Shorty hf bulls

[knabe]

yawn.  you would think that the psi of the pissing match here couldn't get a wall 1 foot away wet.

 

[justintime]

OK aj, from your posts of the last several months, you do not like anything I do...or say. That is quite obvious.  I have tried to never get into the negativity that you like to portray in some of your posts. I have tried to just explain what I have tried to do in my herd. I have never said that you were wrong, in fact I have always said that you are obviously doing something right if you have survived in this business. I guess I do not understand how anything I do here, has any affect on what you do. While I have never visited your outfit, I have been told that you run a good place. I would have to agree with this, even without visiting you, and I  base this on the fact that you have been in the cattle business for many years... and you have survived.

It is most obvious that you do not like Timeline and you think he is as close to the second coming of Satan as there is. That is your right. You don't ever have to use him or anything related to him. Now, what has that got to do with me using him because I think he has some traits that I can use?  The quick answer is absolutely nothing.  You don't have to ever mention him again, as he will never affect your herd in any way. I am hopeful that he will affect my herd in some positive ways, but he will never be of any concern to you... ever. I find it interesting that one of the very good herds in Western Canada, the Buffalo Lake herd, chose to breed their entire herd to Timeline this year. That too, will never affect you in any way.

You have continually told me that I was wrong ever since I came to SP. I will agree that I am wrong on many occasions, and I have never said I was right on most anything I have commented on. . I have just tried to explain what I do, or try to do, or what I have learned from a lifetime in all sectors of the beef industry . I guess where it comes down to is that you have survived and I have survived, so what is the problem? We live far enough apart that we really should never affect each other. Please forgive me, if I appear to be proud of being able to develop a bull market here. The fact is that I am quite proud of this, as I have worked almost all of my life and I am finally seeing results. The fact that remains is that you do not have to like me or my breeding operation. I really don't care. I will stand my record beside your's any day  and quite frankly, I have no plans to change my breeding program just because you tell me I am wrong. My customers mean more to me than any comments you make about what I do. Our operations may be quite different so how does what you do affect me, and what I do affect you? Is it possible that we could both be right, or partly right? I suggest that the key to measuring any success in this business can be based on results.

Please tell me how many bulls you have sold in the past decade and how many females you have sold for breeding purposes ? You must have a powerful program if you can continually tell me that I am wrong when I have sold over 150 bulls in the past 5 years, along with over 100 females privately from the farm in the past 5 years. We will sell another 40 females on October 20th by auction. Besides this, I have sold a few hundred embryos to 6 countries and have 4 herd sires that are being used internationally. I am only stating my facts as I really want to know what I can do to improve. I am always seeking improvement so I am always looking for new ideas. Believe me I am  very open minded.

You have told me regularly that I do not produce cattle for the real world. Well, I guess the two commercial producers who bought purchased their 14th bulls in the last 10 years from me, obviously haven't heard that they don't operate in the real world. Both these outfits make their entire living from their cows... and they keep coming back and buy at least 1 bull a year each. Two other herds with over 800 cows purchased their first Shorthorn bull from us last year. Both are running mostly black Simmental and Angus bulls. One is using a few Hereford bulls as well. Both returned this year to buy more Shorthorn bulls. Both said they were impressed with the calving ease and the vigor in the calves. I guess they never got the memo that Shorthorns are cow killers. In their herds, the Shorthorns appear to be calving as good or better than the Simmental and Angus sires. One of these ranchers used the Shorthorn and a Polled Hereford bull on their heifers. He had lots of calving problems from the Hereford and was very happy with the Shorthorn.

So, I would really appreciate a bit of insight as to what you are doing that is so much better than I am,  so that I can try to improve my operation. I am by no way saying I do everything right. Far from it. Economics affect my decisions as I am sure they do yours as well. You keep telling me I am wrong, on virtually everything I say, but you have never told me if I do anything right at all.... or what I can do to improve. I guess I am just wrong and that is all that matters.  

