B (3:56)

Awesome. Well, so a question I had, and I don't know, but did you judge in college, either one of you?

C (4:02)

I actually did judge in college, but prior to that I had absolutely no idea. Like a judging contest for me was going to junior nationals and judging six or four or eight, you know, cattle classes real fast. I didn't even know what reasons were. But then I actually did judge at SDSU. I don't know. Sam, did you judge in 4H?

D (4:23)

Right, I judged. Actually. Our county had a livestock judging team. There was a senior team and a junior senior team. And I judged all throughout elementary school, high school, middle school, all of that.

C (4:37)

Yeah, so. So yeah, Sant I would have never judged until I got to college. I guess Sam would have had more experience in her younger years. Yeah, I got to sdsu actually. If you remember, Don Boggs used to judge some cattle shows back in the day. He was kind of the head of animal science. And one of the reasons I wanted to go to SDSU was one, it was probably the closest ag school to where I since I was so far into Northwest Iowa. Like Sioux Falls was a lot closer than Des Moines and stuff like that. But anyways, I just Kind of really liked Don Boggs. He hit me at. He was judging a show that I showed some cattle at. And probably when I got to sdsu, you know, he was a department head. Didn't have a lot of interaction with him, but met Kelly Bruns and became my advisor and then, you know, got into livestock judging that way. But I always laugh because when I judged my senior college year in Louisville, I probably judged at like four contests before that. We weren't ready for Denver. We didn't even go. We went to Sioux Falls, and then we actually did the meat animal eval contest. And then it was just Barrow show, Kansas City and Louisville. So didn't have a lot of experience, had some decent success. But yeah, looking back, if I could do it all over again, I would have loved to had a 4H or FFA team and obviously a junior college just for more experience. I really enjoyed. I tell. You know, you hear a lot of judges say this is the best industry to raise kids in, you know, in the show ring. And I do think it is. I think every kid that shows cattle should go through livestock judging. I just think the fact that you have to think on your feet so fast, you have to be able to publicly speak in front of people, I think it's such a great building block to raising, you know, great people in our industry. So I think, yeah, I really do think a lot of collegiate judging, I did do it. I just probably didn't do it at a level that a lot of. A lot of kids do, or you especially a lot of kids do now.

B (6:33)

Well, while we're on the topic, how has livestock judging in general, as well as reasons changed from when you were judging in college to now?

C (6:43)

I don't know that I even had enough experience to know. I, you know, obviously I help officiate quite a few contests. It blows my mind how talented some of them junior college kids, you know, are. When I listen to them. I would say just there's probably in. In my eyes, I don't know, a lot of some of the older guys that have been judging, coaching, judging teams for to me, there is a lot more kids out there that are very, very competitive, if that makes sense. But I'm probably not the best person or most educated on history of livestock judging, you know.

B (7:18)

So now what I'd like to, I guess, dive into is what do you think the industry is now compared to when you all got started in terms of breeding and such? And what was the biggest benefactor to the change of the production of cattle from when you started RJ Cattle Co to now.

C (7:36)

So kind of like basically how I got started was, I mean, obviously it didn't have a lot of money. So I would just go out and try to buy calves that I thought were skinny or, you know, had future. But I could afford to buy, bring them home, put them on feed, try to get them looking nicer, sell them for a profit or I had some very, very good people give me the opportunity. Calves on consignment and sell them on splits, you know, so then we could get into some higher end cattle that I couldn't have afforded to buy and resell, you know. But back then when I would travel the country looking for cattle, especially like in our country in South Dakota, it was nothing for a guy to AI a hundred cows or 200 cows or some guys bigger, three, 400 cows. And I think you still could get those outliers. It was just rare. You know, you had that one or two. You heard about a steer bringing 20,000, 30 and. But it wasn't very often and a lot of times those first ones were all AI. I think now it has gotten so competitive and so good. I think there's just. If you don't have a donor that has a very potent cow family behind her and just the ability to generate and you're not doing a lot of ET work. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's very, very tough. I think just because there's so many people that are so competitive doing it.

B (8:55)

What were some of the biggest challenges that you faced? Getting started? I'm sure one of them would be reaching out to people, making connections and such like that.

D (9:05)

Yeah, for sure. Like just bouncing off of like the last question. Just finding the cattle to be able to sell and, and get started that way. And then really once we could get, get our bearings and, and then find heifers to then become donor cows or even buying some donors like we have just being able to do that and that really has, has helped us with our business and our success that we've had.

B (9:31)

Absolutely, for sure.

C (9:33)

Yeah, I would agree 100% of that. You know, like just finding cattle that like Sam said that are good enough, you know, because no one wants to have a calf that's never going to have the potential to win. So you gotta, first you gotta find something that's good enough and then, you know, be, be able to afford it and get it going. I think the other thing, and we have been absolutely blessed with what we do is and maybe we can talk about this a little bit later. But, you know, we are almost 100% ET operation. So almost every single calf that's born, unless it's a natural calf out of a donor cow, is an embryo calf. And we, as far as me and Sam, we do not have a cabin barn ourselves. So like we rely on co op herds that have, we've been absolutely blessed with, I think, finding co op herds that do a good job building, you know, lifelong relationships turned into lifelong friendships. You know, obviously a crew behind us that to me, as we've gotten bigger, that's are wanting to get bigger, that's probably a really big challenge. And I, I see that a lot is people want to do something but don't have the resources. And maybe finding the correct co op herds I think is a challenge for a lot of people. Or some people have so much a controlling deal where they don't trust somebody to do it for them either, you know.

B (10:56)

Right. It's finding a co op herd or some people with some reception that you trust to put those embryos in. And it's hard, especially put your embryos in that cost so much for sure. But what I will say with that is if you could start over, is there anything that y' all would have done differently and maybe that be some advice for some people that are coming up in the industry or want to have their own cattle company one day?

