Shorty People!

[SIMMGAL]

Ok Shorthorn breeders, I need some advice! I've been mulling over the idea of AIing a few of my commercial cattle to Shorthorn bulls just to see what I'd get. Over the years, I have noticed some Shorthorn crosses who have that broody, easy fleshing look and they have made me want to consider trying out a few straws. Ideally I'd like to keep a few replacement females and would consider feeding out the steers if I went that far. Blue roans would be ideal, but I'm more concerned about structure before coat color.

How do your Sim X Shorthorn and Angus X Shorthorn crosses look and perform compared to other crosses you've used?

Any bull suggestions? Maternal traits and fleshing ability are my main concerns. Carcass traits would be secondary.

Thanks in advance! I'm about 99% unfamiliar with Shorty pedigrees. :hide:

 

[76 Bar]

Get in touch with Don Cardy in Calif. Highly respected SH breeder for over 50 yrs.

 

[JMJ Farms]

Don't have any advice to offer but I've been looking for a blue roan heifer or cow for 5 years. I can't find one to save my life.

 

[Ky hills]

Don't have any advice to offer but I've been looking for a blue roan heifer or cow for 5 years. I can't find one to save my life.

Used to see a few around here but getting pretty rare. Over the last few years when buying heifers, have ended up with a couple that probably had another generation of Angus breeding in them. They had a little of the blue roan color on their head and neck, then a little around the flanks and tail. Earlier this summer was sitting at the stockyards and a couple Hereford Shorthorn cross heifers come through, I brought them home. One is pretty much Hereford marked and one is red roan with a white face.

 

[A.J.]

I haven't seen them post in a while, but Coyote and Tamarack have posted some nice Shorthorns over the years. They should be a good resource for you.

 

[Nesikep]

I once visited AltaCedar shorthorns, they were a beefy looking shorthorn.. Many breeders are going for the solid red because of market acceptance, though I hear speckle parks are doing well in Alberta for markets, so maybe people are starting to look beyond coat color and patterns and looking at other qualities of the animal?

 

[Stocker Steve]

Had some old style SHxHerf cows. Looked beefy. Good mothers. Marginal udders. Color of SH/HerfxBA varied a lot, but always got some smoky colored calves that sold at a discount...

Saw a herd dispersal here this summer that included a couple blue roans. They sold for $400 per head more than the solid colored cows.

 

[Lucky_P]

Steve.
Have used several SH sires over %AN and SimAngus cows over the last 10 yrs. All solid red; no roans.
Some worked well, others...not so much. Steers were great across the board. Heifers/cows have varied from great to terrible.

Several Waukaru SH bulls are available from OriGen, get mine through my ABS rep.
Waukaru Goldmine 2109 and W. Coppertop 464 made good cows; really good. Only ended up with 2 daughters of Waukaru GoldCard 5042, but they are nice.
Daughters of W.Orion 2047 have been hard-keeping, no-milking things that'll almost starve a calf to death. Only kept one W.Patent 8161 daughter...due to calve first time any day now...looks good, but time will tell.
IMO, the Orion And Patent cattle are high performance terminal feedlot types.

Have several daughters of the Rob Sneed 034 bull... I like them...a bit smaller, for the most part than those by Waukaru bulls. Still have a supply of 034 and ArSuLu Mackenzie semen that I'm using up slowly on specific cows.

We've pretty much swung back full circle to Simmental genetics, but there are a few other SH sires I'd try if we were still going that way...Dunbeacon Venture, in the Clearance semen offerings at CattleVisions, is noted as a great female-maker.
Select Sires was carrying a couple of SH sires, and I've heard good things about JSF Gauge.

Gary Kaper has some really good commercially oriented SH cattle...look up Kaper Cattle Co.
https://www.kapercattle.com/4508s.html

 

[Stocker Steve]

Why are you swinging Simi?

 

[Lucky_P]

Been working off my phone... see now that Simmgal was the OP, not Stocker Steve.

Why swinging back to Sim? Been breeding some Simmental influence in our herd since 1983...
A 10-yr foray back toward the Angus side of the equation didn't give us much of anything we were looking for except more black hide. The Simmentals have just been more consistent for us... and we like a white face, so we're preferentially selecting blaze/white-faced sires when we can find one that pushes all the other buttons.