Personally, if I was as unhappy with the breed I have chosen to raise as you seem to be, I would have left long ago. There just has to be another breed that would offer more enjoyment and satisfaction. To me, that has to a part of the reason we do what we do. I have had many opportunities to go into other professions in my life. Maybe I was totally wrong as I chose to continue to do the only real thing I have ever wanted to do. That as well, has been my decision to make, and most days, I have no regrets for doing what I did.

 And I will also mention to all the fine people from the great state of Kansas who have contacted me and apologized for your actions on SP, you really do not have to continue to do so. It is really not required.

I apologize for the length of this, but I am getting rather tired of constantly being told that what I do is wrong, wrong, wrong.... with never a word of what I could do to make it right. I came to SP to learn and to compare notes and ideas with other cattle breeders and people who love this business. The time has come that we all get back to doing this.

 

[knabe]

jit what you need to is buy aj's bull and female crop and do all the work for aj selling their progeny so his program can improve with income for him which you of course don't get a cut. 

anything less would be selfish.

perhaps you could start and run a breed journal for him and sell advertising while you are at it.

 

[knabe]

maybe this is the problem.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/8048844/Brits-sense-of-humour-fails-at-the-age-of-52-study-finds.html

older men are grumpier than women – four times grumpier

wow. my sample population disagrees with that.  perhaps it's just british men who still remember what it's like to be a man.

 

[trevorgreycattleco]

JIT, you play the game and you play it well. In order to survive and profit in the purebred biz you HAVE to play the game. In one comment you say you have and I quote" a wide array of bulls to offer some unique qualities to produce sound cattle that will work anywhere." Really??  I think you are tryin to be like Wal Mart and have something for everyone instead of breeding your cows to your bulls and producing cattle that work in ur area and not worry about anyone elses. I'm not telling you what to do just a opinion. One more opinion from me,  we like some growth here in the states, but we also like 70 to 90 lb calves not the 120 plus Salute type. How come I have never seen a pasture breeding pic of Timeline? Just the one where he is hog fat is all we ever get. How about some pics of Timeline calves being raised with no creep feed? I have tried these same lines for myself and all I can say about them is stockyard bound for me. No real world doability. For sure not fescue cattle.

You are partly right, in that I need to produce cattle that will work for a wider array of people. Why is this? It is simply because I have to make over 90 % of my living from these cattle. Maybe it is different where you live, but here where I am, I have commercial producers who want a wide array of type. I actually have one commercial man who wants big BW bulls as, in his own mind, he is convinced that he can get more pounds at weaning on their calves and he doesn't mind helping a few cows calve. I do not keep any bulls over 110 lbs ( remember, that our calves here are probably 10 lb heavier at birth than in midwest states). As I have said before, I have not had a single complaint from the buyers of over 200 bulls since I started banding everything over 110 lbs. The guy who likes the bigger BWs has asked me to keep one of the bigger BWs and he will use him, but I have not done this.

I have always been very amazed how different people select their bulls. We usually let the potential buyers walk through the bull pens and let them pick themselves. Usually many come out having picked different bulls. Timeline was possibly the only exception we have had in recent years, as almost everyone picked him as their favorite bull. By the way, the hog fat picture you see on the side of my posts was taken after he had bred all the cows at one of his owners. He was used in two more herds after this picture was taken.

I know there are some 120 lb BWs from Salute, but I have not had any. None. I expect you will not believe this. I have only had a few calves from him though ( 8 in total) and they have been from 88 lbs to 105 lbs. In the year we used Salute I also had two Gizmo bull calves. Both were over 110 lbs at birth and both were banded. I am not bashing Gizmo, so don't go there. I love the bull . It just happened I had two bigger calves from him.

So, when I have to sell cattle to a wide array of people who have a wide array of likes and dislikes, I do use some different bloodlines. When you look at our pen of bulls, you will see some variation, but far less than I have seen at some herds who use one or two bulls of the same bloodlines. If you were to come to  my place to look for a bull, you may not want some of them, but I expect you could find something you did. I have not had any problems getting my bulls sold, as we have sold out for the last 6 years now.

