In this episode of the Grazing Grass Podcast, esteemed cattle consultant Steve Campbell shares his remarkable journey from a stocker cattle manager to a leading figure in grass-finished beef production. Following a life-altering leg injury in 1999, Steve's career took a transformative path as he embraced regenerative practices, heavily influenced by the Stockman Grass Farmer magazine. His expertise in optimizing grass and mineral content has led to groundbreaking methods for disease prevention, such as eliminating pink eye and foot rot. Steve's commitment to sustainable cattle management, along with his innovative approach to genetic and epigenetic cattle selection, makes this episode a treasure trove of insights for those interested in elevating cattle development.
Topics covered in this episode:
- Selecting cattle for grass efficiency
- Genetic and epigenetic cattle selection
- Selecting bulls for cattle improvement
- Assessing cattle fertility and indicators
- Grazing management and cattle selection
This episode is a must-listen for anyone passionate about sustainable cattle management and regenerative agriculture. Steve Campbell's profound insights into strategic breeding, disease prevention, and the optimization of grass and mineral content provide invaluable knowledge for both seasoned grazers and newcomers. By listening, you'll gain practical tips and tools to enhance your cattle management practices and improve meat quality while addressing challenges such as fertility and udder quality. Don't miss the opportunity to learn from a true pioneer in the field.
Links Mentioned in the Episode
Tailor Made Cattle
Visit our Sponsors:
Noble Research Institute
Redmond
2025 Manderley Farms Grazing Conference
Grazing Grass Links
New Listener Resource Guide
Provide feedback for the podcast
Website
Insiders
Resources (Coming Soon)
Community (on Facebook)
Check out the Apiary Chronicles Podcast
Original Music by Louis Palfrey
Chapters
- (00:00) - Introduction
- (00:28) - Meet Steve Campbell: Background and Early Life
- (04:29) - Transition to Grass Finishing
- (07:19) - Learning and Implementing Rotational Grazing
- (20:28) - Selecting Efficient Cattle for Grass
- (33:56) - Exploring Dairy Cow Ownership
- (34:24) - Selecting the Right Bull for Your Herd
- (35:22) - Understanding Bull and Cow Anatomy
- (38:04) - Calving Ease and Gestation Insights
- (38:58) - The Importance of Bull Shoulders
- (42:54) - Epigenetics and Herd Improvement
- (43:50) - Environmental Adaptation of Cows
- (48:13) - Indicators of Fertility in Bulls and Cows
- (55:11) - Famous Four Questions
- (01:04:16) - Conclusion and Resources
NOTE This file was generated by Descript
00:00:00 --> 00:00:03 Speaker: We have a great episode today with Steve Campbell on selecting
00:00:03 --> 00:00:09 cattle for grass efficiency, but I have to apologize the audio
00:00:10 --> 00:00:12 is not up to par this week.
00:00:12 --> 00:00:14 I've done all I could to improve it.
00:00:15 --> 00:00:18 The episode's really good, so I didn't want to lose this information, so
00:00:18 --> 00:00:23 we're releasing it, but just know going in audio is not as good as it should
00:00:23 --> 00:00:26 be, but it is a really good episode.
00:00:28 --> 00:00:31 . cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: LEt's get started with the fast five just so
00:00:31 --> 00:00:33 our listeners can get to know you.
00:00:33 --> 00:00:34 What's your name?
00:00:34 --> 00:00:35 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Steve Campbell.
00:00:36 --> 00:00:38 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: What's your farm's name?
00:00:39 --> 00:00:42 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Sold grass finished beef for about 20 years.
00:00:42 --> 00:00:47 I quit four or five years ago now and it was Taylor made beef, and then
00:00:47 --> 00:00:50 my consulting is Taylor made cattle.
00:00:51 --> 00:00:52 And so.
00:00:53 --> 00:00:59 I guess you would call it one of those, the tailor made ranch or something.
00:01:01 --> 00:01:01 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: There you go.
00:01:02 --> 00:01:03 And where are you located?
00:01:04 --> 00:01:06 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Southwest Idaho.
00:01:06 --> 00:01:09 I've lived in Idaho my whole life.
00:01:09 --> 00:01:16 I was born about 110 miles north of where I currently live, and up in New Meadows,
00:01:16 --> 00:01:21 a mountain valley, and then we lived over and kind of grew up in Caldwell,
00:01:21 --> 00:01:23 about 30 miles from where I live now.
00:01:24 --> 00:01:28 Then I moved back up to New Meadows after my dad died, and I'm leaving
00:01:28 --> 00:01:33 parts out here, but and lived up there for about another 25 years, and then I
00:01:34 --> 00:01:36 moved down to where I currently live.
00:01:38 --> 00:01:40 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: When did you start grazing animals?
00:01:40 --> 00:01:42 Oh, yeah.
00:01:43 --> 00:01:46 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: I didn't start grazing animals until 88.
00:01:46 --> 00:01:49 I grew up Dad had cattle trucks.
00:01:49 --> 00:01:54 I grew up hauling cattle around and greasing trucks and scooping
00:01:54 --> 00:01:59 out manure and whatever else you could possibly need to do.
00:02:00 --> 00:02:02 Having cattle trucks, but
00:02:02 --> 00:02:03 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:02:03 --> 00:02:06 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: boy, when I did get to the ranch it
00:02:06 --> 00:02:09 was a totally different smell than being inside of a cattle truck.
00:02:11 --> 00:02:12 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yeah.
00:02:13 --> 00:02:13 Yeah.
00:02:13 --> 00:02:14 It would be.
00:02:14 --> 00:02:14 Yeah.
00:02:15 --> 00:02:19 And did you always just graze cattle or did you graze any other species?
00:02:19 --> 00:02:20 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Mainly cattle.
00:02:20 --> 00:02:26 When I moved back up to New Meadows the stalker cattle running, 1100
00:02:26 --> 00:02:28 head that someone else owned.
00:02:28 --> 00:02:30 I was just getting paid to put pounds on.
00:02:30 --> 00:02:34 But then we kind of got into more of this regenerative thing and
00:02:34 --> 00:02:41 we had some pigs one time, we had some sheep one time we had chickens
00:02:41 --> 00:02:44 and turkeys but mainly cattle.
00:02:44 --> 00:02:49 And it was, it was stockers until I got into the grass finishing and then we
00:02:50 --> 00:02:55 We built our own cow herd, so we were kind of doing a combination of stockers
00:02:55 --> 00:02:57 and our own cow herd and finishers.
00:02:58 --> 00:03:00 Cal: Welcome to the grazing grass podcast.
00:03:00 --> 00:03:03 The podcast dedicated to sharing the stories of grass-based
00:03:03 --> 00:03:07 livestock producers, exploring regenerative practices that improve
00:03:07 --> 00:03:09 the land animals and our lives.
00:03:10 --> 00:03:14 I'm your host, Cal Hardage and each week we'll dive into the journeys,
00:03:14 --> 00:03:19 challenges, and successes of producers like you, learning from
00:03:19 --> 00:03:24 their experiences, and inspiring each other to grow, and graze better.
00:03:25 --> 00:03:29 Whether you're a seasoned grazier or just getting started.
00:03:29 --> 00:03:30 This is the place for you.
00:03:32 --> 00:03:35 Attention ranchers, ready to improve your land and boost your bottom line?
00:03:36 --> 00:03:40 Join Noble Research Institute for its March Ranch Management Courses.
00:03:41 --> 00:03:45 Business of Grazing in Edmond, Oklahoma, March 4th through 6th.
00:03:45 --> 00:03:49 Learn to create detailed grazing plans, optimize profitability, and
00:03:49 --> 00:03:52 make smart infrastructure investments.
00:03:52 --> 00:03:56 Noble Grazing Essentials in Huntsville, Texas.
00:03:56 --> 00:03:59 March 25th through 27th.
00:03:59 --> 00:04:03 Discover how to assess carrying capacity, implement adaptive grazing
00:04:03 --> 00:04:07 strategies, and develop effective pasture recovery techniques.
00:04:08 --> 00:04:12 Expert facilitators with decades of ranching knowledge will guide you through
00:04:12 --> 00:04:14 practical field and classroom training.
00:04:15 --> 00:04:21 Receive exclusive benefits include virtual meetings and one on one consultations.
00:04:21 --> 00:04:22 Space is limited.
00:04:23 --> 00:04:23 Visit noble.
00:04:23 --> 00:04:26 org to enroll and invest in your land.
00:04:26 --> 00:04:28 Livestock and legacy.
00:04:29 --> 00:04:32 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: So that, why did you decide to go towards grass finish?
00:04:33 --> 00:04:34 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Oh, that's a great question.
00:04:35 --> 00:04:41 I broke my leg really bad in the end of January 1999.
00:04:41 --> 00:04:45 Up until then, I was just a busy individual getting things done.
00:04:45 --> 00:04:49 Well, six and a half months in an external fixator.
00:04:50 --> 00:04:53 Those, that thing with the rings around your leg and the wires going
00:04:53 --> 00:04:54 through from different angles.
00:04:55 --> 00:04:56 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: yes.
00:04:56 --> 00:04:58 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: you're going to have to get a desk job.
00:04:58 --> 00:04:59 You won't be able to walk around.
00:05:00 --> 00:05:02 And I'm, you know, what am I going to do?
00:05:02 --> 00:05:03 What am I going to do?
00:05:03 --> 00:05:07 Well, I've been getting the Stockman Grass Farmer since 1989.
00:05:07 --> 00:05:12 And I was reading these articles of, yeah, I was reading these
00:05:12 --> 00:05:14 articles about grass finishing.
00:05:14 --> 00:05:16 It was in the mid nineties.
00:05:16 --> 00:05:17 It was starting to kind of be a thing.
00:05:17 --> 00:05:21 And like, well, I have grass and I've kind of gotten good at growing grass and
00:05:21 --> 00:05:24 putting pounds on somebody else's cattle.
00:05:24 --> 00:05:27 Maybe this would be an opening.
00:05:27 --> 00:05:34 And so once I got that external fixator off that next winter we kind of
00:05:34 --> 00:05:36 decided, Hey, we're going to do this.
00:05:36 --> 00:05:44 And we, we got into buying our own larger stockers and finishing them on a summer's.
00:05:45 --> 00:05:50 Grass there in New Meadows and that evolved into something else over time,
00:05:50 --> 00:05:56 but this, I thought, well, if I'm going to not be able to walk around much, I don't
00:05:56 --> 00:05:57 want to be doing it for somebody else.
00:05:57 --> 00:05:59 I want to be doing it for
00:05:59 --> 00:06:00 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yeah.