C (11:20)

Yeah, I mean, everything's, you know, hindsight 2020 or whatever. But I. So I graduated College in like 2007 and I actually, you know, grew up in the whimmies. I didn't know a lot of people industry wide. I'd really never worked on high end show steers before. I actually took a job with Linhart Limousine and just kind of on the agreement that I would work for them for like I told them it wasn't going to be a forever deal, but I promised them two to five years, you know, and I actually worked there for three and a half years. And then my very good friends, Scott Werning I met in college, he actually judged the year before me. But I like livestock judging so much. I actually did a lot of traveling with his team the year before I actually judged, just trying to learn some stuff. He gave me the opportunity. Him and his wife had just gotten married and had their first kid, that I could move back to South Dakota and live in their basement and kind of help them out as needed on his family's operation and then kind of freelance and do my own thing, you know, if I wanted to Trade some calves in the fall. So they gave me a. An opportunity to leave Southern Iowa. I had a great time, learned a lot. So kind of getting back to your question, I think every kid, I think they should, like, go for some experiences. Whether it's good or bad. You know, you can have great experiences and learn from really smart people. You can go work for some people that you're like, man, what they're doing there is a great idea. What they're doing bad is a. What they're doing over in that direction is a bad idea. I don't want to do that. So I feel like a lot of kids want to jump in, like, head first, and that's great. It works for. For some. But I don't think kids need to be greedy when they're real young. If everybody knew, like, how little I worked for when I first was out of college, they wouldn't believe it, you know, But I just think it's really good for kids to get a little bit of experience under their belt before they dive in. I don't know if Sam's.

D (13:15)

I mean, you know, like, whenever we started, I feel like it really kept us grounded to what we know and what we're doing. And it strived us to be better every day to. To do this, to want to do this every day.

B (13:28)

Yeah.

C (13:28)

Yeah. And same. Like, kids probably, you know, don't spend, you know, above your means. I get, you know, it's amazing. I think back to, like, what our barn is now and our setup. Like, what we started with was a little 40x40 pole shed with a dirt floor, and all we could afford to do was pour some concrete in half of it. So we had a wash rack and. Yeah. And now we've kind of built it kind of how we want it. But you don't need just a terrible lot. It's obviously great to have nice stuff, but you just. It's something you have to work for and not try to get yourself in a hole you can't get dug out of too.

D (14:04)

You know, we did all of our stuff. I mean, it. It just. We would do a sale and we would figure out what we wanted to better our. Better our program for the next year. And that's. That's just what we did. I mean, you. You have to look at it from the. From the back end of it. You have to look and see. Okay, do I really need that this year? Or can we wait until maybe after your sale and. And see what we can do then?

B (14:30)

That's some of the greatest Advice I've heard in a while for sure. What I'd like to know next is obviously y' all raise everything from steers, heifers, bulls, and even have bread sales and everything. What I'd like to know is what's the most challenging part of raising and selling? And then with that is our favorite part of it.

D (14:49)

I mean, the most challenging part of course is are you, are you getting everything across? I mean, thankfully now for social media, it's easy. You can we and even Snapchat, Facebook, everything, you can blast every, every calf out on there and it's easy to get them looked at. I mean, whenever we first started, we were only doing a bid off and yeah, you just hope that you would get people to show up at the house to be able to bid on them and to get them out of, off the feed bill. But then for me, my favorite part is one, being able to see all the calves as their babies and then growing up and coming through the wash rack and getting them broke and clipped and pictured and videoed and out on the sail pens and then being able to see them back into a show ring somewhere. Whether it's a county fair, state fair, I mean Kansas City, Louisville, Denver, any of it.

C (15:51)

Yeah, I would agree with like what Sam said. The favorite part. I just love looking at good livestock. So whether it's running to look at some baby calves at a co op herd and like, hey, is that bull or that mating working? What should we do this spring to watching them get kicked out to grass and getting to look at. I mean, there's nothing prettier than a nice set of ET calves on a nice set of receipts, in my opinion. You know, when the weather's nice and, and you got a beautiful cool morning or a cool evening. Me and Sam always joke in the summers our favorite pastime is maybe grabbing a bite to eat and then hopping in a side by side or a pickup and just driving through pairs or going to look at donors in the evening. You know, just love looking at good livestock. And like Sam said, it kind of comes full circle. You get watch them grow up, watch them get broke, sold, see what happens, you know, the, what direction that calf takes with the new owner. And then, yeah, there's nothing more breathtaking than seeing a beautiful bred heifer in the show ring or a fat steer. You know, I just think I heard a judge say one time in a big fat steer class, like, there's nothing more enamorating or like attention grabbing than a big fat steer in a show ring. Of all the species that we show in the livestock industry, you know, when a big hairy steer, heifer walks in the ring, they really can command a lot of people's attention. And it just something that drives me to have, you know, have stuff like.

B (17:17)

That to go off of. Something you'd said earlier there y' all started off doing bid offs. Now there's obviously online platforms, sc, cci, steer bidder. What was the biggest transition from y' all doing bid off to that?

C (17:32)

And I was a little leery at first because, I mean, I think back to my first sale, this would have been back with CW sales in 2000. And this was before I even had met Sam, while I was living with Scott Wernie, an old friend that I grew up in Kitchen Church, grew up together. Corey Altina from Georgia, Iowa, he actually grew up just like. Or lives like maybe 10, 15 minutes from where I grew up. He called me one summer and said, hey, I know you're kind of looking for a place to maybe have your own sale. I'd be interested in renting you my show barn after I'm done with my September bid off sale, if you're wanting to have an online sale. And I'm like, you know, that sounds great. I'm over here in South Dakota. But, you know, if you can do chores a few days a week for me, I'll be there a few days a week, and I think we can make it work, you know. And he had maybe a few Ks he'd like to put on, but back then, you just, oh, let's have a little online sale. You know, it wasn't like. It wasn't like you were running your bit, you know, we literally rely on running our business by our big September sale, basically, you know, or other calves that we raise go through online sales. So back then, it wasn't that big of a deal. And I remember them first bid off sales we had here in Mitchell. So actually, Sam mentioned she moved to South Dakota in the summer of 14, which would have been August, I. I think. And just by, I guess, God's grace to bring us together, I actually bought this place that we're at the same month that she moved here. And then that's when I met Sam. Because when I was in South Dakota, obviously friends with Corey Thompson and Riley Lobber was there at the time. I helped them guys a lot. So, yeah, that's how I met Sam. Was she. She moved here the same in this. My place is only four miles from the old Bushy park place. So it's kind of a cool, kind of a cool story. Thinking back of our days of helping over there, both of us. And Sam was there full time when she got here. But I just, I joke sometimes now we get so overwhelmed with traffic and it's great. I love people to come look at this livestock, but you can catch a hot September day and the cattle get wore out. When we first started having them bid offs, you would just wish and wish you'd see a car come over the driveway, over the hill. And now it's like, can you guys please leave them alone? I mean, I feel bad, but even if we get a hot week and we tell people to give the calves a break from noon to 4, noon to 5, you know, it just. You think back and I know that some growing pains that every. Every young person that's going to start up doing is going to, you know, try to get people to come and look at them. And then when people do come and look at them, they got to have a good experience and want to come back too, you know. But yeah, I think, you know, we are blessed with a lot of traffic all year long. We get people stopping in to look at stuff a lot, lot. But I think back to the early days, you just wanted beg people to come and look at them, you know.

