were not receiving clear market signals from beef consumers to direct their breeding decisions. Why is that?
In our estimation, the beef industry is a monopolistic and dysfunctional industry. End user’s desires are for all practical purposes ignored and even ridiculed by some. Such industries exist to serve themselves – not beef consumers who have few alternatives except to buy from them and their vested purveyors. The problem isn’t an individual or group of individuals in some sort of conspiracy. It is a structural problem that evolved out of gradual over concentration of the industry with the support of the federal bureaucracy and self-serving industry lobbies. Federal bureaucracies naturally prefer a few large industry players they have become cozy with because it makes the job of regulation and control easier.
Based on what our beef customers told us, our top priority should be to provide exceptionally tender beef that is produced locally in a natural, pasture-based grazing system. Further with their viewpoint in mind, other genetic traits we select for are marbling for flavor, adequate rib eye size, fleshing ability, adequate carcass weights to minimize processing costs (5.5 frame) and efficient cattle that excel in low input forage only systems. To maintain consistency in the quality of our grass fed beef, the cattle are line bred within the Emulous line of the angus breed.
While you can still buy private treaty bulls in the fall we are not actively selling or promoting them. If you are interested please contact me in the summer prior to taking yearling weights in October. The price on the bulls is $3,500.
Semen is available of a few select bulls. Contact us if you are interested.