00:06:02 --> 00:06:05 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Moved up to New Meadows and Uncle Daryl
00:06:05 --> 00:06:07 dad's brother, Dad was dead by then.
00:06:08 --> 00:06:13 It's like control your water, you know, better grass if you don't
00:06:13 --> 00:06:15 over or under irrigate things.
00:06:15 --> 00:06:16 And, you know, I worked really hard at that.
00:06:16 --> 00:06:19 Well, then I'd run into these diseases.
00:06:19 --> 00:06:21 Uncle Daryl, how do I fix this?
00:06:21 --> 00:06:26 And then over the winter it's like, how do I not have pink eye next summer?
00:06:27 --> 00:06:30 How do I not have foot rot next summer?
00:06:30 --> 00:06:33 What's missing in the grass, in the mineral?
00:06:33 --> 00:06:36 So, I've always been this person Preventive maintenance
00:06:36 --> 00:06:37 fellow with the trucks.
00:06:37 --> 00:06:42 Well, preventive disease, prevent disease in the cattle.
00:06:42 --> 00:06:45 So I was learning how to do that.
00:06:46 --> 00:06:52 on somebody else's dime so that when I got my own, I had very little of
00:06:53 --> 00:06:59 that problem, didn't need to use antibiotics which was a big deal.
00:06:59 --> 00:07:02 And the more you get into that, you know, your circle expands and then
00:07:02 --> 00:07:06 you realize, Well, now there's a whole lot more that I don't know.
00:07:07 --> 00:07:10 And the circle is, oh, now there's even more that I don't know.
00:07:10 --> 00:07:15 But, you know, you're touching other people and other ideas the more you know.
00:07:15 --> 00:07:18 And, and boy, I was a vacuum for information.
00:07:19 --> 00:07:23 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: You mentioned there when you started started grass
00:07:24 --> 00:07:28 Finishing you were doing custom grazing and you had gotten to where
00:07:28 --> 00:07:32 you could grow grass really good What got you to that point that
00:07:32 --> 00:07:33 you could grow grass really good?
00:07:34 --> 00:07:36 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, this is going to sound a little crazy,
00:07:37 --> 00:07:40 but if you'd been at the conference I was at yesterday in Ontario,
00:07:40 --> 00:07:42 Oregon, it would have fit right in.
00:07:43 --> 00:07:51 I read a book in 1980 called The Goal excellence in manufacturing.
00:07:51 --> 00:07:52 1980?
00:07:53 --> 00:07:53 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:07:53 --> 00:07:56 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: and I was, I was hauling cattle.
00:07:56 --> 00:08:00 I wasn't manufacturing, but in everything you do, there is a bottleneck.
00:08:02 --> 00:08:06 There's something that, it, it slows the process.
00:08:07 --> 00:08:13 And long story short, to graze good grass well, was it warm enough?
00:08:14 --> 00:08:17 Was the ground wet enough?
00:08:17 --> 00:08:19 Was the ground too wet?
00:08:19 --> 00:08:21 Was it too hot?
00:08:21 --> 00:08:23 Did you have enough biology?
00:08:23 --> 00:08:24 Did you have enough minerals?
00:08:24 --> 00:08:30 Well, we had a very short, sweet growing season there in New Meadows.
00:08:31 --> 00:08:37 And I just spent hours and days trying to get the irrigation right.
00:08:38 --> 00:08:42 A friend of mine said he said your method of irrigation is every blade
00:08:42 --> 00:08:48 gets a drink of grass, but it doesn't get a gallon of, of, of yeah, a drink
00:08:48 --> 00:08:50 of water doesn't get a gallon of water.
00:08:51 --> 00:08:54 And my uncle, after about five years, he's like, I can't believe you got
00:08:54 --> 00:08:59 rid of that slough grass that fast, but it was controlling the water.
00:08:59 --> 00:09:05 Well, When that ground becomes aerobic instead of anaerobic, because it's
00:09:05 --> 00:09:10 over irrigated all the time, then that nutrition that was in the soil was
00:09:10 --> 00:09:15 able to come up in the plants and so that the average daily gain was going
00:09:15 --> 00:09:20 up, the total pounds for the year was going up, learned how to rotational
00:09:20 --> 00:09:27 graze, there's some stories around that but Yeah, I would just, and I was a
00:09:27 --> 00:09:36 student of everything that there was to try to learn how to do there on, I
00:09:36 --> 00:09:41 don't know, about 1, 200 mostly owned, a little bit of leased ground acres.
00:09:43 --> 00:09:44 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yes.
00:09:45 --> 00:09:48 And with, with that, you mentioned rotational grazing.
00:09:48 --> 00:09:50 When'd you introduce rotational grazing into the
00:09:50 --> 00:09:53 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, Dad had bought some old,
00:09:56 --> 00:09:59 Electric fencing, the string, you know, from New Zealand,
00:10:00 --> 00:10:00 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yes.
00:10:01 --> 00:10:03 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: back before I ever showed up.
00:10:04 --> 00:10:08 In the spring of 1989, I'd moved back up in the spring of 88.
00:10:08 --> 00:10:15 In the spring of 89, a fellow came, oh, about 30, 40 miles away and gave a talk.
00:10:15 --> 00:10:21 And he recommended getting a subscription to the Stockman Grass Farmer.
00:10:22 --> 00:10:24 So, 98, 108.
00:10:25 --> 00:10:26 18.
00:10:27 --> 00:10:31 I have, I've been a subscriber now for what, 36 years?
00:10:32 --> 00:10:37 Anyway, read more and more in there, Jim Garish and some other different ideas.
00:10:37 --> 00:10:41 I've got a slide about the different, the different kinds of rotational
00:10:41 --> 00:10:44 grazing, if you will, out there.
00:10:44 --> 00:10:49 But what I learned the very most, I mean it's trying different things, but one time
00:10:49 --> 00:10:56 I had, I'm getting kind of deep here into the story, but I had 400 and some odd.
00:10:56 --> 00:11:01 Steers together, and I was trying to use them to control a particular weed.
00:11:01 --> 00:11:03 I was like, I am not using any more chemical.
00:11:04 --> 00:11:09 So when I, when I go into a 40 acre pasture, I would make paddocks that
00:11:09 --> 00:11:14 were 1 feet long and 132 feet wide.
00:11:16 --> 00:11:20 So, so if you were to set both of your elbows on the table in
00:11:20 --> 00:11:24 front of you, your, your fingers are the height of all the plants.
00:11:25 --> 00:11:27 If you move your right.
00:11:28 --> 00:11:33 And now just the fingers of your right hand are sticking up above the table.
00:11:34 --> 00:11:37 That represents the grass that got eaten.
00:11:37 --> 00:11:43 And your left hand, forearm and fingers, there's what did not get eaten.
00:11:43 --> 00:11:50 The important fact of those two different elevations is the short one is now going,
00:11:50 --> 00:11:54 wait a minute, wait a minute, we need They're telling the biology, we need that
00:11:54 --> 00:11:58 stuff we were getting 40, 60, 80 days ago.
00:11:58 --> 00:12:00 We got to start over.
00:12:00 --> 00:12:04 And the tall ones going, I'm just gonna need a little manganese here pretty quick.
00:12:04 --> 00:12:08 So you've got this war going on underground.
00:12:08 --> 00:12:11 The biology pulling in different directions.
00:12:11 --> 00:12:17 Well, it was 25 years later, Edwin Blosser, Midwest Biosystems, I, he
00:12:17 --> 00:12:22 was telling me about the, the, how the plants told the biology what to do
00:12:22 --> 00:12:26 and he wanted you to graze and clip.
00:12:26 --> 00:12:28 And so then I told him this.
00:12:28 --> 00:12:30 I told him about what I was doing.
00:12:30 --> 00:12:32 They either grazed or they trampled it.
00:12:33 --> 00:12:35 So all the plants got the same thing.
00:12:35 --> 00:12:36 Insult.
00:12:36 --> 00:12:39 So all the plants are telling the biology, wait a minute, we
00:12:39 --> 00:12:42 need that stuff from before.
00:12:43 --> 00:12:46 Well, I told him a story, I'm sure they do this every year, but one
00:12:46 --> 00:12:55 year in Canada, oxen sled pulling contest, the winning oxen drug, not
00:12:55 --> 00:12:58 quite 8, 000 pounds on a, on a slip.
00:12:58 --> 00:12:59 On a sled.
00:13:00 --> 00:13:03 Number two was just a little over seven and then on down from there.
00:13:03 --> 00:13:07 Well, after the ribbon ceremony, they said, I wonder what they could
00:13:07 --> 00:13:09 pull if we hitched them together.
00:13:10 --> 00:13:14 You add up what they did individually, it was right at 15, 000 pounds.
00:13:14 --> 00:13:18 But when you hitched them together, pulling in unison,
00:13:19 --> 00:13:21 they pulled 26, 000 pounds.
00:13:22 --> 00:13:25 Well, it was, it was crazy.
00:13:25 --> 00:13:28 The amount of quality.
00:13:29 --> 00:13:34 came back in the regrowth that year, you know, when I came back to it.
00:13:35 --> 00:13:37 well, I'll just leave that there.
00:13:37 --> 00:13:38 It's, there's more to the story, but
00:13:41 --> 00:13:45 that every plant getting an insult is a big deal.
00:13:45 --> 00:13:46 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: oh, yeah.
00:13:46 --> 00:13:46 Makes a
00:13:46 --> 00:13:47 big difference.
00:13:49 --> 00:13:53 We, we had started a little bit earlier with your grass finish.
00:13:53 --> 00:13:54 We've kind of jumped backwards again.
00:13:54 --> 00:13:57 Let's jump back to that grass finishing and you had kept some
00:13:57 --> 00:13:59 stockers or got some own stockers.
00:13:59 --> 00:14:04 When did you get in the cattle on calf rearing business?
00:14:05 --> 00:14:07 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, we started in the spring
00:14:07 --> 00:14:10 of 2001 with grass finishing.
00:14:11 --> 00:14:18 So, not this, I got injured in 99 and so be out the spring of 99.
00:14:18 --> 00:14:21 Two years later, we're going to, we're going to finish some animals.
00:14:22 --> 00:14:31 Well, at the end of March 2004, I went down to Sacramento to
00:14:31 --> 00:14:34 a SGF, Stockton Grass Farmer.
00:14:34 --> 00:14:38 Conference where Gerald Fry was going to talk for an hour and a
00:14:38 --> 00:14:45 half about how to visually identify tender, flavorful beef on the hoof.