I also believe in blending bloodlines. I think it is an important part of breeding cattle. Like you, I have some bloodlines that I am not fond of, but if I were to find an animal that was from that bloodline that I thought would work in my breeding program, I would not be afraid to use it. I would also say that it is your right to disagree with the bloodlines I use, but it is not your right to tell me what to do, in order to make a living. I do not have another job to go too to support my cattle habit. You can sell bulls and females in your area, and I will do the same here. I doubt if we will bother each other. I am hoping to sell 40 bulls in 2011 and my goal is to sell 50 bulls within 3 years. What are your goals. You seen to have a lot of answers but very little performance to back it up. JMO

Well JIT my goals are to stay in business this year and continue to rebuild my herd from MY females that I have bred. I have been doing this almost 12 years now. I have a reserve champ bull at Louisville so far and the third high selling red angus in Kentucky on my first try. I became more and more discouraged with all the different Trump lines I was using so the decision was made to cull the herd. Over 90% of the herd. I have begun to close my herd and just build from within. Trump lines lack masculinity in a big way IMO. Look at the other thread on hear about okotoks wonderful cow and look what Salute did. Hard to tell heifers from bulls. I am hear for all the little people that have  bought into believing what they are buying is the best and ended up pissed off or are heading down this road right now. My invetsment in shorties was pretty big and I can promise you I have tried all the mainstream herds one way or another and when put to the test, other lines outperform trump by a mile. I have no beef with you JIT, I just think you squeak the loudest and in return you get the most grease. Hopefully in a few more years I will have my numbers up to get a bull sale going and I guess time will tell who was on the right path.

 

[justintime]

Well JIT my goals are to stay in business this year and continue to rebuild my herd from MY females that I have bred. I have been doing this almost 12 years now. I have a reserve champ bull at Louisville so far and the third high selling red angus in Kentucky on my first try. I became more and more discouraged with all the different Trump lines I was using so the decision was made to cull the herd. Over 90% of the herd. I have begun to close my herd and just build from within. Trump lines lack masculinity in a big way IMO. Look at the other thread on hear about okotoks wonderful cow and look what Salute did. Hard to tell heifers from bulls. I am hear for all the little people that have  bought into believing what they are buying is the best and ended up pissed off or are heading down this road right now. My invetsment in shorties was pretty big and I can promise you I have tried all the mainstream herds one way or another and when put to the test, other lines outperform trump by a mile. I have no beef with you JIT, I just think you squeak the loudest and in return you get the most grease. Hopefully in a few more years I will have my numbers up to get a bull sale going and I guess time will tell who was on the right path.
[/quote]


Is it possible that we are both doing some things right? Does it make any sense for every cattle breeder to do the same thing, or use the same bloodlines? Why is it, in every other thing in our lives, whether it be a car, siding for your house, or an appliance for your home, that the rule is " buyer beware" which basically means you have to understand what you are doing when you purchase a product.  When a person buys an animal and it either doesn't perform in your conditions or it turns out that you paid too much for it, why is that only the seller's fault? It only is, if they have misrepresent the product. I have never had a gun to my head when I am bidding on an animal, or when I am trying to buy an animal privately. The final decision to buy or not to buy has always been mine to make. Like you, I have shipped out many expensive animals over the years, but I always blame myself NOT the seller. Just last week a fairly expensive animal went to meet their maker, and I chalked it up to another lesson learned.

I believe we are all masters of our own destiny's. I know their are crooks out there like in any other business, but most of the breeders I know try to use genetics that they can market.  You have found that the Trump cattle do not work in your conditions. That doesn't mean that they don't work for some other people. That is what is nice about this business, is that we can all decide what is best for our own operations. There are many other options, if you don't like certain cattle.