B (20:22)

Yeah, for sure.

C (20:22)

And now like Sam talks about social media and just we're not in a world that we were in, especially when we were born and stuff. It's. It's easy, you know, to get the word out and people, whether it's good or bad, like, you know, what they see and yeah, I just think the industry has changed a lot and we actually went back to having a live sale with our bread heifers this year, but it was through the Internet on CCI live. So yeah, there's a lot of platforms, you know, are ways to sell your cattle that can work for, you know, still a live auction where they're running cattle through the ring is great, you know, if it works in that scenario. But for us, our big deal in September works great because you got about a 3, 4 week window that works great for people to come look at the cattle and you know, they can come and go as they please and it just seems to work good and. And show circuit offers a great platform for us to. To sell them, I guess.

B (21:19)

You know, you said that y' all had yalls live auction this year. Talk to me how that went and is that something y' all are going to potentially be doing again?

C (21:26)

Yeah, we actually did. So we have our bread sale with one of our partners on a lot of our Angus donors and one of our very first and best co op birds, Plant Farms. Chris Plant was another guy that I met in college and, and became good friends when I moved back to South Dakota. It gave me the opportunity to start putting some embryos in, in his commercial cows. And it's just kind of grown. His daughter spends ding near every waking second here in the summer working on show cattle after school all Christmas break. Yeah, they're just like a second family to us. And I know our little boy looks up to her like she walks on water, you know, so that is. I know I get to talking in circles a little bit, but we actually had an live auction in West Point, Nebraska with plants. This has been 17, 2017, nearly eight years ago. I wouldn't say it was a wreck or anything, but it wasn't a great sale. Prior to that, we had maybe one or two little online bread heifer sales. I don't know. We just didn't probably like moving the cattle to a different area to try to sell them. You have to worry about getting them, you know, presented for a catalog, presented for a live sale. It probably just wasn't the best fit for us. Everybody had some different, different. Plenty of other stuff going on. So then we went back to selling them online with lots of great sales. I think they were, I don't know. I don't ever remember one of the online sales where we weren't happy. This year we probably had maybe a few more and thought the quality was really good. As we get deeper into this, we can keep more ET heifers back of our own for that sale that we kind of got a cow family and a story behind versus maybe going out and just finding different stuff to sell, like on commission or buying and, you know, reasonable heifers. So just kind of had some close friends, Kent Jakey and Steve Bonham been kind of chattering at us trying to get us to do this. Justin Mock has been a really good friend since I moved back to South Dakota. He decided to do the same thing and he'd been selling them online and it, it worked great. Honestly, it was our. Probably our best bread heifer sale we've ever had. Now a lot of that can indicate the cattle market this year, the quality, you know, but yeah, it worked great. And I think just selling a bread heifer online maybe is a traditional. And that's the crowd you're, you're like catering to, if that makes sense, you know. So I think a live auction in that scenario worked really well because the bread heifer buyers like a live auction. And for us, the CCI deal was awesome because we could picture and video them, get them up, make an online catalog. The cattle stayed right here on the little pasture behind our show barn. They were easy for people to come and go and look at as they please. And, and as we sold them, they just got loaded up and hauled directly to their new home. We didn't have to bring them to a sale barn, bounce them around, you know, a couple different times. So yeah, I think it's something we'll look into and I think it's a great way, you know, we can use technology to sell them online but still have a, a live auction like that. And I think it works great.

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B (27:09)

A lot of breeding decisions that lead up to having a sale. So talk to me about some of those decisions y' all make with the primary donors that y' all usually do a bunch of e. T work with. You know, what bulls work to what cows and what's been, you know, some of the more profitable matings that y' all been able to accomplish with.

C (27:27)