00:14:48 --> 00:14:51 Subsequently, after Gerald died, I actually went to Australia and
00:14:51 --> 00:14:56 took the five day school Classic Livestock Management course.
00:14:56 --> 00:14:59 But boy was that an eye opener.
00:14:59 --> 00:15:03 And later that summer a guy I used to haul cattle for had hired Gerald
00:15:03 --> 00:15:05 to go up to Quincy, Washington.
00:15:05 --> 00:15:10 And I kind of nosed my way in, said, Can I pay my share and come and listen?
00:15:10 --> 00:15:15 And after that, it's like, hey, we need to own our own cows if we want to
00:15:15 --> 00:15:19 have high quality animals to finish.
00:15:20 --> 00:15:23 You know, you could go cherry pick if people would let you
00:15:23 --> 00:15:25 pick three head out of a hundred.
00:15:26 --> 00:15:29 I, I did that, what was it, there in New Meadows?
00:15:31 --> 00:15:36 I did that for, I guess, 2001, 11.
00:15:36 --> 00:15:38 I did that for 10 years.
00:15:39 --> 00:15:46 And I was really, really picky at, at picking out of these thousand
00:15:46 --> 00:15:47 stalkers that would come up.
00:15:48 --> 00:15:51 I would get 8 to 12 head out of there.
00:15:53 --> 00:15:57 Every year I was getting approximately 1 percent out of that deal.
00:15:57 --> 00:15:58 The guy would sell them to me.
00:15:59 --> 00:16:05 And then we finished those, but I probably 3%, 3 percent of the kind
00:16:05 --> 00:16:10 of cattle that he sent were the right type for finishing on grass.
00:16:11 --> 00:16:15 I was, I was so picky I only took one percent.
00:16:15 --> 00:16:21 Well, then I, I got into Red Devon and Red Angus and, and learned some things
00:16:21 --> 00:16:27 about shape and, and what not that gave you a more efficient animal on grass
00:16:27 --> 00:16:33 and always was looking for the quality that came with fine bones, vertical
00:16:33 --> 00:16:37 folds in the hide, butterfat indicators, but there was a volume, a meat to
00:16:37 --> 00:16:40 bone ratio thing to look at as well.
00:16:41 --> 00:16:43 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: So you were keeping those.
00:16:43 --> 00:16:45 When did you start getting your own cows?
00:16:46 --> 00:16:49 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: So that would have been the spring of 2005.
00:16:51 --> 00:16:53 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: And what did you, you mentioned Red Devon and
00:16:53 --> 00:16:56 Red Angus, what'd you go look for?
00:16:56 --> 00:16:59 Did you, I'm sure you're looking for a certain type, but did you
00:16:59 --> 00:17:01 also go for a certain breed at that
00:17:01 --> 00:17:04 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Mainly Red Angus, a friend of mine that I had
00:17:05 --> 00:17:08 known for 20 years, lived 60 miles south, and I'd go down there and he'd
00:17:08 --> 00:17:11 let me pick some replacement heifers.
00:17:11 --> 00:17:13 The neighbor just next door, he let me pick some from him.
00:17:14 --> 00:17:18 And anyway Then bred those to Red Devon.
00:17:20 --> 00:17:22 And the meat quality was great.
00:17:22 --> 00:17:27 We were having a hard time with fertility and udders and things like that, and
00:17:27 --> 00:17:29 so kind of gave up on the Red Devons.
00:17:30 --> 00:17:33 Eh, ten years later, in fact, Really just red Angus.
00:17:34 --> 00:17:38 Red Angus was the dominant thing that I was going for at that point.
00:17:38 --> 00:17:44 So I had, I had some half Devon, quarter Devon and kind
00:17:44 --> 00:17:46 of worked my way through those.
00:17:47 --> 00:17:51 But yeah, started having my own cows in 2005 and
00:17:53 --> 00:18:02 I was, In 2018, I was, I was doing three things by, I, I'd learned how to, how to
00:18:02 --> 00:18:07 raise them and grow grass and Gerald got me into consulting there in the late,
00:18:10 --> 00:18:12 If you will, like 2008, nine.
00:18:12 --> 00:18:13 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: oh yes,
00:18:13 --> 00:18:17 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: And anyway, I was, by 2018 I was consulting, I was
00:18:17 --> 00:18:21 selling vinegar for Golden Valley vinegar and, and I was raising grass finished
00:18:21 --> 00:18:23 beef and I knew I couldn't do all three.
00:18:24 --> 00:18:27 And so I made a plan at the beginning of 2018 to be out of
00:18:27 --> 00:18:31 cattle at home by the end of 2020.
00:18:32 --> 00:18:35 And it was very easy to sell all the meat I had in 2020.
00:18:36 --> 00:18:36 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh yeah,
00:18:37 --> 00:18:43 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: But currently I, I own, I have interest in some
00:18:43 --> 00:18:49 really old red angus genetics with a younger man back in Ohio, the bull
00:18:49 --> 00:18:55 that we're using, well, ampules of semen on this bull, he was born in
00:18:55 --> 00:19:03 1959, his Great grandad was the very first bull born in the Red Angus breed.
00:19:04 --> 00:19:04 So we're trying to
00:19:05 --> 00:19:05 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: oh
00:19:05 --> 00:19:09 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: recreate those really good grass
00:19:09 --> 00:19:11 genetics and bring those forward.
00:19:13 --> 00:19:14 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: That's, that's very interesting,
00:19:15 --> 00:19:20 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: So we have ampules on three kind of, Well, two that
00:19:20 --> 00:19:24 are three quarter brothers and another one that's a half a brother to those
00:19:24 --> 00:19:30 other two and, and that's in ampules and then after that it became straws.
00:19:31 --> 00:19:35 So it's, we're very judicious with those ampules.
00:19:37 --> 00:19:37 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:19:37 --> 00:19:37 yeah.
00:19:38 --> 00:19:39 Imagine so.
00:19:40 --> 00:19:42 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: kind of back to your cow question I never
00:19:42 --> 00:19:49 wanted to own cows to just sell calves into the, the normal system.
00:19:49 --> 00:19:53 I, I, I wanted conception to consumption.
00:19:53 --> 00:19:58 I was trying to make the, the, the best piece of meat I
00:19:58 --> 00:20:00 possibly could for my customer.
00:20:00 --> 00:20:05 And the more I could control everything genetically and epigenetically.
00:20:05 --> 00:20:08 Epigenetics,
00:20:08 --> 00:20:10 the air, the water, the grass.
00:20:10 --> 00:20:16 The mineral, stockmanship, uh, you know, all of those things, the more you get
00:20:16 --> 00:20:22 those right, the better the genetics work, the better the genetics, the better they
00:20:22 --> 00:20:26 can deal with all of those other problems.
00:20:28 --> 00:20:32 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: One thing you mentioned there about Red Devon and Red
00:20:32 --> 00:20:40 Angus, and you went with Red Devon for a And we're also, as we talk about cows
00:20:40 --> 00:20:44 that excel and making sure you have the right genetics and epigenetics.
00:20:45 --> 00:20:47 How important is that breed component of it?
00:20:48 --> 00:20:52 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: You can find good cattle for grass,
00:20:52 --> 00:20:56 all grass, in any breed, okay?
00:20:56 --> 00:20:59 You're going to find more of those in the British breeds
00:20:59 --> 00:21:01 than in the continental breeds.
00:21:01 --> 00:21:01 Okay.
00:21:02 --> 00:21:08 The breeds that haven't been messed with as much typically
00:21:08 --> 00:21:11 you have more consistency there.
00:21:11 --> 00:21:18 In the meat, and in the, the bell curve of the shape of the animals.
00:21:19 --> 00:21:24 Sex hormones shut off long bone growth, so the taller an animal in any
00:21:24 --> 00:21:28 breed in general, the less fertile.
00:21:28 --> 00:21:31 Now, Everything else being equal.
00:21:32 --> 00:21:35 You can have a taller animal that's more fertile than a shorter
00:21:35 --> 00:21:39 animal if everything else was wrong with the shorter animal.
00:21:39 --> 00:21:45 Okay, but in general, the shorter down to a point, the more fertile they are.
00:21:45 --> 00:21:49 Now, I got a Back away from that a little bit.
00:21:49 --> 00:21:54 The closer you are to the equator, the shorter in height, the lower in weight,
00:21:55 --> 00:21:57 and the more of an oval there is up front.
00:21:58 --> 00:22:01 The less distance between those front legs because they have
00:22:01 --> 00:22:04 to dissipate heat and humidity.
00:22:04 --> 00:22:09 The further north you go, the taller they are, the more they
00:22:09 --> 00:22:10 weigh, and the more of an O.
00:22:11 --> 00:22:11 up front.
00:22:11 --> 00:22:14 They've got to retain heat in the wintertime.
00:22:14 --> 00:22:19 So, it's, there is a shape, I call it the solo cup.
00:22:19 --> 00:22:25 You take that cup and turn it on its side, and on the cow, the little end
00:22:25 --> 00:22:28 of the cup is the cow's head end.
00:22:29 --> 00:22:33 On the bull, the big end of the cup is the bull's head end.
00:22:33 --> 00:22:35 They're the opposites.
00:22:35 --> 00:22:39 When I was a kid, somebody said, Well, it's like two triangles back to back.
00:22:39 --> 00:22:41 Well, that wasn't, I didn't get the visual.
00:22:42 --> 00:22:46 But you think about taking two of those solo cups and one
00:22:46 --> 00:22:48 facing one way and one the other.
00:22:49 --> 00:22:50 One's the bull.
00:22:50 --> 00:22:51 Bigger on the front end.
00:22:52 --> 00:22:53 One's the cow.
00:22:53 --> 00:22:54 Smaller on the front end.
00:22:56 --> 00:22:59 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: And that's, that's a great segue into our overgrazing
00:22:59 --> 00:23:04 discussion today of, you know, efficient cattle for grass or selecting
00:23:04 --> 00:23:07 the more efficient type for grass.
00:23:08 --> 00:23:12 Speaker 2: At Redmond, we know that you thrive when your animals do.
00:23:12 --> 00:23:16 That's why it's essential to fill the gaps in your herd's nutrition
00:23:17 --> 00:23:19 with the minerals that they need.
00:23:19 --> 00:23:24 Made by nature, our ancient mineral salt and conditioner clay are the
00:23:24 --> 00:23:29 catalyst in optimizing the nutrients your animals get from their forage.
00:23:30 --> 00:23:35 Unaltered and unrefined, our minerals have the natural balance and proportion
00:23:35 --> 00:23:37 to help that your animals prefer.