The Shorthorn deal presented mixed results... I still like some of our SH-cross cows, and will come back over some of those with another cross of SH, and still making a few half-blood SHs (have 3 in this fall's calf crop)... but I'm liking most all of my Braunvieh-cross heifers, too... just gotta see how they work out as cows.

SimmGal... I don't know how they'd do... but a white SH bull should up your chances of getting blue roans... if I understand the genetics correctly... they're homozygous for the roaning trait, but have no red color genes.
If I were gonna use a white bull... with the criteria you've set forward, this is the first one I'd try... combines that good ol' Saskvalley Bonanza and Jake's Proud Jazz.
https://cattlevisions.com/detail.php?Bu ... bulltype=5

 

[Stocker Steve]

Why swinging back to Sim? Been breeding some Simmental influence in our herd since 1983...
A 10-yr foray back toward the Angus side of the equation didn't give us much of anything we were looking for except more black hide. The Simmentals have just been more consistent for us... and we like a white face, so we're preferentially selecting blaze/white-faced sires when we can find one that pushes all the other button

There are a lot of them out there. :nod: Should be a good angus bull somewhere. ;-)

 

[ALACOWMAN]

Was a breeder that was a member on here,that has some of the best I've seen...""Coyote"""I think was his user name...

 

[A.J.]

Was a breeder that was a member on here,that has some of the best I've seen...""Coyote"""I think was his user name...

There's a lot to like about their cattle.

http://muridale.com/herdsires.html

 

[elkwc]

The lady I go with had an old blue roan cow that was a very nice moderate framed cow when I first started going down there. Kept every daughter after I started going down. The blue roan is strong. I imagine she was half shorthorn. Well muscled, good uddered and a good cow. Have one blue roan daughter and a solid black daughter in the herd. The blue roan daughter has her 5th calf now. 3 have been blue roans. All out of Angus bulls. We calved a blue roan heifer by her this spring. Have kept 2 bull calves to use out of her. One a yearling and the other a weanling. The yearling is solid black and his full brother has some roan hairs in his face and tail. Otherwise he is solid black. Looking forward to seeing the first calves by the yearling next spring. His sire was a Bennett Performer son and we never pulled a calf out of heifers sired by him. So bred the heifers to the yearling this year. Hopefully his is the heifer bull his sire was. He carries just a little more bone that his sire and better muscling throughout. Will be interesting to see how he matures and what frame size he reaches. We will continue to keep all the blue roan heifers we get. Everyone of them has made top cows. Almost put one in the pasture with the Hereford bull this year but decided not too at least for this year.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

I also was told you needed a white short bull to get the blue roan color. I do love blue roans.
I see the white bull recommended is Free from genetic defects. Be sure to watch for that. Also, from what I hear around, the "clubby" (or thick) type shorts are really poor milkers. Will starve their calves.

 

[Boot Jack Bulls]

The white bull, HP Manimal, was bred by good friends of mine. He is double clean, and has show ring appeal. He is sound and built right. If I were really picky on him, he is a bit straight in the shoulder, but that's very picky on a bull I have seen in the flesh. The herd he originates from are cows that earn a living, and produce show quality stock. I would recommend him...

 

[SIMMGAL]

Wow, thank you for all of your feedback and replies, everyone! I'm intrigued by the Manimal bull. I might end up sampling him. Thank you again!

 

[Stocker Steve]

The white bull, HP Manimal, was bred by good friends of mine. He is double clean, and has show ring appeal. He is sound and built right. If I were really picky on him, he is a bit straight in the shoulder, but that's very picky on a bull I have seen in the flesh. The herd he originates from are cows that earn a living, and produce show quality stock. I would recommend him...

Any way to get a semen discount?

 

[Boot Jack Bulls]

The white bull, HP Manimal, was bred by good friends of mine. He is double clean, and has show ring appeal. He is sound and built right. If I were really picky on him, he is a bit straight in the shoulder, but that's very picky on a bull I have seen in the flesh. The herd he originates from are cows that earn a living, and produce show quality stock. I would recommend him...

Any way to get a semen discount?

LOL! Maybe, but what do I need shorthorn semen for???? ;-)