Yeah, I always get a kick out of people, you know, at their sale, they get on and announce, we work 364 days for this staple. But in true, truly, like if you're selling a bread heifer, she's not two, she's not two years old until you sell her. It took nine months to incubate her, you know, and then you had to decide what mating you were going to make to make her it. Just like I always tell people, we have people ask if they should invest in a heifer. I said, once you're committed, you are committed. If you're buying a heifer calf, I mean, you're buying a nine month old heifer calf that can't be bred until she's a little over a year old, can't calve till she's two. Get to flushing on her, you know, you're not gonna have actual calves out of her tails. She's about three, you know, three et calves and you know, she's gonna be four or five years old before you ever see much income coming back. And that's what makes the cattle deal tough. Like you really have to be committed and disciplined. Believe in the heifers that you're flushing, believe in the cows that you're flushing that they're gonna work because it's not, you know, I look at some of them guys that raise pigs and they get a litter out of one sow. We gotta spend a fortune to flush a cow to get a litter and then it takes nine months for us. Heck, they're, you know, what Is it three, three months, three weeks, three days. And then they got a new litter of pigs and they're selling them when they're just little babies. I don't. It's crazy. That's why I think the cattle people really have to be disciplined. And it's a long, long term investment. And that's what makes it tough too because. And that's why we just weren't able to the ones that you really wanted at the time until you can get rolling and save more and more money, you know, and then, hey, maybe we should try to get in on this cow or buy that one. You know, as far as cows that have made us, obviously we had bought. When I got out of college the fall of 07, I seen a purebred Simondal heifer calf at DL Warning's place and bought that heifer actually with Jared and Scott Warning from their dad. That turned out to be 85.43. And for like the Simmental gurus, that's the mother of bankroll, relentless executive order, family tradition, night watch. They're still, you know, selling progeny that are pretty high end out of her. And she was born, and I take that back, it was not 07, it was the fall 08. She was born in 2008. She really jumped started. I remember the first year we had a couple heifers out of her. We were champion reserve in Kansas City and Denver. One junior nationals. The Vicklin family showed a high regard out of her. So she probably really helped us start getting our name out there. And you know, we were kind of in the mode of wanting to sell show heifers. It turned out. 85, 43 obviously had a couple right away, but she turned into like raising a lot of herd sires that are very influential in the show ring and still today trace a lot of the Simmental cattle back to a lot of her sons. You know. And now I. I don't know. I always joke. Willie Weiss always jokes to me like, like gun to your head, which donor are you never giving up? And he might name a couple and I'd be like, I guess I'm taking the bullet because I'm not giving up neither one. You know, we just, we have really been lucky with some of the cows. You know, if I see something and I. I was actually visiting with some guy about some embryos that are selling on embryos on snow. I said some of the best stuff you find is when you're not looking for it. Like, like you go out looking for something and you Just you, like, catch yourself buying something you didn't need. An example I was telling him was, we have a. A cow we call Judy 318k. She's a purebred Charlay cow. And I'll never forget the first time I seen her. I was at Tree Lanes and she was about four pens away. And I looked at Bod and I said, is that a Charlotte composite? And he started laughing. He said, it's a purebred. And the closer I got to her pen, I knew she was going to be some way somehow. I was hoping we could get her back here. We actually ended up partnering with Drew Smith from Ohio, and she was campaigned by McKenzie Neal very successfully. But more importantly for us, we could get her back here and get her into production. And she's done a lot of cool things in just her first set of ET Ks we're looking forward to, you know, so just stuff like that. Like Little Red has obviously blessed us with an incredible set of steers every year. Tim Heckman, a great friend of ours, we actually owned Lady Crystal and Shortcake with him as well. He was telling me about a bull called not for Sale and thought that that bull was kind of cool, you know, when he was growing up. And I think they ended up promoting him when he's a little older in life. I remember they took like a mature picture of him and he had already had some calves out of him and he would kind of. I think these calves are pretty nice for a clean bull. And he'd always show me this video or picture on his phone of this red. He walk around with her head up, look big bone, really sound and cool. And I said, you know, maybe just in. Are you. No, we'll probably keep her. And all of a sudden I. I just happened to pull up Ty Webster's bread heifer sale. It was a steer bitter online sale. And I called Heckman. I said, isn't that that heifer that you've been showing me for the last year and a half? Yeah. We decided maybe we'd just see if we could, you know, cash in on half of her. So not that she was free, but she wasn't terribly expensive to what. What some of these stuff brings today. You know, we happened to be able to get her. Yeah. Some of these Angus females that we bought with Plan. Lizzo would have been the mother. She's a primo McKinley. She would have been the mother of the last show heifer that Sarah Sullivan was supreme in Louisville with. She was also supreme at Kansas City. One junior Nationals. That little Angus cow. We call her Lizzo Oakland plant shoulder. She's a Primo McKinley from Keith Mosher. Keith Mosher. I actually grew up in 4h for with. I would say Keith didn't really know what he was doing. I mean, me and my sister could go to our county fair and win with purebred limmies. And everybody kind of curled their nose. I mean, we. Not that we knew what we were doing, but we knew more than everybody else, you know, and everybody kind of curl their nose up and not welcome you. And Keith was the most awesome guy asking questions you guys deserve to win, like, how do you do this? And I hadn't seen Keith for, man, maybe 10 years. And I was at Angus Junior Nationals. And I come walking around the corner and Keith, I said, what are you doing doing here? Oh, and they had a big feedlot at home commercial, you know, cattle. And he said, well, we've had a really good year. We decided to go to Prairie View and buy a little fall Angus heifer. And that Angus heifer that they bought ended up winning her division at junior nationals as a calf. She won her division as a senior yearling. She won Atlantic national one Iowa Field day. And that's the mother of our Lizzo. I mean, that heifer was awesome. I seen her in the show ring and I was like, holy cow, that's Keith heifer. And yeah, just kind of reconnected with Keith that he kept half of Lizzo's get some awesome calves out of her. But she's blessed us in some ways recently. We've had a bunch of really good calves out of a cow we call 138J. Or the kids in the show barn called her Queen. That would be the mother of the heifer Oakland was reserve in Louisville with. I found her at Boyer and Coors. I was getting a two or one spring from Jared Boyer. I like to get out and just go see everybody's calves what's working. And I'll never forget, I could drive you the exact lot where I first seen her as a baby calm. And I thought, holy smokes. I don't know if I've ever seen an Angus like that. And she's. She was a dignity 419. I thought 419 up until that point was one of the best Angus females I've ever seen. Grace any show ring is as well as dignity's mother. The Nowadsky family seen her. I remember the first time I seen her in the ring at Denver as a heifer calf. So I thought you know, this heifer calf looks awesome. She combines two of my favorite females I've ever seen. You know, know love to do something. And we're fortunate. Austin plants partnered with Jim Cowan on that heifer and she's done us an incredible job. Yeah. So just, I don't know. 400 was another cow that won Texas. She won rodeo Austin for us one year. Just recently won Nebraska state fair. That heifer was actually a purchased embryo Justin Muk bought when Chris pulls in, was selling a lot of eggs and he had this really cool butterscotch heifer in his pasture sale. And Bergs who been lifelong friends. I met him in college there another one of great co op herds. Sold them steers throughout their kids whole 4h career. They're kind of matching. You know, we wouldn't mind showing a charolay composite heifer Junior nationals were maybe close that year. I can't remember. And I found this butterscotch heifer at Justin Mox. She was a walk this way out of a cow called Pebbles and kind of bidding along, bidding along and got down to two. And I said Justin, who am I bidding against? I was kind of getting to the end of my rope. And he goes, well, it's me. I kind of want to keep her. And I said, well, how about I just buy half of her and the rest is history. History. She's put high quality calves in both of our sales since. Man, I can't. I do remember the first in God she ever had was a yellow calf that actually Kirby Eves bought and also turned into another really, really good friend. I'll never forget that calf. He was really, really nice. So yeah, just by chance, you know, not necessarily that you need to go out, hey, I'm gonna go by myself. The next Angus, the next Simi, the next main donor or club cap donor. I just think, you know, if you see something believe in and. And you want to do it and you want it and you know, if resources allow, give it a try, you know, but make sure you believe in her.

B (37:18)

Well, something that crossed my mind as you were talking and Troy Sloan had said this before and maybe that's why the pig world is so ahead of us because they get to have three litters a year and we get to have one. But what, what is your philosophy or theory about virgin flushing? It's just something that did come across of mind.