00:23:37 --> 00:23:41 This gives your herd the ability to naturally regulate their
00:23:41 --> 00:23:44 mineral consumption as they graze.
00:23:45 --> 00:23:48 Our minerals won't just help you improve the health of your animals,
00:23:49 --> 00:23:54 but will also help you naturally build soil fertility so you can grow more
00:23:54 --> 00:23:57 nutrient dense pasture year after year.
00:23:57 --> 00:24:01 Nourish your animals, your soil, and your life with Redmond.
00:24:02 --> 00:24:04 Learn more at redmondagriculture.
00:24:05 --> 00:24:05 com
00:24:08 --> 00:24:10 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: So I think the solo cup's a great visual
00:24:10 --> 00:24:12 to be able to visualize that.
00:24:14 --> 00:24:19 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Ken Redmond was in charge of crunching the numbers
00:24:19 --> 00:24:22 on, I don't know, 50, 60, 70, 000 head.
00:24:22 --> 00:24:26 They linear measured there over the course of probably 25 years.
00:24:26 --> 00:24:27 He and some other folks.
00:24:28 --> 00:24:32 And for his master's thesis, he went back to school after he quit doing that.
00:24:32 --> 00:24:40 He took 9, 500 head, all one breed, happened to be Simmental, anywhere from
00:24:40 --> 00:24:44 Mexico to Canada, everywhere in between.
00:24:45 --> 00:24:46 Three commonalities.
00:24:47 --> 00:24:51 with cows that had had 10 or 11 calves in a row without skipping.
00:24:52 --> 00:24:56 They had a bigger belly than the herd average.
00:24:56 --> 00:24:57 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:24:57 --> 00:25:01 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Campbell says they could eat and digest enough for three
00:25:01 --> 00:25:04 in a dry year after they lost their teeth.
00:25:05 --> 00:25:09 They had a wider butt than the herd average.
00:25:09 --> 00:25:10 Well, that's calving ease.
00:25:12 --> 00:25:12 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:25:12 --> 00:25:12 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: ability.
00:25:12 --> 00:25:17 You think about standing behind a cow or a heifer and looking at her.
00:25:17 --> 00:25:22 You want her to be 40 percent as wide as she is tall to have calving ease.
00:25:23 --> 00:25:26 If they're too narrow, you're going to be pulling calves.
00:25:27 --> 00:25:33 But the one trait, That became the most important to get the 9th,
00:25:33 --> 00:25:40 10th, 11th calf in a row out without skipping was sloped from hooks down
00:25:40 --> 00:25:45 to pins and boy did it just crank up and I called Ken and asked him.
00:25:46 --> 00:25:48 Why he felt that that was so important.
00:25:49 --> 00:25:53 And he gave me all the usual suspects, except what I was thinking.
00:25:54 --> 00:25:59 One, as that pelvis flattens out and the grow bone, I now call that
00:25:59 --> 00:26:01 the anti fertility bone, sticks up.
00:26:02 --> 00:26:07 Typically that the vulva is sloping further forward.
00:26:08 --> 00:26:14 And if she doesn't have a big gut and not digesting well, and it's really green or
00:26:14 --> 00:26:19 whatever, and There's some manure back there on the vulva, if, if the bull shows
00:26:19 --> 00:26:26 up, he takes in foreign material, the pelvic floor is sloping into the cow, and
00:26:26 --> 00:26:29 so that drains into the cow, and she gets
00:26:29 --> 00:26:34 cystic ovaries, doesn't breed back, but if you have plenty of slope
00:26:34 --> 00:26:38 for one, The vulva is vertical, so there's probably not something on it.
00:26:38 --> 00:26:43 But even if he did take something in, the pelvic floor is sloping out of the cow.
00:26:43 --> 00:26:46 She doesn't get cystic ovaries, and she breeds back for that
00:26:46 --> 00:26:48 9th, 10th, 11th calf in a row.
00:26:50 --> 00:26:54 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: As we look at cattle, I see a lot more cattle with
00:26:54 --> 00:26:59 a higher tail head placement and not slope back there, at least initially
00:26:59 --> 00:27:04 I don't see too much slope there in a lot of cows that's being bred now.
00:27:06 --> 00:27:09 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: 90 plus percent of the herds that I get asked
00:27:09 --> 00:27:15 to come and go through and help them out, that is their biggest problem.
00:27:16 --> 00:27:21 Is that is that people I call it, you know, it's the tail process.
00:27:21 --> 00:27:22 Gerald called it the grow bone.
00:27:22 --> 00:27:25 Well, when I first heard it, it's like, oh, yeah, growth.
00:27:25 --> 00:27:26 We need some of that.
00:27:27 --> 00:27:29 I now call it the anti fertility bone.
00:27:30 --> 00:27:35 If you've chosen growth, if you've got that grow, that grow bone sticking up
00:27:35 --> 00:27:41 back there behind the hooks, you've chosen a cow that's less fertile.
00:27:42 --> 00:27:46 Well, Gene Meyler, another one of these Not, no, no, no.
00:27:46 --> 00:27:50 Michael McDonald, another one of these linear measurement guys.
00:27:51 --> 00:27:54 If you're just selling calves off of the ranch, 40 percent
00:27:54 --> 00:27:56 of the profit is fertility.
00:27:57 --> 00:27:59 A cow having a calf every year.
00:27:59 --> 00:28:03 30 percent is what it costs to run the cow.
00:28:04 --> 00:28:09 20 percent growth, 40 percent fertility, 20 percent growth.
00:28:09 --> 00:28:12 We got this teeter totter, 10 percent carcass traits.
00:28:12 --> 00:28:16 Well, 70 percent of the profit is choosing a cow that's fertile
00:28:16 --> 00:28:18 and doesn't cost a lot to run.
00:28:19 --> 00:28:21 30 percent is what industry wants.
00:28:23 --> 00:28:23 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh yeah.
00:28:23 --> 00:28:24 Yeah.
00:28:24 --> 00:28:26 Oh
00:28:26 --> 00:28:29 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: And I guess a story about that big belly.
00:28:30 --> 00:28:34 Anibal Pordomingo, who writes in the Stockman Grass Farmer, got his
00:28:34 --> 00:28:39 PhD from New Mexico State in 1995.
00:28:41 --> 00:28:43 that time, the average beef cow in the U.
00:28:43 --> 00:28:44 S.
00:28:44 --> 00:28:50 digested 55 percent of what she ingested.
00:28:52 --> 00:28:54 Well, then he heard Gerald talk, got his data out.
00:28:54 --> 00:28:58 There are some that digest 70%.
00:29:01 --> 00:29:02 And some only 40.
00:29:04 --> 00:29:09 Well, one time I was in a guy's place, he kind of had a hodgepodge of cows that
00:29:09 --> 00:29:11 he put together for grass finishing.
00:29:11 --> 00:29:15 And I was there in the spring, he still had a bale feeder, it was real muddy.
00:29:15 --> 00:29:17 And, and I go, well, these are your best cows, and these will
00:29:17 --> 00:29:19 work till you can replace them.
00:29:19 --> 00:29:23 But these three over here, they were that reverse wedge.
00:29:23 --> 00:29:25 They were walking uphill with no guts.
00:29:26 --> 00:29:32 They, they kind of looked like a real puny bull, rather than a, Walking downhill,
00:29:32 --> 00:29:38 sex hormones shut off, long bone growth, estrogen in the front end of the female.
00:29:38 --> 00:29:42 So on the top, that solo cup sloping towards the cow's head
00:29:42 --> 00:29:45 means she's producing more estrogen.
00:29:45 --> 00:29:50 But on the bottom, that, that she's getting deeper as she goes back.
00:29:50 --> 00:29:56 Well, these, these Herefords had no guts and they were walking uphill and I told
00:29:56 --> 00:30:01 the guy, I said, The best thing you can do is Because take those to the sale
00:30:01 --> 00:30:05 on, on Monday, you know, just get rid of them, then you'll never make any money.
00:30:06 --> 00:30:11 So, so Saturday morning he takes me to the airport and get to the first
00:30:11 --> 00:30:13 stop, turn my phone back on me.
00:30:13 --> 00:30:14 Here's a message from him.
00:30:14 --> 00:30:17 He said, I've been thinking about those three that you didn't like.
00:30:17 --> 00:30:21 He said, all the others, they'll eat for a couple hours, get a drink, eat a little
00:30:21 --> 00:30:23 more, go lay down and chew their cuds.
00:30:24 --> 00:30:25 Those three you didn't like?
00:30:25 --> 00:30:28 They get up in the morning and they just stand at that round bale
00:30:28 --> 00:30:31 feeder and they eat all day long.
00:30:31 --> 00:30:32 They're going to scale.
00:30:33 --> 00:30:39 So the ones with the biggest bellies actually don't eat as big of a
00:30:39 --> 00:30:43 percentage of what they weigh.
00:30:43 --> 00:30:46 I guess the best story about that is 18 years later.
00:30:47 --> 00:30:53 Don Faulkner, a PhD from Arizona State, said we're getting really good
00:30:53 --> 00:30:56 at predicting percent of body weight that a group of dry cows would eat.
00:30:57 --> 00:31:02 But we can't tell you, well, would eat depending on what we fed them.
00:31:02 --> 00:31:06 But what we can tell you is what individual animals
00:31:06 --> 00:31:08 in that group are eating.
00:31:08 --> 00:31:10 Some are eating twice as much as others.
00:31:11 --> 00:31:16 Well, if they were averaging 3 percent of body weight, Some were eating 4%
00:31:16 --> 00:31:18 of body weight and some only two.
00:31:19 --> 00:31:22 Well, the one with the great big belly that weighs 1300 pounds,
00:31:22 --> 00:31:26 eating 2%, she ate 26 pounds Today.
00:31:27 --> 00:31:30 The thousand Pounder with no guts, eight 40 pounds today.
00:31:32 --> 00:31:36 It's not just about weight, it's, it's a shape.
00:31:36 --> 00:31:41 And of course, the more butter fat indicators they have, the,
00:31:41 --> 00:31:43 the easier keeping the cows are.
00:31:44 --> 00:31:47 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: So you, you talked a little bit there about the shape.
00:31:47 --> 00:31:49 What are the butterfat indicators?
00:31:49 --> 00:31:52 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, first and foremost, a bald udder.
00:31:52 --> 00:31:56 I mean, if she's already producing milk, less hair.
00:31:57 --> 00:32:02 There's going to be more hair on what's considered a bald udder in Bismarck,
00:32:02 --> 00:32:04 North Dakota, than on the Mexican border.