 

[aj]

That is a great song.George Jones......the king is gone. It just hits a lick. I down loaded it. Its hard to be cool with a flat top. George pulls it off. As far as the cattle deal goes I like to get you going. You are so self absorbed. It is all about you. Its just fun to read your posts. The people who need to know know about my cattle.Keep up the good work JIT. We all love you.

 

[knabe]

The people who need to know know about my cattle know about them.

what about the people who don't "need" to know, but want to know if they "need" to know.

i guess that would open up your program to evaluation, something you don't need to know?

 

[aj]

You know....I don't know . I know not to crow. Does that make me a ho? Now should I go? We won second place in rate of gain in the Shorthorn test 2 years ago.We were second behind Wakuaru by one tenth of a pound. We should get some in the Montezuma test this year. We will see how they do since my cows aren't big enough. DR'ds seeing interest. Not show people though. So....if you need to "glow".....do you need to "show''? Yabba Dabba dooooo. ;D

 

[justintime]

That is a great song.George Jones......the king is gone. It just hits a lick. I down loaded it. Its hard to be cool with a flat top. George pulls it off. As far as the cattle deal goes I like to get you going. You are so self absorbed. It is all about you. Its just fun to read your posts. The people who need to know know about my cattle.Keep up the good work JIT. We all love you.

If I have come across about " it being all about me" then I must apologize as that has never been my intention. It is certainly not this at all. It is really about each one of us, trying to use genetics that we feel will work in our herds, and allowing other breeders to do the same. That is all I have tried to explain on here. When I talk about my operation, I do so, because it is where I have drawn any experience I have acquired over the years. I keep saying that I have made many mistakes but I have tried to learn from them, rather than just try to find someone else to blame for them. I often think that a site like this would be such a wonderful place if we could all help each other try to do better in what we do. To some extent, I think this site is still the best place for this, and it is what makes this place one of the good sites I have found. I really like to see other people's successes, and I do not think that anyone who displays some pictures of their animals as being self absorbed in any way.

aj, I have found many things that you have commented on, that I have been in full agreement with. You only get me going when you make blanket statements about all animals from a particular bloodline, or you try to insult people who are just expressing their point of view.  When I call you on doing this, that is when you try to always get personal with me and try to stack the insults on what I do.

 

[knabe]

does anyone take animals to shows that aren't in the show?

ie, to make the show a conduit for advertising and bringing the animals to potential customers instead of vice versa.

a guy i worked for did this and it was fun to have someone slap an animal on the rear and get them up.

typically, this was a bull whose heifers were selling in a sale or who was the sire of another breeders calves with the same thing in mind.

would like to see more of this, but it's probably too expensive.  sure would like to see some of the old pics of old fullblood maines (high % shorthorns) when they were first around.

 

[knabe]

DR'ds seeing interest. Not show people though.

i thought only the people who need to know, know?  maybe they can pay more than an existing customer?  why advertise like this.  you sound like JIT.  irony alert.

 

[trevorgreycattleco]

I blame myself alone for my mistakes. My biggest mistake was not being able to identify a artificial enviroment or cows that were fat but at a high cost. I bought into the sales pitches yes. But I was also being told these cattle WILL work in my low input deal. My first shorthorn bull ever killed 5 heifers and one angus cow because of HUGE calves and I was told he was a heifer bull. You don't know until you try and mistakes are going to happen and always will. I lost well over 100,000 in my first go round so forgive me if I am bitter. Maybe we are both doing some things right. I sure hope so. I built my place by myself with no help from nobody. I have to maintain a second and third job still because of my choices. I am not a quitter and my first trainwreck has only motivated me more to do it right this time. Most in my situation would have left the shorties and never looked back but I have stayed and will continue to do so. Who knows maybe someday we will do business and be shocked at the outcome.