C (37:37)

So this is great. Sam will tell you that we have some incredible baby calves on the ground that we got to go look at. We have never done that and always Been scared or didn't want to. You know, I always. My theory was, hey, let's just wait one more year. We can flush that cow for 10 years versus just trying to get a few quick ones out of them. But I would say we are going to do it more and more now because we have some very nice calves out of a couple heifers that we have high hopes for that. Have we? Maybe Oakland would have showed last year. I want to knock on wood because they look really nice now and got a long time till they sell them. More importantly, they hit the show ring and stuff like that. But I do think we will do a lot more of that in the future. Actually, I plan on doing a lot. You know, we buy a lot of heifer, not a lot of heifer calves, but I feel like we spent an arm and a leg. It seems like you find something you have to have. But we will do more and more of that probably in the future. This is kind of funny. You talk about pigs getting ahead of us or, you know, can move faster. But I had a really good friend that taught me a lot about judging livestock. His name's Chris Smith from South Dakota. Very good. Close friends of ours was in our wedding. And he always said the pig people gotta swing the pendulum just as far as they can, and then they gotta go back. You know, and the cattle world, obviously, we do probably take some stuff to some extremes, but we can't probably move that pendulum back and forth as fast as a pig. People, you know, it just. It ain't possible for us, you know. So whether that's. Sometimes that's good stuff or bad stuff, you know, I don't know. I think it's very, very interesting. But that I always preach, you got to keep balance.

B (39:21)

And you talk about swinging for the fences. This come across my mind. But swinging for the fences. DS on ds, guess some people do it. But what do you think of that? How. How hard do you go on that? Just club calf general, I guess.

C (39:34)

But, yeah, I would say that I can remember very distinctively the two or three calves that we've had that were th and th. And we will never do that again. The DS doesn't bother me too much. We've. Man. I can only remember, like one or two tree climbers we've ever had. I think if you got some pha in your cow herd, you have to be really, really, really careful with ds. We don't really have much of that. I do remember we had one pha calf, and that was an accident. The Bull was test, supposedly tested clean and it turned out he was dirty. But, yeah, I don't, I don't do that. I will not do that. If you've ever seen a thkf, they got more will to live than anything else and you gotta put them down. And I just, I don't like it at all. I feel like there's enough good cattle out there, we can make good ones without having to do that. So, hey, I, I remember buying some, you know, we used to buy, trade a few calves for families. And I remember one of the very best animals we ever had. His name was Megatron. Actually, I think there was two of them. Vicklin's one of the last years Vedas showed. She showed a Fu Manchu that won a bunch of jackpot shows, and that calf was double dirty. And I think the very next year, or maybe even that year it was the next year, we bought a calf from Wade Rogers, a here I am, headliner that the Pratt family in Colorado showed. And to this day, they called him Megatron. One division one in the city. That calf was double dirty too. I mean, they want to be two of the better calves I ever worked on. So I'm not saying, hey, if that's your deal and you want to do it, you probably will raise some cool stuff, but for us, it's just not our thing. I don't like it.

B (41:09)

And one thing also, there's bulls out there that are triple dirty. Obviously you have your own bull battery, so. But I want to know people that use triple dirty bulls. And I'm not saying triple dirty bulls are bad by any means. I've seen, seen a lot of triple dirty bulls that looked awesome. But what's your thoughts on using those kinds of bulls?

C (41:27)

I don't necessarily think I. So we have, we work do a lot of stuff with Chuck and Ben Olson. They have bought bread heifers from us for years. Their kids are starting to show and very, very good pig breeders for years and years. I'll never forget going. And this is one thing, it goes back to the judging team. Like, you get to go to guys, places that are very, very intelligent and listen to them talk about livestock. Right? And I'll never forget Ben and Chuck talking about breeding livestock. Doesn't mean that you're breeding the best animal, the best animal and getting the next best animal. It's like putting the pieces of the puzzle together, like what's going to work on that cow or that bull to make everything work, you know? So to me, breeding livestock's about putting pieces of the puzzle. So if you want to use a triple dirty bull, I don't think that's bad if you got a really bland set of cows, you know, But I think our cows are getting pretty good now. I don't know that I. A triple dirty bull is necessary. Hey, maybe I might walk across one in Denver this year and think we've got to try them, you know, but on certain cows that are maybe a little more bland, as far as lining the ds, I think that's fairly safe. You know, they say some bulls are hotter for it than others with pha and stuff like that. I do think it's hard not to have some TH&DS in our show steers. They just. There's no doubt their hair quality better. You know, you can see it right away, a clean one or a dirty one, as soon as they're born, dang near. They either got the thick fuzz or a little straighter hair.

B (42:57)

So. Well, even at that, like people that, you know, breed how great over here I am. Cal, what's your thoughts on that? Not necessarily inline breeding, but close to.

C (43:07)

I was thinking about this a little bit. It's probably one of the bigger challenges in our industry with raising steers right now is we are so tightly. I guess you could go all the way back to heat seeker, you know, and heat wave. We are so tightly wound with that. It would be nice to. To have a little bit different, something that works and it's the same thing. I remember Simmy's Dream on's gotten old enough now that it's far enough back, but everybody, oh, we got to do something Dream on. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to keep line breeding Dream on because they're good. And you guys can try that outcross stuff. It's like the Angus show cattle world, like, they are pretty tightly wound, but if you go and try to use some of that stuff, it's just not. They weren't their purpose, you know, like some of them seed stock Angus cattle, their purpose was not raised to win a show. So it's. To me, it's in all the livestock that we're breeding. It's. We are getting them pretty tight. I don't. It still seems to work. And I feel like you watch the progression of pitchers over the years or I always tell people, you don't think our cattle are better, go use a bull from 20 years ago and let me know how your calves look. You know, I. I mean, I. I really do believe our Cattle are incredibly high quality and the talent of presentation is at an all time high. Not that it wasn't always good, but I look back to like when me. And I mean for sure when I started showing her scene, you put a little glue in their tail, had a little glue in their legs, and you had them clipped really good before the show. And one guy could bring about four head to a show and pull it off. I mean, it takes five guys to get one calf right ready for a couple hours before they hit the ring. I mean, you just. There is not one ounce of hair that's not touched before they go in the show ring. You know, it's just. It's tough. And so I. I don't. I know I'm talking in circles a little bit, but to your point about them bulls being tight one, I wish we could find an outcross, but I have no idea where you're gonna, you know, like to use a purebred main bull. We obviously have a lot of talented main bulls in the breed, but to actually raise a steer, you know, I think it'd be tough. I don't know. I don't know where that comes from or what the answer is. I do think it's a great question, and I don't know if I have an answer for it because I feel like anytime you try to go off the path of what's working, it's tough, you know, I really do think that's hard.

