Early 90’s Charolais throwback.

[Ky hills]

Going through some pictures from my registered Charolais days.
That not so photogenic bull was an ET calf out of a recent at the time National Grand Champion bull and National Reserve Champion female. He was bought from a prominent nationally recognized breeding program.
If I remember right, I got him in 1991 at around 15 months old maybe a little older.
He was an 11 frame as a yearling as recorded by the breeders. We didn’t measure him as a mature bull. I had him until up in 5 years of age and I’m guessing him to have been very similar in mature height to some other big bulls I saw in person that were said to be 6ft at the hip. He was significantly taller than me, but a gentle giant.
Very calm and easy going bull.
He has the distinction some during our smallest and largest calves. The smallest was somewhat of an anomaly as I had a particular cow that always had a lightweight calf at birth, generally between 80-90 lbs, well as she was getting older the last calf she had was a bull calf by him that weight a very surprising 60 lbs. Typically from the rest of our cows that bull sired 100+ lbs calves, the largest of which weighed in at 135#. We had a lot of 115#-125# calves by him. He was fairly easy calving every once in a while there’d be one to pull. Every once in awhile there’d be a calf that was slow to get up and going. Very tall, long legged big boned calves
I’m not for sure if the calves in the pictures are mostly his or not, but I believe there’s a good chance that they are.
Definitely a different type of cattle than what we see to day. I was kind of glad to moderate away from some of that, but I think we’ve almost went too far by now with moderating

 

[kenny thomas]

Notice his long head. Good for easy calving.
I had several registered Charolais through those years. Do you mine sharing his bloodline

 

[Ky hills]

Notice his long head. Good for easy calving.
I had several registered Charolais through those years. Do you mine sharing his bloodline

He was out of show cattle lines his sire was Airhart Charmark, Charmark was out of BRMF Krugerrand. His dam was Airhart Sharla I can’t remember for sure but she may have been by a bull called Apocalypse.
I also used some descendants of a bull Silver Creek High Rise too, both in herd bulls and AI.
Then I started using AI bulls from Lindskov/Theil LT Ranch and just used herd bulls for cleanup bulls.

 

[kenny thomas]

I owned some Krugerrand bulls. I do remember them being extremely tall.

 

[Ky hills]

I owned some Krugerrand bulls. I do remember them being extremely tall.

I remember a popular at the time Krugerrand grandson that had 150# birthweight, a bull named Bea Cool

 

[Ky hills]

I will also add that the above bull and his bloodline that he came from were specifically bred for the big show rings. I did not realize that until I found out the hard way in my experience that the females were not necessarily proficient at getting bred in a timely manner and if they did get bred there was an ever bigger problem in that they didn’t have milk.
I had a base herd of registered Charolais that came from a local breeder. Those cows were granddaughters of a bull called FZ Mighty Mac 828. He was known as a bull that sired maternal focused females and my cows from that line were moderate sized for the time and heavy milkers. I made a mistake of listening to the sale managers when they said I needed to get away from those kind of cattle and get nationally known bloodlines. Wasn’t too many years, until the Mighty Mac 828 descendants were sought after to put milk back into cowherds.
Mr. Camelot was a bull from the 60’s that was still being used via AI with ampules instead of straws. His line was also used for adding milk.
As far as for terminal commercial cattle, my above pictured bull was great in that setting. I never had any feedback of calving issues from his sons and they had the frame to add growth to calves and carried on his great disposition.
At weaning his bull calves would weigh on average around 825-875#. I remember one year specifically the lightest bull calf probably the youngest weighed 775# and I thought that was extremely light. Fast forward to today and I’d think 775 was a major accomplishment.

 

[mwj]

I saw Sir Sam 21 in a liquor store in Kansas-city in the mid sixties. My father in law bought a 1/2 breed bull out of Iowa to put on cows in the very early seventies.

There were a lot of ''white'' bulls sold at the sale barn that produced roan calves!

 

[branxchar&charx]

Wow. How old was he in that pic? He even has that look to put some serious pounds on.

 

[Ky hills]

Wow. How old was he in that pic? He even has that look to put some serious pounds on.

I’m thinking he was 4-5 years old there.

 

[kenny thomas]

I will also add that the above bull and his bloodline that he came from were specifically bred for the big show rings. I did not realize that until I found out the hard way in my experience that the females were not necessarily proficient at getting bred in a timely manner and if they did get bred there was an ever bigger problem in that they didn’t have milk.
I had a base herd of registered Charolais that came from a local breeder. Those cows were granddaughters of a bull called FZ Mighty Mac 828. He was known as a bull that sired maternal focused females and my cows from that line were moderate sized for the time and heavy milkers. I made a mistake of listening to the sale managers when they said I needed to get away from those kind of cattle and get nationally known bloodlines. Wasn’t too many years, until the Mighty Mac 828 descendants were sought after to put milk back into cowherds.
Mr. Camelot was a bull from the 60’s that was still being used via AI with ampules instead of straws. His line was also used for adding milk.
As far as for terminal commercial cattle, my above pictured bull was great in that setting. I never had any feedback of calving issues from his sons and they had the frame to add growth to calves and carried on his great disposition.
At weaning his bull calves would weigh on average around 825-875#. I remember one year specifically the lightest bull calf probably the youngest weighed 775# and I thought that was extremely light. Fast forward to today and I’d think 775 was a major accomplishment.

Some of the bulls I liked the best were Camelot bred. Very gentle also.

 

[Ky hills]

Some of the bulls I liked the best were Camelot bred. Very gentle also.

Me too I really liked that type

 

[Ky hills]

I saw Sir Sam 21 in a liquor store in Kansas-city in the mid sixties. My father in law bought a 1/2 breed bull out of Iowa to put on cows in the very early seventies.

There were a lot of ''white'' bulls sold at the sale barn that produced roan calves!

Yeah, a lot of herds around here during those years had bred up their Charolais from their Hereford or Shorthorn cows. The base cow herd that I had came from cows that had been bred up from Hereford cows.
I even had a few calves that born with a faint reddish hair coat on their bodies with distinctive Hereford white face and complete Hereford markings. They would lighten up an be all white within a couple weeks or so. Also had a red factor calf two that stayed solid light reddish, but that’s a different situation all together.

 

[mwj]

Those white bulls throwing roan calves were ''shorthorn'' from end to end. The folks selling them let people think they were another ''white'' breed if they wanted to.

 

[Ky hills]

Those white bulls throwing roan calves were ''shorthorn'' from end to end. The folks selling them let people think they were another ''white'' breed if they wanted to.

Oh ok I got now, I wasn’t thinking about the white short horn angle. I’d say that was used by some.

 

[mwj]

Some people are very proud of what they think they know! Color is color and they are all priced the same. Some people are still convinced that black cattle always top the market.

 

[CSM]

I started my Charolais herd in 1999. Was very careful which bloodlines I started with.
Unlimited Ease, Duke 914, Eliminator, Impressive, WCR Sir Ease and later a lot of Bluegrass. All of these proved to be trouble free on calving and enough growth and milk.
Also had a Charles Stipe cow from the Charlie bloodline. If anyone out west remembers the Horton Feedlot trials, that bloodline always topped the list of most profitable steers. I miss the white cows on my hillside.