00:32:05 --> 00:32:05 Okay,
00:32:06 --> 00:32:11 but the ones with the least amount of hair in your environment, in general,
00:32:11 --> 00:32:13 they're producing more butterfat.
00:32:14 --> 00:32:19 A real close second is the number of vertical hides, which are an indicator
00:32:19 --> 00:32:27 of how loose The hide is, and you see 'em, you know, if you see 'em
00:32:27 --> 00:32:30 in the neck area, that's good, but the further back, the ribs they go.
00:32:31 --> 00:32:35 But the ones you really want, heifer or cow, are the ones that have a
00:32:35 --> 00:32:41 lot of vertical folds from the vulva down to the other Though, you, you
00:32:41 --> 00:32:44 don't find a lot of those, but boy, if you find them, you wanna own them.
00:32:46 --> 00:32:46 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Interesting.
00:32:46 --> 00:32:50 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: There's a book that was written in the mid 18 hundreds
00:32:50 --> 00:32:54 by Francoise Ong from, from France.
00:32:55 --> 00:32:59 And in 1848, I'm going to paraphrase slightly, but the French government
00:32:59 --> 00:33:06 said if a person would follow the treaties as laid down by Monsieur
00:33:06 --> 00:33:13 Guénon, there need be no doubt as to whether a cow was a good milker.
00:33:15 --> 00:33:23 And a person could tell with certainty whether a heifer was going to be a
00:33:23 --> 00:33:29 good milker so that you would not get taken in the purchase of that animal.
00:33:31 --> 00:33:34 That, that doesn't sound like expected progeny difference.
00:33:34 --> 00:33:41 There need be no doubt, tell with certainty, and the government
00:33:41 --> 00:33:45 of France said we will pay your expenses for the rest of your life.
00:33:45 --> 00:33:48 You could tell as many people on the dairies in the
00:33:49 --> 00:33:51 countryside about this program.
00:33:53 --> 00:33:55 You can, you can get that book reprinted today.
00:33:56 --> 00:34:02 M I L C H C O W F R A N S W O G E G U E N O N.
00:34:02 --> 00:34:05 And oh, it's a, there's a lot of drawings in there.
00:34:05 --> 00:34:07 It's worth, it's worth owning,
00:34:07 --> 00:34:08 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: oh
00:34:08 --> 00:34:08 yes.
00:34:09 --> 00:34:10 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: if you're a dairy person.
00:34:13 --> 00:34:14 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: I will have to look that up.
00:34:14 --> 00:34:16 I don't have any dairy cows now.
00:34:16 --> 00:34:20 Of course, I threaten my wife with buying one or two every once in a
00:34:20 --> 00:34:23 while, and then I come to my senses and know I don't have that much time.
00:34:24 --> 00:34:28 When we think about producer out here, they're gonna bring in bulls.
00:34:28 --> 00:34:32 So what should they be looking for in their bulls they're bringing in?
00:34:34 --> 00:34:36 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Michael Davis from Northeast.
00:34:37 --> 00:34:42 New Mexico, fine gentleman, very knowledgeable, a good
00:34:42 --> 00:34:44 teacher as it turns out.
00:34:45 --> 00:34:49 One time he asked me, he says, if I wanted you to buy a bull
00:34:49 --> 00:34:50 for me, what would you buy?
00:34:51 --> 00:34:54 So I started asking him a bunch of questions and he goes, no,
00:34:54 --> 00:34:55 no, I'm not going to ask that.
00:34:55 --> 00:34:56 You can look at my cows.
00:34:57 --> 00:35:01 And I thought for a while and thought for a while, and finally I
00:35:01 --> 00:35:05 said, well, I'd figure out what the biggest problem was in your herd.
00:35:05 --> 00:35:07 You know, leaving principle, the short stay.
00:35:07 --> 00:35:09 What is holding you back?
00:35:10 --> 00:35:11 I mean, is it fertility?
00:35:11 --> 00:35:13 Is it easy keeping what is it?
00:35:13 --> 00:35:17 We, and then I would bull buy a bull.
00:35:17 --> 00:35:21 That would fix that problem first.
00:35:22 --> 00:35:28 Well, virtually everything about a bull and a cow are the opposite shape wise,
00:35:28 --> 00:35:33 except for slope from hooks down to pins.
00:35:34 --> 00:35:40 If you've got the grow bones sticking up in your cow herd, You need an exaggerated,
00:35:40 --> 00:35:43 and you almost can't get it, too much.
00:35:44 --> 00:35:48 You need a lot of slope, from hooks down to pins in the bull.
00:35:49 --> 00:35:55 And 90 percent of the cow herds that I get in these days, that is what they need.
00:35:56 --> 00:35:59 And if the hooks on the bull are not level with the backbone, if
00:35:59 --> 00:36:05 they're down an inch or two, you just lost an inch or two of slope.
00:36:05 --> 00:36:09 You want the hooks level with the backbone so that every time he takes
00:36:09 --> 00:36:14 a step, you see one hook bone rock rotating up above the backbone, and
00:36:14 --> 00:36:15 then the other, and then the other.
00:36:15 --> 00:36:19 And similarly up front, when he walks, you want to see a shoulder
00:36:19 --> 00:36:22 blade rotate up above the backbone, and down, and up above, and down.
00:36:22 --> 00:36:24 That's front and rear.
00:36:24 --> 00:36:29 You want Those, the shoulder blades going up above when they walk on the rear.
00:36:29 --> 00:36:33 You want to see those hook bones rock rocking up above the backbone, or you
00:36:33 --> 00:36:36 won't get enough to change your herd.
00:36:36 --> 00:36:40 Your offspring are going to be halfway between your bull and your cow.
00:36:40 --> 00:36:43 It's probably going to take a couple of generations for most
00:36:43 --> 00:36:49 herds to get one, a more fertile.
00:36:49 --> 00:36:54 Easier keeping cow than you've currently got.
00:36:55 --> 00:36:59 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Well, I like hearing that because One of the recent
00:36:59 --> 00:37:02 bulls we brought in, I think we don't have enough slope on our cows and I
00:37:02 --> 00:37:06 bought a bull that's got a lot of slope, so that makes me feel good about that
00:37:06 --> 00:37:06 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Good.
00:37:07 --> 00:37:10 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Because I was trying to, to get that
00:37:10 --> 00:37:11 slope back where we wanted it.
00:37:12 --> 00:37:16 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: In the trying to get that 40 percent of
00:37:16 --> 00:37:21 rump width on a cow, she's 40 percent as wide as she is tall for calving,
00:37:21 --> 00:37:22 eating, flushing, and milling.
00:37:24 --> 00:37:27 don't necessarily want a bull that's wide back there.
00:37:27 --> 00:37:29 You want a bull with really wide shoulders.
00:37:30 --> 00:37:33 One time I called Gerald Fry and I said, Boy, I've got this bull that,
00:37:34 --> 00:37:37 he's really got a set of shoulders, but he just doesn't have much rump on him.
00:37:37 --> 00:37:42 And Gerald, just, Gerald, that fashion, just like that, he goes, You know, I
00:37:42 --> 00:37:47 think every defensive player in the NFL knew how big Jim Brown's shoulders were,
00:37:47 --> 00:37:51 but I doubt there's one of them could have told you what size pants he wore.
00:37:52 --> 00:37:59 So, if, if you want wide rump on a cow, you need wide shoulders on a bull.
00:38:00 --> 00:38:04 And you need wide shoulders on a bull for calving ease.
00:38:04 --> 00:38:04 What?
00:38:06 --> 00:38:07 For each inch.
00:38:07 --> 00:38:08 Now this is Michael McDonald.
00:38:08 --> 00:38:11 For, at a year of age, for each inch.
00:38:12 --> 00:38:16 The bull's shoulders are wider than the length of the rump.
00:38:17 --> 00:38:21 It's two and a half days less gestation.
00:38:21 --> 00:38:22 I'm going to say that all again.
00:38:23 --> 00:38:24 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Yeah, say
00:38:24 --> 00:38:24 that
00:38:24 --> 00:38:27 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: one year of age, for each inch the
00:38:27 --> 00:38:31 bull's shoulders are wider than the length of the bull's rump.
00:38:32 --> 00:38:35 It's two and a half days less gestation.
00:38:35 --> 00:38:36 Gestation.
00:38:36 --> 00:38:41 So if you can find a bull at a year of age that's plus two or three, he gets
00:38:41 --> 00:38:46 the calf out ten to fifteen pounds lighter because the calf came out
00:38:46 --> 00:38:48 five to seven and a half days early.
00:38:49 --> 00:38:53 Now that is calving ease rather than buying a sissy bull.
00:38:55 --> 00:38:56 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: That is, yeah.
00:38:57 --> 00:38:57 I.
00:38:58 --> 00:39:01 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: there's a fellow north of Douglas, Wyoming,
00:39:01 --> 00:39:04 Frank Ethorn, had a bull named Pawpaw.
00:39:05 --> 00:39:09 And when that bull was six and a quarter years old, his
00:39:09 --> 00:39:12 crest was bigger than his head.
00:39:13 --> 00:39:18 His shoulders were eight and a half inches wider than the length of his rump.
00:39:19 --> 00:39:23 You think about taking your phone, you want to blow a picture up and you spread
00:39:23 --> 00:39:25 your fingers apart and everything grows.
00:39:26 --> 00:39:30 Testosterone makes the shoulders of the bull grow wider faster
00:39:30 --> 00:39:32 than anything else on the bull.
00:39:34 --> 00:39:39 Progesterone makes the rump grow wider faster than anything else on the cow.
00:39:41 --> 00:39:45 took that massive bull and put him on 100
00:39:48 --> 00:39:53 15 month old heifers in a 4, 600 acre pasture.
00:39:55 --> 00:40:00 60 days later, there were 92 pregnant heifers, but it was a long walk home.
00:40:01 --> 00:40:06 If he had just broke that up into 460 acre paddocks and left them in
00:40:06 --> 00:40:09 there six days at a time, I'll bet there would have been 98 or 99.
00:40:09 --> 00:40:11 He couldn't find them all in 4,
00:40:12 --> 00:40:13 600 acres.
00:40:13 --> 00:40:20 He was by himself with 100 in 4, 000 and he wasn't worried about calving ease.
00:40:21 --> 00:40:28 He, he had it built in to both the bull and the females he was breeding.
00:40:29 --> 00:40:31 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: that is very interesting.
00:40:31 --> 00:40:34 I don't know that I've heard that statement before about the width
00:40:35 --> 00:40:36 of shoulders, so that's very
00:40:37 --> 00:40:39 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: McDonald, God rest his soul, is
00:40:39 --> 00:40:40 the one that shared that with me.