B (45:29)

No, I completely agree. For sure. And we're on the topic of bull, so let's get to your bull battery because it's been pretty hot here lately. But you got bulls that y' all come out with like greater good, Golden Rule hits different or even. I mean, Trust fund has made significant stamp in the show heifer world. But talk to me about just what those bulls have done for you and what you think they bring to the market and a few others if you'd like.

C (45:54)

So Grainer Good and Golden Rule were a couple bulls we actually sold basically two falls ago. So their first calves are just hitting the ground. I actually just got to see our first couple. Greater goods has us really excited. Probably love that bull and a lot of his flushmates his whole life. Still love to look at him at the bullstead today, so. So really looking forward to him. We've had some full brothers to him. One was reserved at Iowa State Fair. There'll be a lot more showing like this winter and stuff like that. Very excited about him seeing what he can do. We love the how great cattle and he's a how great on an in God back to horn 620cow. So I actually took the opportunity me and one of my buddies went down to horns looked through all those cow herds and just the consistency that Six20 injected into his cowherd was just floored. I don't know. I was just very very amazed by it. So just love what the you know we call our 6261 donor can do. You know and seems like she's really cliff to how great so very excited about greater good golden rule is a triple clean in God little red very he was I remember that calf. He was born up at Bergs. Very very distinct to how big footed and boned and flexible he was. Obviously being clean. He was never blessed with a big big hair coat. But I do think that bull on some dirty cows. I'm excited. We're supposed to have a few. We don't have a lot of dirty cows but we got a few. We're supposed to have some quite a few calves out of him. Looking forward to seeing them. They got both of those bulls got promoted by Griswold so they do a very good job of getting semen scattered around. So don't know exactly what those bulls are going to do for us but but we we did put a lot of stock in that basket and looking forward to it. Trust fund Obviously he's been around for a couple years to I'd say nearly all of our high selling bread heifers were out of trust fund. Still see some awesome trust fund heifer calves you know at several sales during the year. Does a really good job adding some bone and hair and look to Simondale cattle but still keeping them good in their structure. Hits different different. It's kind of a cool story I'll never forget seeing hits difference mother at Iowa Beef Expo. She would have been showing you know as a coming yearling heifer the TAC family. And I thought holy smokes. I don't know if I've ever seen a high main heifer with that big of feet that big of bones that good in her angles. Still had some robust you know rib cage and muscle and good looking and kind of followed her along. She had a lot of success for the tac family and a couple years after that heard some grumblings that but they had a really good all me sauna out of that cow and kind of liked what all me had done and seen some stuff out of him really good. We had a high main heifer out of all Me sell real good. In one of our sales. Me and Sam were actually. Was it the. It was a fall that Rhett was born because we had. We were on our way home from Louisville and we came back that way and asked Barry to lack. Well, first I asked him if I could buy him. He said I committed him to Embryos on Snow. And I said, I can't knock you for that. We just sold trust fund the year before. Stopped and looked at him. I remember. Remember, we had to. Rhett was just. He would have only been a couple months old, I guess, and we had to alternate. One of us went and looked at him and the other one had to come back to the vehicle and watch Rhett so the other one of us could go look at him. Neither one of us. I don't know. Sam remembers that, but I couldn't really find a lot we didn't like about him, I guess. And then I guess for us, one of the things about bulls that I think's really important, whether it's a bull that we're AI into that we don't own or one that we're going to promote ourselves.

B (49:37)

Ourselves.

C (49:37)

Like, I really, really think the cow has to be extremely good and extremely potent for that bull to work Very good. Yeah. If. If you see us tie into a bull, it's probably. We think a lot of the cow. You know what I mean? Whether it's one we're going to promote or one we buy. Yeah. So that bull has blessed us with an incredible rookie calf crop we had. I always joked at everybody, we send a lot of heifers around to these younger guys that do awesome jobs of finding great homes for them and foul. Selling them and getting them into the show ring properly. And I always joked we could have had five times as many of them as we did because they. Everybody wanted to take them and sell them, whether they were maintainers. Main Angus, we had a couple high mains. We're gonna have more this year. But, yeah, I don't know if I've seen a main bull like breed that kind of hind leg and then put foot and bone on them and look. And yeah, he. He has definitely blessed us recently. When that first calf crop came around, Tim Heckman and Justin Muck actually came up the same day. Heckman was out in South Dakota selling seamen. I told Muck, I said, come up. We'll drive through a bunch of those calves at Playamps, see what you guys think. And they're looking around and looking. I mean, we were just breeding. I mean, he was a purebred Maine bull. We were breeding him to our show heifer makers wanting to raise high dollar show huffers, you know, that potentially could go win a show. And Heckman and Mark, they're kind of looking, they're like, don't you think that bull could maybe raise like some club calf cows on the right cows? And I was like, yeah, I suppose. I guess this kind of bone and hair is hard to replicate. We really only had I think 216 is a Garth cow we own with Adam Pryor. Her rookie calf crop calf steer calf crop was this year we had one tickle in 50 and I know prior had a couple of high sellers. That cow did us an awesome job. She had a natural hits different heifer calf that was the high sell and Fitz's and Weiss's sale in Stillwater in December. So really that was the only one we had on a quote unquote club calf cow. And she was awesome and look forward to seeing what she could do. So we actually, as we were talking about that muck, went home and flushed some of his club calf cows that way. And we, you know, we've been doing the same and really look forward to maybe, you know, seeing if we can kind of get some more of those maternal club calf cows out of him as well as competitive show heifers. So yeah, it's kind of excited about that.

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B (54:41)

Very neat. For sure. Not many people necessarily take, you know, bulls like that on club calf cows, but the idea sounds awesome and definitely has worked obviously with that one heifer going in that sale. So very excited for these.

