Our Herd
We purchased our first Speckle Park bull in 2011 and looked forward to our first crop of speckled calves in 2012. How quickly 10 years can go by! Our first registered purebred cow arrived on the farm in the fall of 2012 as a bred heifer and she has put some fantastic females into our purebred herd. We now will be calving out 50 head of Registered Speckle Park cows, alongside 90 head of commercial cows.
For the past 6 years we have been growing our family, our farm, and our speckle park herd. In the same 6 years, the quality and depth of our purebred herd has come into its own, while we had our hands full with four new daughters.
We are proud of where we have come from and what we have been building, as well as excited to share our goals for the future.
Speckle Park cattle are instantly eye-catching, but there are so many tangible benefits to the breed, we are proud to raise them.
We appreciate the vigor of the calves, that they are up and going so quickly. With good mothering ability and calving ease, we rarely have to intervene. The clean udders and feet are a huge plus, definitely a selling point to use in a commercial herd too.
Temperament is also critical to us. We work closely with our cattle and have four small kids. It is important to us that our cattle are both quiet and respectful of our space. When we do our pasture rounds in the summer with mineral, they usually come running for their mineral when called.
Their efficiency is also impressive! It is definitely noticeable in our commercial herd. Where there is Speckle Park influence, the feed consumption is far less, up to 30% less feed. We began from a commercial perspective and still hold true to that, as input costs directly impact our bottom line as well that of the producers we are marketing to. Many of our bulls have had great impacts in the commercial operations they have been purchased for.
We also have our own direct marketed freezer beef business. The feedback on the quality of our meat production from both our customers and our experienced butcher have been overwhelmingly positive. Tender and flavorful meat, with good marbling, with efficient production ticks all the boxes for us.
We have our favorite cow families on the farm. We added a scale to our operation in 2022, which, along with allowing us to gather more concrete data and EPD's, has solidified and allowed us to quantify what we have already observed.
Three spectacular foundation cow families we keep our eye on are:
D.L.R. MZ Ysabell 35Y: Our first purebred cow, bred by Doug Epp and purchased from Moovin Zpotz. 4/10 of the cows producing top gain for 2022 are her offspring or descendants. We have several of her daughters and granddaughters producing impressive calves in our herd.
MOOVIN ZPOTZ ZADA 38Z: Our second purebred cow. 3/10 of the top producing cows for 2022 are herself and her offspring. Her 2022 heifer tipped the scale at an 803lb WW and was our heaviest YW female, including the commercial herd.
MOOVIN ZPOTZ BALLETDANCER 77B: She brought in a bull with top rate of gain in 2022. Second place was her daughter and we have retained a grandson, Wild Prairie Knight 220K, to use in our own herd. He boasts a moderate BW and impressive rate of gain.
Our foundation Registered Speckle Park Cow - D.L.R. MZ Ysabell 35Y
Summer 2023