00:40:42 --> 00:40:42 Another,
00:40:43 --> 00:40:43 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Talk about,
00:40:43 --> 00:40:44 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: PhD
00:40:44 --> 00:40:44 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: go ahead.
00:40:45 --> 00:40:46 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: with a lot of common sense.
00:40:48 --> 00:40:49 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh yeah,
00:40:51 --> 00:40:55 so we talked about slope, talked about shoulders what else
00:40:55 --> 00:40:57 should we look for in a bull?
00:40:57 --> 00:41:01 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, if you want easy keeping cows, you
00:41:01 --> 00:41:07 need large rumens, so they digest a greater percentage of what they eat.
00:41:10 --> 00:41:14 Well, you don't necessarily want a bull with the largest belly because he might
00:41:14 --> 00:41:18 like watching basketball from the couch rather than practicing basketball.
00:41:19 --> 00:41:25 You want a bull whose mother, grandmother, aunts, and sisters all have big bellies?
00:41:26 --> 00:41:30 You'll know that you're then breeding easy keeping low
00:41:30 --> 00:41:33 maintenance into the daughters.
00:41:33 --> 00:41:40 The bull with the biggest belly, the bull that wins the game test, is
00:41:40 --> 00:41:42 probably not the one you want to buy.
00:41:43 --> 00:41:48 Johann Zietzmann wrote a book, Man, Cattle, and V E L D, which
00:41:48 --> 00:41:52 is grass over there in One of the better books out there.
00:41:53 --> 00:41:59 You wanna, if you want a bull that's gonna create grass type easy
00:41:59 --> 00:42:03 keeping daughters, you need a bull who looks like 8 pounds of sugar.
00:42:04 --> 00:42:08 in a five pound sugar sack on all grass.
00:42:10 --> 00:42:12 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: We've talked a little bit about bulls,
00:42:12 --> 00:42:15 to improve future generations.
00:42:15 --> 00:42:21 Does it make sense, if I've got a cow herd and, and I'm seeing some problems with it,
00:42:21 --> 00:42:26 does it make sense to buy a bull and work for a couple generations in the future?
00:42:27 --> 00:42:30 Or would it be better to go buy better cows?
00:42:30 --> 00:42:32 Sell those cows and get different cows?
00:42:33 --> 00:42:35 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Oh, it depends.
00:42:35 --> 00:42:39 Fred Provenza wrote a book called Nourishment and in there he talks
00:42:39 --> 00:42:41 about the home field advantage.
00:42:42 --> 00:42:49 The junior, the calf, unless you take him to a higher plane of nutrition
00:42:49 --> 00:42:52 is never going to perform as well as what mom was eating while he
00:42:52 --> 00:42:54 was in utero and at mom's side.
00:42:54 --> 00:42:57 So back to this epigenetic side of things.
00:42:57 --> 00:42:58 Yeah.
00:42:58 --> 00:43:02 If, and I have gotten to places where,
00:43:03 --> 00:43:08 well, I, I get, I got to one place and I, I told him to sell three quarters
00:43:08 --> 00:43:14 of his animals and the other quarter, the other quarter, they were marginal.
00:43:14 --> 00:43:16 But rarely do I do that.
00:43:17 --> 00:43:24 Maybe a quarter of them and let's get the The epigenetics right you you're
00:43:24 --> 00:43:28 not expressing the genetics that you have Because there's too many of the
00:43:28 --> 00:43:33 neighbors toxins and not enough minerals in utero So when they come out They
00:43:33 --> 00:43:37 don't even look like they're supposed to look and then at mom's side and and on
00:43:37 --> 00:43:42 down the line But then buying a better bull And you can make a big change
00:43:43 --> 00:43:45 bringing somebody else's animals in.
00:43:45 --> 00:43:48 Well, you've got to bring them from a similar environment
00:43:49 --> 00:43:50 or they're not going to work.
00:43:50 --> 00:43:54 Different horses for different courses.
00:43:54 --> 00:43:58 Kind of back to this, a cow at the equator, a cow at Bismarck,
00:43:58 --> 00:44:02 North Dakota, a different shape.
00:44:03 --> 00:44:05 No, no, a different package.
00:44:05 --> 00:44:09 They're, they're, they're narrower and not as deep in the chest
00:44:09 --> 00:44:12 at the equator than they are.
00:44:12 --> 00:44:13 at Bismarck, North Dakota.
00:44:14 --> 00:44:17 They're deeper in the chest and wider in the chest at Bismarck
00:44:17 --> 00:44:19 because they've got to retain heat.
00:44:19 --> 00:44:24 You don't want to be bringing cows that require 50 acres to make a
00:44:24 --> 00:44:29 living to, A place where it only takes two acres to make a living.
00:44:29 --> 00:44:31 They'll get too fat to rebreed.
00:44:31 --> 00:44:33 That's a whole nother story.
00:44:34 --> 00:44:40 But dissimilarly, cows that grew up on two acres and you take them where it takes
00:44:40 --> 00:44:46 fifty, they are, unless you're planning to supplement, they're going to suffer.
00:44:46 --> 00:44:51 So you want, If you're going to buy cows, you want to buy them from as
00:44:52 --> 00:44:54 harsh of an environment as you've got.
00:44:55 --> 00:45:01 Probably the best time to buy is if all of those cows are equal.
00:45:02 --> 00:45:05 All the calves are weaned at the same time, they all had a
00:45:05 --> 00:45:09 calf last year, da da da da da.
00:45:09 --> 00:45:10 And they're all pregnant now.
00:45:12 --> 00:45:15 About a month before they would normally stop breeding.
00:45:15 --> 00:45:19 Feeding hay, if you went to look then, the ones that are shedding the earliest.
00:45:19 --> 00:45:23 The ones that maintain their body condition on the poorest feed.
00:45:23 --> 00:45:27 Now, there's a rib slope angle story you'd have to kick in there
00:45:27 --> 00:45:30 to, to kind of really cement that.
00:45:31 --> 00:45:35 The ones that have the most vertical folds, the least hair on their udder.
00:45:36 --> 00:45:39 That a cow has a U neck, it drops down.
00:45:40 --> 00:45:49 R S T U V, a ewe neck, a bull has a crest, a bull has a hump, a bull has an upside
00:45:49 --> 00:45:52 down ewe, a cow, a fertile cow has a ewe.
00:45:52 --> 00:45:55 I mean, looking for those things.
00:45:55 --> 00:46:01 But rarely do I tell somebody, to get rid of all their cows.
00:46:01 --> 00:46:05 Usually it's in the 10 to 20 percent and then try some of these things.
00:46:05 --> 00:46:08 And then you'll, you'll find another 10 percent probably next
00:46:08 --> 00:46:10 year that you want to get rid of.
00:46:10 --> 00:46:15 But if with that better bull and better epigenetics, you'll start seeing
00:46:15 --> 00:46:18 the genetics that you already own.
00:46:18 --> 00:46:22 And then the better shape, which it would, you know, if you're
00:46:22 --> 00:46:24 70, You gotta go find a bull.
00:46:24 --> 00:46:27 You're, you're not gonna breed this
00:46:27 --> 00:46:29 from inside your herd.
00:46:30 --> 00:46:33 And, and I guess I gotta go back, Cal, to finding the bull.
00:46:33 --> 00:46:37 The more uniform the cow herd you're buying out of.
00:46:37 --> 00:46:39 Somebody, years of thoughtful breeding.
00:46:39 --> 00:46:43 They've been trying to do this versus, they've got quite a variety
00:46:43 --> 00:46:45 of shapes and sizes of cows.
00:46:46 --> 00:46:50 You're not gonna have the cookie cutter calf crop.
00:46:50 --> 00:46:51 out of one of their bulls.
00:46:52 --> 00:46:56 But if somebody has the cookie cutter cows, you can buy just about any bull
00:46:56 --> 00:47:01 from them and you'll get the cookie cutter calf crop out of your cows.
00:47:01 --> 00:47:03 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: You know, Steve, I'm, I'm interrupting you right there.
00:47:03 --> 00:47:09 That is, there's been tons of knowledge drop, but that I had never even thought
00:47:09 --> 00:47:11 about, but that's such a valid point.
00:47:12 --> 00:47:17 If it's coming from a uniform herd, those, those cows are all very similar.
00:47:18 --> 00:47:22 And, and you're going to get some consistency there.
00:47:22 --> 00:47:26 If you go to a herd where they're, you got all shapes and sizes, it
00:47:26 --> 00:47:30 doesn't have that consistency that's been bred for, for generations.
00:47:32 --> 00:47:35 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: And, and, and I call it years of thoughtful breeding.
00:47:35 --> 00:47:39 You know, there's line breeding, there's inbreeding, there's close breeding.
00:47:40 --> 00:47:44 People talk about masculine and feminine.
00:47:45 --> 00:47:47 Well, if we had 50 people in the room.
00:47:47 --> 00:47:51 And you had him write it out, you would probably have 50 slightly different
00:47:51 --> 00:47:52 descriptions of what's a masculine.
00:47:53 --> 00:47:59 There are indicators for feminine, excuse me, for fertile females.
00:48:00 --> 00:48:03 And there are indicators for fertile males.
00:48:04 --> 00:48:10 That's what I want to talk about, because the other is too subjective.
00:48:11 --> 00:48:12 pretty objective.
00:48:13 --> 00:48:13 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh,
00:48:13 --> 00:48:15 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: What is a fertile male?
00:48:15 --> 00:48:19 There's a book, Herd Bull Fertility, by James Dresen.
00:48:20 --> 00:48:25 If you use bulls to get your cows pregnant, I highly
00:48:25 --> 00:48:26 recommend owning that book.
00:48:28 --> 00:48:31 Herd Bull Fertility, James Dresen.
00:48:33 --> 00:48:35 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: I was looking over towards my shelf.
00:48:35 --> 00:48:37 I don't remember if I have that book
00:48:37 --> 00:48:37 or
00:48:37 --> 00:48:37 not.
00:48:37 --> 00:48:38 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: a yellow book.
00:48:38 --> 00:48:40 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: if I do have it, I don't recall
00:48:40 --> 00:48:40 reading
00:48:40 --> 00:48:41 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: it's a yellow book.
00:48:43 --> 00:48:46 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: You mentioned those fertility indicators.
00:48:46 --> 00:48:50 Let's go back over those fertility indicators on cows and on bulls.
00:48:50 --> 00:48:55 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, on both, sex hormones shut off long bone growth.