C (54:54)

I do think our, our industry's changed a little. I would say if you asked me what the ideal female was when I started this and Sam can remember, I remember we used to take care of a lot of Vickland's fema. We were selling them. We had a heifer called She's Styling that we had bought from Udell. She was a style huda man. And at that time I would have told you that's the best animal I'd ever seen. I thought she walked on water. And looking back, if I seen her now, yeah, I'd still appreciate her quality. But she was not wide and she was not heavy muscle. I mean, she could do a lot of other things really well. But I do think what we are winning with most of the time in the short ring, it's kind of come back to where we need them. Because that, that type of female at first I would have thought would have worked. I learned very quickly and I would say our cows do not look like that anymore. They are way, way stouter and Wider and stuff like that. At the time I would have told you that's what the ideal female, you know, her heifers that look similar to her. And I'd get so mad if we'd get beat, you know, by something that had more muscle, but then it wasn't as pretty and wasn't as flat shouldered or as sound as she was. Was, you know. But that's for sure.

B (56:09)

You're on the topic of the evolution of the show heifer world, but I want to initiate a topic. What is it that you think we're lacking in the industry as of now in terms of heifer or steers?

D (56:22)

Probably the cost of, of what these things are bringing. I mean.

B (56:26)

Yes, yeah, yeah.

C (56:28)

You gotta find people that can afford to buy them. It's ridiculous. Yeah, that, that is a very good point. As far as the cattle themselves, I, and I know I, I am the first one to. If I see a tall club calf bull, I'm out. I'm not using him. But I'd much rather have a holdover that can find a show somewhere than one that gets away from you. But I do wish our cattle were a little more like, grew a little quicker and you know, like just a little more mean. I don't know what the right word is, but could fit the industry a little bit closer. I'm not saying we should show feedlots to steers, but man, some of these steers are getting to be slow, slow growing. I wish that you could still make good cattle consistently with not having to make them so old. You know what I mean? I mean it's right nothing, you know, a fall born to be showing. It's just, you don't hear about especially a true September, October, November, you know, it's just. And cattle now state fair steers are being born at Christmas, you know, January fellow feel like you're starting to fall behind in February, you know. So I wish them cattle were a little, had a little more performance. But I'm the first one to say I'd rather raise a moderate one that can find a show someday and not show till he's two years old, you know, and then I don't know, the heifer deal. Like Sam says, it's just, it's frustrating when families are good at what they do and they can't afford to buy, you know, something that they want. Man, these. And then ain't no different with steers. But some of them heifers, they get outrageously priced, you know.

B (57:58)

Right. I'm currently here cattlemen's Congress. And I was looking just through the barns and watching the show, the variation of size within the, the same month you got January's, February's marches, Aprils. And the variation of size differences is crazy to me. And you talk about consistency, I think that's one thing that we could definitely be better at. 100%.

C (58:22)

Yeah. And I think you, you bring that up that you're a cattleman's congress. I had an old rancher tell me one time, like I don't, he said don't, don't get out there and judge shows and just sort them by size like we used to. I didn't know a lot about sheep. They said just tallest, you know, the wool sheep or breeding sheep people, just tallest, the shortest. Like, I feel like there's ranchers in South Dakota and North Dakota, maybe Minnesota and Iowa. They have abundance feed sources. They might want a bigger cow and can afford to feed her and reap the premiums of a bigger, heavier calf on the seller versus somebody, you know, out west or you know, where they're in like desert country. They might really need a more moderate cow that don't take much feed, you know. So I think there's good big ones and there's good little ones.

B (59:10)

And even with that said, that's what creates your judges that have types and kinds. That's what I also think is neat.

C (59:16)

Yeah, for sure. And if everybody thought, you know, judging cattle is subjective. If everybody thought that the same thing was, you know, the best, well, then it wouldn't, we wouldn't have our, you know, our industry that we're in, you know, so. Yeah, but I do agree with you. You talk about going to cat, you know, a Cattleman's Congress or Louisville or Kansas City, you know, you see cattle from all over and you know, what one, one guy thinks is their treasure might be the other guy's trash, you know, but you got to be open minded too. That's another thing that kids should, should think about. Like you got to look at that thing, you know, from an open minded standpoint. You know, I can get mad when I was younger at a judge or this and that, but you know, maybe that's what, what he's made his living off of was something that looked like that and not what you're showing, you know.

B (60:06)

So we're on the topic now just talking about judges and their selection and stuff like that. What do you think in terms of our variety of judges that do? And I asked the same question to someone, someone else, and the answer was Real good. But I want your thoughts. We have a pick of judges as of now that are in their elder stages. Do you think that now or in the next two to three years, maybe more, it'll start to switch over to some of these younger guys or the younger generation?

C (60:37)

Yeah, I mean, obviously, it's gonna have to at some point. No. I starting to get asked to judge more and more, and we raise a lot of cattle that gets spread out. So it's. I had a. A successful guy that I respect something. You know, judging isn't always fun because you're out there. You don't want to make anybody mad. You got it. You want to do the right thing. But if somebody asks you to do it, you should. If you can, you should have the respect to do it. You know, they had the respect to ask you, you should have the respect to judge the show. But I get it where, you know, an experienced judge at a show committee, you know, they want everybody that's coming to their show to have a good experience. So, you know, if they've got experienced judge that's worked well with kids and done a fair evaluation and done a good for years, I get it where they want to keep using them. But at some point, you know, it's just they're gonna have to find new blood. And. And there is some young kids that I've seen judge some AGR shows and jackpots that are very talented and look forward to, you know, the problem. You know, the old saying is one or two people are gonna be happy when you leave. It's just the way it is. It's just, you know, judging livestock is so subjective. It's not. It ain't like that steer is heavier than the. That, you know, it's just. Yeah, it ain't like we put them on a scale to win or, you know, even in sports, whatever the scoreboard says at the end is pretty cut and dry. You know, you might argue about the refs here or there and stuff, but with. With judging livestock, it's very interesting. You know, I've seen families so frustrated and I've been frustrated. You know, we're all on that same end of it, but yeah, yeah, sure. I think there's, you know, we talked about judging being important and how competitive that's gotten. There'll be of a lot. Lot of opportunities for young kids to, you know, continue to step in the role.

B (62:28)

And you were talking about it, but there's your different types and kinds of judges. You've got your. Your cowman that does it for a living. And then you have your professor or collegiate livestock coach or something of that nature. Is there one that you personally would prefer rather than not, or is there one that you see more benefit in that opinion or not?