 

[knabe]

why don't more people have 2 calving seasons and hold heifers to be bred at 1.5 years?

on the other hand, elephant seals are big and they breed heifers. 

i guess they have a more honest culling process. (not in the sense people are being dishonest)

 

[Okotoks]

does anyone take animals to shows that aren't in the show?

ie, to make the show a conduit for advertising and bringing the animals to potential customers instead of vice versa.

a guy i worked for did this and it was fun to have someone slap an animal on the rear and get them up.

typically, this was a bull whose heifers were selling in a sale or who was the sire of another breeders calves with the same thing in mind.

would like to see more of this, but it's probably too expensive.  sure would like to see some of the old pics of old fullblood maines (high % shorthorns) when they were first around.

Here is a link to videos from Browarny on couple of old Maine bulls.From arorund 1969.
http://www.browarny.com/legacy/video/clip15.html
http://www.browarny.com/legacy/video/clip16.html
http://www.browarny.com/legacy/video.html

 

[Okotoks]

Here's a video of Mandalong Super Flag. He was brought in from Australia by my sister and brother in law,Terry and Gary Carter, of Newbiggon Shorthorns. He had a pretty big birth weight at the time but was used on hundreds of cows.A lot of bulls today trace to Flag. His BW EPD today is avearge. We have calves coming from him next year from AI and ET. Newbiggon will also have a Newbiggon Jumbo calf,(Jumbo was Mandalong Super Elephant x Mandalong Roany 51st) as well as a Mandalong Royal Ferrari calf.
http://www.browarny.com/legacy/video/clip27.html

 

[aj]

Well said. Artificial enviroments and big birth weights.Trevor....well stated.

 

[knabe]

Well said. Artificial enviroments and big birth weights.Trevor....well stated.

which is different than latitude.  latitude is not an artificial environment.

 

[turning grass into beef]

It is all about you. Its just fun to read your posts. The people who need to know know about my cattle.Keep up the good work JIT. We all love you.

This is one of the problems with reading the printed word, as opposed to speaking those same words directly to another person.  It is possible that the reader can misinterpret the real idea of what information is being conveyed from one person to another.  Although I personally have never found JIT's post to be self absorbed, I can see how a reader may misinterpret them as such.  Maybe this is because I know JIT personally and know that he is not like that.  Maybe if we don't personally know the person who is posting we need to give them the benefit of the doubt.

If you are the type of person that thinks of the glass is half empty instead of half full, consider the following story.
Two ranchers (let's call them Mr. Brown and Mr. Gray) lived in separate areas of the country. They decided to sell their ranches and move to Somewheretown U.S.A. They both contacted the same real estate agent and both looked at the same ranch. After the tour of the ranch Mr. Brown asked the agent 'What are the neighbors like around here?' To this the agent replied 'What were your neighbors like around where you came from?' Mr Brown stated that his old neighbors were miserable. They did not keep their fences up, they never lent a hand when a neighbor needed help, etc., etc., etc. The agent then informed Mr. Brown that the neighbors around the new ranch would probably be the same as they were around his old ranch.
When Mr. Gray had finished touring the ranch he asked the same question, 'What are the neighbors like around here?' The agents reply was also the same 'What were your neighbors like around where you came from?' Mr. Brown stated that his old neighbors were fantastic. They kept their fences up, they always lent a hand when a neighbor needed help, etc., etc., etc. The agent then informed Mr. Brown that the neighbors around the new ranch would probably be the same as they were around his old ranch.

Just something the think about. 

 

[sue]

My attachments are not working - this should be a female.

5113 - photo taken at age 14. she is the granddam of JPJ-

Todd Clark  shared this pic with me last May after visiting, she is the donor dam of a ET Proud Leader son ( has no name at this Point) at there place  south of Des MOine, IA. This bull calf looked like one  of the more promising young sires I have seen this spring. He is dark roan, deep, wide moving good smooth shouldered bull calf. After seeing this pic of his grandam I am more impressed.

I pressure Todd on a daily basis to photo this ET bull calf who has no name....

Todd purchased group of Ohlde shorthorns - I loved the Proud Leader daughters, lots and lots of rib, short but females that weighed. Hence another reason to like this bull calf with no name. Wait for his spring calf crop - watch to see what Todd names this calf. Keep your eye on this beef bull.