00:48:56 --> 00:49:00 Estrogen in the front end of the cow, so the cows, everything else being equal,
00:49:00 --> 00:49:06 the cows walking downhill on level ground are producing more estrogen.
00:49:07 --> 00:49:12 Bulls who are walking uphill because testosterone shuts off long bone
00:49:12 --> 00:49:14 growth in the back end of the bull, are producing more estrogen.
00:49:14 --> 00:49:19 Bulls that look like they're walking uphill on level ground are more fertile.
00:49:19 --> 00:49:23 If you find a two year old that's walking uphill, buy it.
00:49:23 --> 00:49:27 Usually you don't really see it until they're three on the bull side.
00:49:28 --> 00:49:34 On the cow side, if she's level two, she'll be level at three and she'll be,
00:49:35 --> 00:49:40 you know, you, the downhill bull calves, heifer calves are all, They're all kind
00:49:40 --> 00:49:45 of walking downhill, but if you find a bull at two that's walking uphill,
00:49:45 --> 00:49:47 he's gonna be a man when he grows up.
00:49:49 --> 00:49:51 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Now walking downhill on Heifers said
00:49:52 --> 00:49:54 two if they're level they're gonna be level throughout their life.
00:49:54 --> 00:49:58 So at what point can you differentiate that?
00:49:59 --> 00:50:01 Downhillness on a heifer
00:50:01 --> 00:50:03 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Oh heck, at three months of age,
00:50:03 --> 00:50:07 six months of age, nine months of age yeah you, can tell early on.
00:50:08 --> 00:50:08 I
00:50:09 --> 00:50:11 guess that's what to say about that.
00:50:12 --> 00:50:16 And you're, you're gonna be thinking, oh, all of these bull
00:50:16 --> 00:50:17 calves are walking downhill.
00:50:18 --> 00:50:19 Well, yeah, they are.
00:50:19 --> 00:50:21 Maybe some time in their future.
00:50:21 --> 00:50:24 Second year of life, they'll start leveling out.
00:50:25 --> 00:50:28 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: beyond Walking uphill or walking downhill.
00:50:29 --> 00:50:29 What else are we
00:50:30 --> 00:50:33 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: So a bull's head should be one
00:50:33 --> 00:50:35 half as wide as it is long.
00:50:36 --> 00:50:40 You're measuring outside the eyes, the pole to the muzzle.
00:50:41 --> 00:50:46 And the more of his lower jaw you see, the more masculine he is.
00:50:48 --> 00:50:53 On a cow, this is going to sound strange until I finish it, you want
00:50:53 --> 00:51:00 a cow's head to be twice as long as it is wide, plus one to two inches.
00:51:00 --> 00:51:05 If it's shorter than one inch, it's Longer, she's too masculine, not fertile.
00:51:06 --> 00:51:10 If it's longer than two inches, she's high maintenance.
00:51:10 --> 00:51:18 And the less of that lower lip you see, the more fertile she is.
00:51:20 --> 00:51:22 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: I'm gonna have to go look at my mouths of my cows
00:51:22 --> 00:51:23 and see what I
00:51:24 --> 00:51:28 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: so then, to the other end, small
00:51:28 --> 00:51:32 diameter tail, male and female.
00:51:32 --> 00:51:34 That's going to be butterfat.
00:51:34 --> 00:51:36 That's going to be tender meat.
00:51:37 --> 00:51:39 Butterfat is easy keeping.
00:51:39 --> 00:51:41 You're breeding butterfat into the daughters.
00:51:41 --> 00:51:44 You've got cows that have a lot of butterfat.
00:51:44 --> 00:51:47 They're easier keeping than those that don't have.
00:51:47 --> 00:51:49 A lot of butter fat.
00:51:51 --> 00:51:57 On the males on the back, when the, when the bulls are born, the flatter they are
00:51:57 --> 00:52:02 across the top of the shoulder blades and the deeper in the chest, when they're
00:52:02 --> 00:52:04 a week old, you can see a difference.
00:52:05 --> 00:52:10 On the, on the females, the wider they are across the back end and the deeper the
00:52:10 --> 00:52:15 belly, you can see a difference at, at a week of age or, or at least by a month.
00:52:16 --> 00:52:18 When you put the bulls in.
00:52:19 --> 00:52:24 You got a hundred cows and you've got six or seven bull calves following the
00:52:24 --> 00:52:27 bull who's following the cows around.
00:52:27 --> 00:52:28 We got early libido.
00:52:30 --> 00:52:32 You want to write those numbers down.
00:52:33 --> 00:52:35 But on a bull calf, blocky head,
00:52:38 --> 00:52:43 flat across the shoulders and depth of chest, small diameter tail,
00:52:44 --> 00:52:46 and then slope from hooks to pins.
00:52:46 --> 00:52:50 Slope from hooks, which are level with the backbone, down to pins.
00:52:51 --> 00:52:53 Those would be the major indicators.
00:52:54 --> 00:52:59 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: information there As I look at the clock, it's
00:52:59 --> 00:53:04 about time for us to wrap up and move to our famous four questions, but before
00:53:04 --> 00:53:08 we do, is there something else you would like to add to this discussion?
00:53:09 --> 00:53:10 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: That is a good question.
00:53:12 --> 00:53:15 Yes, the angle of the last rib.
00:53:16 --> 00:53:20 So, on a bull, we want as deep and as wide as we can get them up front.
00:53:21 --> 00:53:23 The thing that will do that is vertical ribs.
00:53:24 --> 00:53:26 It shoves those front legs apart.
00:53:27 --> 00:53:31 Those toes on a lot of bulls that point out to the side, they're now pointing
00:53:31 --> 00:53:33 straight forward or slightly pigeon toed.
00:53:36 --> 00:53:40 Gives you more width between the top of the shoulder blades, a big rib eye muscle.
00:53:41 --> 00:53:47 Well, a bull who has really vertical ribs, because he has wide shoulders,
00:53:47 --> 00:53:53 will give you daughters whose ribs angle back, that last rib pointing
00:53:53 --> 00:53:55 somewhere between the hock and the ankle.
00:53:56 --> 00:54:02 Those girls, those cows, tend to take better care of their calf.
00:54:03 --> 00:54:09 Cows, or heifers, but cows whose ribs are too vertical, they look good
00:54:09 --> 00:54:12 year round, but they bring in a dink calf because they're taking care of
00:54:12 --> 00:54:15 themselves instead of their calf.
00:54:17 --> 00:54:24 And you won't get that rib angled back in your cows unless you
00:54:24 --> 00:54:27 have vertical ribs in the bulls.
00:54:27 --> 00:54:32 And I see too many bulls, what you want is that last rib pointing at the
00:54:32 --> 00:54:35 prepuce, where the bull's penis comes out.
00:54:35 --> 00:54:38 I see too many bulls that angle back, you know, pointing
00:54:38 --> 00:54:40 at the back toe or something.
00:54:41 --> 00:54:46 And you're not fixing the problem of masculine cows.
00:54:48 --> 00:54:50 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: the ribs are sloped too much on a bull,
00:54:50 --> 00:54:52 what does that do to his daughters?
00:54:53 --> 00:54:53 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: too vertical.
00:54:54 --> 00:54:54 They're too
00:54:55 --> 00:54:56 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: They're too vertical.
00:54:56 --> 00:55:01 But if you can get a vertical ribs on a bull, then you get the right slope
00:55:01 --> 00:55:02 on his
00:55:02 --> 00:55:03 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: And that right slope?
00:55:04 --> 00:55:06 Somewhere between the hock and the ankle.
00:55:06 --> 00:55:07 Actually,
00:55:09 --> 00:55:09 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Very good.
00:55:11 --> 00:55:14 Well Steve, this has been an enlightening discussion, but it's time
00:55:14 --> 00:55:17 we move to our famous four questions.
00:55:17 --> 00:55:20 Today's famous four questions are sponsored by Manderly
00:55:20 --> 00:55:22 farms grazing conference.
00:55:23 --> 00:55:26 Attention, all farmers, ranchers, and land enthusiast.
00:55:26 --> 00:55:29 Join us for owned forgettable grazing conference on
00:55:29 --> 00:55:34 February 21st and 22nd, 2025.
00:55:35 --> 00:55:39 At the beautiful Manderley farms in Pikeville, Tennessee
00:55:39 --> 00:55:41 nestled in the scenic Sequatchie valley.
00:55:41 --> 00:55:44 This is your chance to learn from the best in the business.
00:55:44 --> 00:55:46 Our speakers include
00:55:46 --> 00:55:51 the renowned, Greg Judy, alongside the dynamic duo, Greg and Debbie Brann.
00:55:51 --> 00:55:57 Expect engaging sessions, informative pasture walks and interactive question
00:55:57 --> 00:55:59 and answer sessions with our experts.
00:56:00 --> 00:56:03 Discover help to revolutionize your land management with
00:56:04 --> 00:56:06 regenerative grazing practices.
00:56:06 --> 00:56:08 Whether you're looking to enhance
00:56:08 --> 00:56:13 whether you're looking to enhance soil health, increase, biodiversity,
00:56:13 --> 00:56:15 or improve your pasture productivity.
00:56:16 --> 00:56:18 This conference is tailored for you.
00:56:18 --> 00:56:22 Don't miss this opportunity to grow your knowledge and your farm.
00:56:23 --> 00:56:25 For more details and secure your spot.
00:56:25 --> 00:56:29 Visit www.manderlyfarms.com.
00:56:30 --> 00:56:30 That's Elm.
00:56:31 --> 00:56:35 A N D E R L E Y.
00:56:35 --> 00:56:38 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Same four questions we ask of all of our guests.
00:56:38 --> 00:56:39 Our first question.
00:56:40 --> 00:56:44 What is your favorite grazing grass related book or resource?
00:56:46 --> 00:56:47 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: there was a book first written
00:56:47 --> 00:56:51 in 46 and updated in 1964.
00:56:52 --> 00:56:53 Factors.
00:56:53 --> 00:56:56 Affecting calf crop.
00:56:56 --> 00:56:59 You can get a PDF of that online.
00:57:00 --> 00:57:03 Send me an email, I'll send it to you and then your listeners can,
00:57:03 --> 00:57:05 can get you to send it to them.
00:57:07 --> 00:57:09 If you already know something about a cow,
00:57:12 --> 00:57:14 that's the best book I've ever read.
00:57:15 --> 00:57:19 Unless you live in Florida, start reading at chapter six,
00:57:19 --> 00:57:21 or you're gonna think I'm crazy.
00:57:22 --> 00:57:25 The first six chapters, the first five chapters are pretty much
00:57:25 --> 00:57:27 the deep, deep, humid south.