C (62:51)

Once again, I think there's talented people on both side. I always say I don't care if I agree with everything they say or every placing they do all day, but, you know, can understand what they're saying about him. I just like it when you wake up that morning and know that everybody that's coming to the show's got a fair shake. That's probably my biggest. I don't care if it's a professor, somebody that runs a thousand cows and has calved out a thousand cows for the last 20 some years or 40 years. You know, I think there's some talented people in both. You know, both areas. You want to look for a judge, and there's talented kids that are very good, too. But that's probably my biggest thing. I just hope that morning when you wake up, you're gonna go get a fair shake, I guess, for sure.

B (63:35)

Well, to slowly wrap it up, what I'd like to know, I mean, what is something that motivates y'? All. Y' all gotta have something. Is a quote or Bible verse or something of that nature.

D (63:47)

I mean, definitely, I. I'm sure RJ would agree, but Rhett, our son, he is definitely what motivates us every day now, for me, RJ Motivates me every day whenever we can wake up and do this together. And that's. That's a fun part for it. What do they say when you work? If you love it, love what you're doing, you. You don't really work a day in your life. So being able to do it with him, to get together is. It is really cool to be able to do. Of course, our help that we have here at the barn, we couldn't do it without either one of them.

C (64:21)

They.

D (64:22)

They definitely keep the wheels going. If we want to sneak away and. And go and go to a show or something. I mean, you gotta have. You gotta have people in your corner. And you said something about a Bible verse and Psalm 46, 10, be still and know that I am God. Our church is the first thing that our pastor always says in the mornings, on Sunday mornings, to be able to get ready for worship. And that is. I mean, you gotta. You gotta kind of clear your mind every day before you go out to the barn and. And take what. What you're given and. And Just go with the flow. You've. You've just gotta let him do it. And he. He only throws what you can take.

B (65:07)

And one thing. I mean, y' all mentioned your son. This is a question that I'd had with y' all being parents now. Is there something new that y' all had learned now, having a kid and incorporating him into the livestock industry? Well, I'm sure that you have, but I figured that'd be something fun to talk about.

D (65:23)

Well, I mean, so we. We definitely had him at the best time that we absolutely could. We had him a week before our big September sale. And so that was. That was definitely eye opening whenever we got home. And, like, we. We literally got home from the hospital the Friday before our, what we call the big weekend, and we were like, yep, we got this. Yep. They. They sent us out of the hospital. We're good to go. And thinking, oh, we're gonna go home, and we're gonna get a good night's rest. And, yeah, that couldn't have been further from the truth. You know, he. Having him around, it's one. It's probably helped tame down some of these calves. Earlier on, having him running around here and just being able to see him like the. The heifer that Oakland showed it at Louisville and was reserved with, we always said, oh, Rhett's heifer, he would come out here and he could lead her around and just seeing him interact with them. And I mean, I know RJ Always says, if somebody ask, like, is Rhett going to show cattle? And RJ said, well, if he was.

B (66:28)

Wants to.

D (66:29)

If that's something that he wants to do, I. Yeah, I would assume that that's something that he's going to want to do, but maybe as he grows up a little bit, he might not. Who knows? But I hope he does for sure. I don't know what we would do without him doing that.

C (66:43)

Yeah. I think, kids, obviously, he has done a great job of teaching us both patience. You know, everything might take a little bit longer of doing chores with him or checking a pasture or even getting ready to leave for church. You know, I mean, we were together for quite a while even, you know, before we had Rhett and we could run, run, run, go where we needed to go. And, yeah, he definitely slows you down a little bit and. But, yeah, absolutely blessed, like Sam said, to watch your kid walk up to a show heifer and give her a hug and a kiss, you know, like, you're very blessed to be able to raise your kid in a barn. Like that. That. And, you know, as he gets older, he's just turned two this past fall, so he's not super old, but to teach him some responsibilities and stuff like that, Be looking forward to that. You know, a lot of fun. So.

D (67:34)

And, you know, and also, like, being able to have him be around our barn help Oakland. I mean, he. He looks up to all of them so, so much. And. And all of the kids that have come through our barn and still come through through our barn.

C (67:50)

Oh, and families, like we talked about, the co op herds, the bird family plants and our own. They've been more like family than any our own families. It's so fun to watch, you know, your kid play with their grand grandparents and stuff like that. So. Yeah, and she talked about obviously the same thing. Obviously, Sam would empower me to be a better person. You know, Rhett, your own personal family, just the younger generation, you know, you. You have people looking at you all the time that you don't think about, but you need to do better. And that's why I think Sam talks about be still and know that I'm God. One of my favorite things in the Bible that I think world would be a better place if all kids just could know the difference between right and wrong and read the ten Commandments and just tell me that that doesn't make sense, you know, and how much better a world would be a better place if we could all live out that, you know, know. So he felt.

B (68:44)

Yes, sir, for sure. Well, y' all pretty much answered my last question. It's been a staple on the podcast for sure, but it's usually a phrase of what empowers you to be better than who you were before. Obviously, I would think that is your son, but is there anything else that.

C (68:59)

Comes to mind to me if. If you're not, like, trying to do better. You know, I talked about you got to have those embryos in before you're selling the next kit. If you are not, like, pedal to the floor trying to get better, like you're falling behind. You know, in our industry, there's so many talented people that if you don't try, I mean, I just can't fathom sometimes in the mouth. We have invested in the next calf crop that ain't even born yet and then getting them home and ready for a sale. And there's so many things that go into that to doing a good job, making sure your calves are healthy and presented well, and people like what they see. You know, I think to me, that's a challenge that. Sleepless nights for me in the spring when I'm trying to decide. Decide what? What bull to flush that cow to. Or do you think that'll work? Or that'll work? Is that mating getting old? Should we try something new? There's just so many things that you know to keep all the wheels turning in the right direction and making it work. It's tough, but I mean, it's also a great thing that motivates you to keep going and keep doing better. Because if you're not doing better, somebody else is.

B (70:07)

You know, we're hour and now, but it's been great. I couldn't have asked for a better episode. But honestly, I appreciate both of y' all coming on and talking with me. I know it's real late and we've all got stuff to do, but I do appreciate the opportunity and glad we were able to have a conversation for sure. So this is what it's all about and what I'm grateful, blessed to be able to do so. With all that said, empowerment is here. This is the episode Mr. Ryan Johnson and his wife. So thank you all for tuning in and we'll see y' all next next time.

A (70:40)

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