Innovator

[librarian]

I was studying this bull and didn't come up with much except some general wisdom on innovation from garybob from back in 2007.
Innovator was a Columbus son out of a Leader 21 daughter. He was used in the Homedale herd.
Did anyone use this cross the other way around; a Leader 21 son on a Columbus daughter?
What were the herds behind Columbus like? What were the breeders aiming at?
I think someone said Columbus was big, like Clark, but I always imagined him smaller.
I wish someone would reconstruct an equivalent of this cross.

 

[cflem]

Columbus was a Milking Shorthorn pedigree that was used on a lot of beef cows. There were several sons of his sire around in the 70's that were promoted and used in beef herds. Columbus and Clark were owned by Graham's in Minnesota. Thornwood Major was owned by Dick Braman in Michigan. Spiro was owned by Palo Acres Shorthorns at Gruver, TX. He was probably the stoutest on of the bunch.
I remember Graham's always had ads on the back cover of the Shorthorn Country and promoted Clark as siding 70 0/0 heifers.  We showed a Columbus son out of Ayatollah's dam that sold in Graham's dispersal sale in probably 1986-87 that was res grand behind Fifth Avenue several times and was grand champion at Ft Worth that season with Don Stout judging.
Probably the biggest impact that this bunch of Bulls had was their daughters made some good cows.

 

[oakview]

I had posted a week or so ago that Columbus was significantly smaller than Clark and Spiro was smaller yet.  I saw all three bulls and Columbus was by far my favorite, although I had two All-American bulls (in the beef division) sired by Clark and also a champion or two at the Iowa Beef Expo by him.  All, including Thornwood Major, were sired by Scottshill Major Clark who in turn was sired by LaFraise Duke 3rd.  Duke 3rd appeared in many popular dual purpose pedigrees that found their way into the ASA herd book.  I know people that used to have Major Clark and Duke 3rd semen.  Not all of this line were useful as beef animals, in my opinion.  Grahams, breeders of Clark, Columbus, Spiro, and Thornwood Major among many others, seemed to hit it about right with the increased size we were wanting at that time along with some eye appeal.  It didn't hurt they also had polled heads.  Most of the animals they raised were the result of mating animals they had purchased from someone else.  They were evidently very good at this.  Clayside Cindy 2nd was a cow they purchased specifically to mate to Columbus and the resulting first calf, Great White Hope, was one of the best dual purpose bulls of the day.  I had won the Iowa and Minnesota State Fair beef shows with Justamere Todd, a straight dual purpose bull, but I could not beat Great White Hope in class at Kansas City, Louisville, Chicago, or Denver.  It didn't hurt that Weaver Angus Farm was showing him with Roger Worthington at the halter.  I had another grandson of LaFraise Duke 3rd, Bar-D Belle's Winner, a son of Lago's Cache Winner.  He was a very poor investment.  You can't win them all.  Grahams also produced Ayatollah.  I believe his dam was a granddaughter of LaFraise Duke 3rd.  He was a little too "dairy" for me, although he did sire a few beef show winners. 

 

[librarian]

I'm studying Milking Shorthorns today. I had thought Columbus was dual so this is helping me.
Sorry, oakview, I misunderstood your post...Im glad to be set straight.
Merry Christmas.
https://archive.org/stream/milkingshorthorn00milkrich#page/n5/mode/1up

 

[Dale]

What is/was the difference between dairy (milking) Shorthorns and dual purpose Shorthorn?  I'm thinking both about the type and also the pedigree or registration.  While you are at it, what is native Shorthorn?

 

[librarian]

Hopefully a more knowledgeable person will address your question. I'll put in my understanding, hoping the weak points will get corrected.
Shorthorns began as a dual purpose breed.
Dairy Lines and Beef lines began to differentiate early on.
In America, at the the turn of the century and as late as WWII, farming was diversified, including animals and crops in continuous interdependence. Shorthorns gave a cream check to get the farmer by during the scarce times and grew a good calf for beef. These were great cows, voluminous and relatively large. I'm guessing 1500s average, larger in Canada.
After WWII, farmers became either dairy or crop or beef, not all three so the dual purpose cow was culled for being either too milky out not milky enough. The not milky enough Milking Shorthorns are the type I wish we could recover.
Native means going back to the Coats Herd Book all the way pure Shorthorn for all time.
But this only means pure by pedigree. As we know, some pedigrees are real works of art.
Also many that actually are Native are excluded due to insufficient paperwork once upon a time at importation.

 

[r.n.reed]

In answer to your original question of what influence was behind Columbus.He had about as much milk production bred into his pedigree as a Milking Shorthorn could have prior to the introduction of the Illawarra.His sire was by Lafraise Duke 3rd who was strong in Flintstone breeding and out of a polled cow  that was linebred to Clarence Forgey's Pride of Meadowbrook.The Pride's dam had a 17,000 lb milk record back in the 50's.The dam of Columbus from the Guckian herd was strong in the Clay breeding.Those Clay cows had records back in the early 1900's that would compete with a lot of Holstein records today.
I went to a sale with Clarence Forgey back in the 70's in eastern Indiana.There were about 10 Guckian cows in that sale.They all looked the same,5 frame, big barreled super correct smooth and balanced and beautiful uddered.About perfect for a beef cow but to much milk.That was one of the things that impressed about the dual herds back then.If you saw one cow you knew what the rest of the herd looked like and yet every herd had a uniqueness about it.
One of the things I remember most about that sale was at one point I was in the middle of a conversation with Clarence Forgey of Meadowbrook,John Scott of Scottshill farm,Mr.Guckian and W.C.Wood jr.of Woodside Farm.
I went to college with Larry Bertsche of LaFraise farm.They had bred up their  Milking Shorthorns to purebred Charolais and were cleaning up at the State fair one year, the same year that the Columbus cattle were doing the same in the Shorthorn show.I remember asking Larry what it was like to have their breeding dominating in 2 breeds.

 

[REBShorthorns]

Would dual purpose help to add milk production back to a line of cows that is lacking the big beautiful bags? If so where do you get some semen? Or some milking shorthorn semen. I have thought about trying to experiment with a milking breed with some commercial cows to get better milking recips. But all that is around me is holsteins

 

[librarian]

I've never understood where dual purpose Shorthorns sorted out between the two registries.
What would be the difference between the Milking Shorthorn in Columbus and the Dual purpose of that time?
When we talk about the long lost Dual Purpose type, I think of exactly what r.n. described, "They all looked the same,5 frame, big barreled super correct smooth and balanced and beautiful uddered.About perfect for a beef cow but to much milk."
As far as I know, Milking Shorthorns today are kind of (forgive me) skinny and long headed. Same for Dual Purpose. Please prove me wrong. Haumont cattle have every kind of merit, but they seem to be on a genetic island.
Would Meadowbrook Prince put things back in the long lost direction?
How do we get there from here? I don't think it's going to be done in one magic breeding, the would be an intermediary phase of recombination.

To REB, I've seen some really nice udders on Braunvieh cows that seemed like ideal recips due to their long hips and docile nature and apparent easy keeping.