00:57:28 --> 00:57:32 But for everything else, that is a really good book.
00:57:34 --> 00:57:37 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Excellent, I I'm not familiar with that book.
00:57:37 --> 00:57:38 So that's that's a great
00:57:38 --> 00:57:42 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: So another just aside one time Gerald was going
00:57:42 --> 00:57:47 to Australia to judge a livestock show and he said, I won't be back for
00:57:47 --> 00:57:49 three weeks, we won't be able to talk.
00:57:50 --> 00:57:50 Okay.
00:57:50 --> 00:57:53 I mean, at that time we're talking a couple of times a week, I suppose.
00:57:54 --> 00:57:58 About 10 days later, he calls me and he goes, I'm like, well,
00:57:58 --> 00:58:00 Gerald, are you back already?
00:58:00 --> 00:58:01 He said, no, no, no.
00:58:01 --> 00:58:02 But I found this book.
00:58:02 --> 00:58:04 He said, it's better than Bonsma.
00:58:05 --> 00:58:06 I'm like, well, what is it?
00:58:06 --> 00:58:11 I get my pencil out and he goes, the Milk Cow in England by E.
00:58:11 --> 00:58:11 R.
00:58:11 --> 00:58:12 Cochran.
00:58:12 --> 00:58:17 And I'm like, Gerald, I gave you that book four or five years ago.
00:58:17 --> 00:58:19 It's actually so long to read.
00:58:19 --> 00:58:24 You'll have to get it from your England or the continent.
00:58:25 --> 00:58:26 There are no copies in the U.
00:58:26 --> 00:58:27 S.
00:58:27 --> 00:58:31 Like aid books or alibis books or book finder or something.
00:58:31 --> 00:58:39 The, the, The freight will be more, but it's the M I L C H cow in England.
00:58:39 --> 00:58:42 It was written in 1944 by E.
00:58:42 --> 00:58:42 R.
00:58:42 --> 00:58:43 Cochran.
00:58:43 --> 00:58:49 It's about dairy, but 80 plus percent of that book is beef as well.
00:58:49 --> 00:58:51 It is a very good book also.
00:58:53 --> 00:58:57 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: oh very good very good You know, I ask this question
00:58:57 --> 00:59:02 on every episode and I love it when we get books that I'm not familiar with and I'm
00:59:02 --> 00:59:07 like these are, are two and you mentioned some others that I'm not familiar with, so
00:59:07 --> 00:59:12 that's wonderful for me because I get to go spend more money and do more reading.
00:59:12 --> 00:59:13 My wife will be really
00:59:13 --> 00:59:13 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Okay,
00:59:15 --> 00:59:17 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Our second question, what's your
00:59:17 --> 00:59:18 favorite tool for the farm?
00:59:20 --> 00:59:21 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: electric fence.
00:59:22 --> 00:59:24 Yeah, electric fence.
00:59:25 --> 00:59:27 Hands down electric fence.
00:59:28 --> 00:59:31 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Our third question, what would you tell
00:59:31 --> 00:59:32 someone just getting started?
00:59:34 --> 00:59:39 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: I hate my answer because it's the answer I got
00:59:39 --> 00:59:41 and it's like, well, that doesn't tell me anything, but it all, it
00:59:41 --> 00:59:44 does actually all start in the soil.
00:59:44 --> 00:59:49 And so if you've got a degraded resource, whether it was farm ground
00:59:49 --> 00:59:54 that was planted back to grass or somebody's just left cattle set stocked
00:59:54 --> 00:59:59 forever on there, and you've kind of got to bring it back to life, well,
01:00:00 --> 01:00:01 that electric fence will help you.
01:00:02 --> 01:00:06 And there's a number of different grazing ideas out there.
01:00:07 --> 01:00:14 But until you get that right, you've got to make up for what is not in the
01:00:14 --> 01:00:22 soil, With a mineral program, and my biggest complaint about mixed minerals
01:00:22 --> 01:00:30 is the vast majority to compete on price, even if they've got a great recipe, to
01:00:30 --> 01:00:37 compete on price, they get the individual minerals that originated in China.
01:00:38 --> 01:00:41 Almost every mineral coming out of China has cadmium in it.
01:00:42 --> 01:00:49 The first thing cadmium does in a cow's body is screws up their ability
01:00:49 --> 01:00:52 to regulate internal body temperature.
01:00:53 --> 01:00:55 They're too hot in the summer and don't breed.
01:00:55 --> 01:00:59 They're too cold in the winter and require more feed.
01:00:59 --> 01:01:04 The way you can know if you have that without testing, the way to
01:01:04 --> 01:01:09 know if you have that in your herd, If you have a slight hump in the
01:01:09 --> 01:01:12 cow's back from the shoulders, it goes up two or three inches and then
01:01:12 --> 01:01:14 drops back down to the hook bones.
01:01:15 --> 01:01:18 Classic cadmium toxicity look.
01:01:19 --> 01:01:21 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yes,
01:01:22 --> 01:01:27 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: So if you clean, and so anymore, all I'm
01:01:27 --> 01:01:32 doing is using sea salt one of the detox clays, Redmond conditioner,
01:01:32 --> 01:01:35 desert dining man, that sort of thing to get rid of the neighbor.
01:01:35 --> 01:01:40 Unless you've got listeners who live where the wind does not blow, there
01:01:40 --> 01:01:46 are things from the neighbor blowing in and they negatively affect your cows.
01:01:46 --> 01:01:52 So, making up for what is not in your soil, and as you, improve
01:01:52 --> 01:01:58 your grazing and cover crops and interseeding and that sort of thing.
01:01:58 --> 01:02:02 The diversity, the biology, pretty quick, the bricks of your grass
01:02:02 --> 01:02:06 and the diversity is up and then you need fewer and fewer and fewer
01:02:06 --> 01:02:10 supplements but get clean supplements.
01:02:11 --> 01:02:13 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: get clean supplements.
01:02:14 --> 01:02:15 Excellent advice, yes.
01:02:17 --> 01:02:19 And lastly, where can others find out more about you?
01:02:20 --> 01:02:22 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: I have a website, Taylor
01:02:22 --> 01:02:26 with an I, taylormadecattle.
01:02:27 --> 01:02:34 com and on there, And I'm hoping to get a copy of this too.
01:02:34 --> 01:02:35 I'll put it on there.
01:02:35 --> 01:02:39 There are 12 or 13 videos.
01:02:39 --> 01:02:40 There's a videos tab.
01:02:40 --> 01:02:47 There's 12 or 13 videos and then just some other general information on there.
01:02:48 --> 01:02:50 My phone number is 208.
01:02:50 --> 01:02:55 3154726.
01:02:57 --> 01:02:59 I want to go back to the website.
01:02:59 --> 01:03:06 There's a schedule tab and I try to update when I'm traveling and where
01:03:06 --> 01:03:10 I'm traveling and approximately when I'll be there and if you're somewhere
01:03:10 --> 01:03:16 along the route and you would like a consultation or to put together a field
01:03:16 --> 01:03:19 day on your farm or a two day school.
01:03:21 --> 01:03:24 call me and we can talk about that.
01:03:24 --> 01:03:35 And then my email address is steve at t a i l o r made cattle dot com.
01:03:36 --> 01:03:39 steve at taylor made cattle dot com.
01:03:40 --> 01:03:43 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Steve, we, we appreciate you coming
01:03:43 --> 01:03:44 on and sharing with us today.
01:03:45 --> 01:03:47 steve_1_02-07-2025_162952: Well, I'm surprised we didn't use any slides.
01:03:49 --> 01:03:50 But thank you for the opportunity.
01:03:50 --> 01:03:53 And I just hope that this information was helpful.
01:03:53 --> 01:03:57 We'll cause some people to look maybe in slightly different way
01:03:58 --> 01:04:00 areas than they've looked before, and
01:04:01 --> 01:04:07 we'll add to the bottom line and they and their, their future generations
01:04:07 --> 01:04:12 can stay on the land instead of moving away like we see so much these days.
01:04:12 --> 01:04:13 cal_1_02-07-2025_172951: Oh, yes.
01:04:13 --> 01:04:14 I agree.
01:04:16 --> 01:04:19 Cal: Thank you for listening to this episode of the grazing grass podcast,
01:04:19 --> 01:04:24 where we bring you stories and insights into grass-based livestock production.
01:04:24 --> 01:04:27 If you're new here, we've got something just for you.
01:04:27 --> 01:04:29 Our new listener resource guide.
01:04:29 --> 01:04:33 Is packed with everything you need to get started on your listening
01:04:33 --> 01:04:35 journey with a grazing grass podcast.
01:04:36 --> 01:04:39 It gives you more information about the podcast about myself.
01:04:40 --> 01:04:41 And next steps.
01:04:41 --> 01:04:44 You can grab your free copy at grazinggrass.com
01:04:44 --> 01:04:46 slash guide.
01:04:46 --> 01:04:47 Don't miss out.
01:04:49 --> 01:04:51 And Hey, do you have a grazing story to share?
01:04:51 --> 01:04:56 We're always looking for passionate producers to feature on the show,
01:04:56 --> 01:05:01 whether you're just starting out or have years of experience your story matters.
01:05:01 --> 01:05:03 Head over to grazing grass.
01:05:03 --> 01:05:05 Dot com slash guest.
01:05:05 --> 01:05:07 To learn more and apply to be a guest.
01:05:07 --> 01:05:11 We'd love to share your journey with our growing community of grazers.
01:05:12 --> 01:05:13 Until next time.
01:05:14 --> 01:05:16 Keep on grazing grass.
Related Episodes
e144. Revving Up Agritourism: Merging Land, Life, and Leisure with Taylor Moyer
Join us on an exciting journey as we welcome back Taylor Moyer, who has transitioned from a successful NASCAR career to full-time farming. Over the past 18 months, Taylor has embraced the challenges and rewards of regenerative farming, leaving the racetrack after the last race in Phoenix to pursue ...
e142. Prescribed Conservation Grazing with Jake Yancey
Unlock the secrets of successful cattle farming in wet climates with Jake Yancey from the Tracking Y Ranch in Western Washington. Join us for an inspiring exploration of Jake's journey as a first-generation rancher, overcoming the challenges of heavy rainfall to expand his operations across a thous...
e139. From Homestead to Thriving Ranch with Eileen Napier
Join us as we welcome Eileen Napier of Ramstead Ranch, who shares her remarkable journey from humble beginnings on a two-acre property in Washington to establishing a thriving 240-acre regenerative livestock operation. Eileen and her partners, Stan Hayes and Jean Hayes, embarked on this adventure w...