South Devon

[BIZIN]

Hey guys, can I get your thoughts on South Devons? Had a neighbour bring some cows in that are half south devon and look alright. Dad and I got talking and he thinks they are good cattle but hard to find up here. Are there any good breeders in Canada? How do they compare to other british breeds?

 

[Santas and Duhram Reds]

don't know a whole lot as they are not real common around here. I think they are more common in Australia. I know a guy that crosses them with Shorthorns. There is also a guy who crosses them with Red Polls in Northern MO. They are the largest framed breed of the British breeds. They are sometimes confused with Gelbvieh or Limousin. They are not related to Devons (Red Rubies).

 

[Aaron]

NR is a good resource for South Devon info and experience. He has had good luck with them on the grid.

All I can say is that they are docile, large-framed (biggest of the British), milk like a Holstein and have terrible udders. But I think NR told me once that the bad udders were quickly being bred out of them.

I thought if they ever got the udder situation under control, they might be fun to do either purebred or crossbred. :cowboy:

 

[spear B]

They are excelent crosses on red angus. I know a fella that does it and is one of the richest ranchers I know.

 

[novatech]

Fella down here buys South Devon/Angus terminals and sells grass fed beef. He has a money back guarantee on the beef. He has never had any sent back. But as with any other breed you have to have the right ones.

 

[Northern Rancher]

They can be a bit shallow ribbed lol.

Same cow with her twelth calf her mother was the only hairpin branded animal we ever owned

Hereford steer out of a SD/An cow

Black South Devon out of a baldie cow

South Devon steer out of a black baldy cow

The south devon we've used have made us money over the years. The bull that we got some bad udders from we use as mostly a terminal cross bull-if you really were careful and used on excellent uddered cows you'd probably get by. The other bull we use is from the Midland Test in Billings-he was probably the best footed-best travelling bull I ever ran. The daughters could be a bit edgy but we had alot of EXT in the Angus side of things back then. I'm not running any bulls right now since I have a good semen bank on both those bulls. That old purebred cow is out of the first bull I talked about we might flush her to the Midland bull. If your into F1 bulls SD/Ang or SD/HH would probably work well especially in a forage type of deal. They have a different hair coat than Angus not as long but denser seem to winter well. The old cow is out licking snow and bale grazing with the rest.

 

[BIZIN]

Dad said their used to be some good breeders at Cupar, do you know if they are still around and still have South Devons?

 

[Northern Rancher]

I have no idea-there's a breeder at Iron River, Alberta or at least there used to be. I went and looked at some SD cattle down your way years ago at Barry Bigalky's in Lipton. The one bull we use came from Jim Brown at Lodgegrass, Montana he's the sire of that old red cow. The black bull we have is listed at plus 37 for milk but quite frankly I don't see it-he is a plus ribeye bull though and his carcass stuff at Midland was pretty decent. I think you'd probably find more SD raised on more ranch style outfits in the U'S than up here.

 

[BIZIN]

Ya dad mentioned Jim Brown as well

 

[BA]

South Devons have good and bad things like all breeds. They typically have a good disposition and big rib eyes. Very good meat quality as well. Typically have some frame to them and have a little of a milk cow "type" to a lot of them. Udder problems can be there with carrott shaped teats in some lines. Bollenback (Cimarron) genetics have excellent to good udders. We never had a bad one out of them. When pure, watch out on the birthweights. I wouldn't use a SD on a SD heifer again to save my life. Some of the genetics have some big time BW back in there a ways. If you are wanting moderate - small cattle, they probably aren't for you. Jim Brown and Bollenbachs would be about the best herds that I'm aware of. There is one bull in ABS - Black Enuf - I actually bred his grand sire. If you are crossing them, I think they will out produce most anything. We still have some that are now mostly crossed with Red Angus and some Salers. I think if a person had a SDxSAxRA cow he would make a lot of money. Those are by far the most productive cows we've had.

 

[BA]

Remembered the name of a couple Canadian place. High Chapparel Ranch in Lipton, SK and Sampson - McGregor in Iron River, Alberta. We sold a bull to Sampson - McGregor years ago.

 

[3waycross]

South Devons have good and bad things like all breeds. They typically have a good disposition and big rib eyes. Very good meat quality as well. Typically have some frame to them and have a little of a milk cow "type" to a lot of them. Udder problems can be there with carrott shaped teats in some lines. Bollenback (Cimarron) genetics have excellent to good udders. We never had a bad one out of them. When pure, watch out on the birthweights. I wouldn't use a SD on a SD heifer again to save my life. Some of the genetics have some big time BW back in there a ways. If you are wanting moderate - small cattle, they probably aren't for you. Jim Brown and Bollenbachs would be about the best herds that I'm aware of. There is one bull in ABS - Black Enuf - I actually bred his grand sire. If you are crossing them, I think they will out produce most anything. We still have some that are now mostly crossed with Red Angus and some Salers. I think if a person had a SDxSAxRA cow he would make a lot of money. Those are by far the most productive cows we've had.

I remember seeing some of those at your place. They were good looking cattle. Do you try to breed any straight or are they all crossbred now?

 

[BA]

We breed them all to Red Angus now. Their calving problems is what drove us to using Red Angus heifer bulls and after that and the good RA calves, we switched over. We still have some old timers that are fullblood, but most are 1/2 RA now. They do a good job.

 

[Northern Rancher]

That black baldie heifer is a Black Enuf daughter-we used our Prairie Granite 112G bull on heifers and got along with him. That red cow I pictured was out of a cow from Sampson-McGregor.

 

[BA]

We had a few bulls that weren't a disaster calving, but went from 25% pulls to 1 out of 30 on the RA. I can picture the faces of the Prairie people from Hays, KS, can't remember what that bull was out of though. Was it Cimarron Ultimate 375? Worst calving deal we ever had was when we bought a high dollar 75 lbs. bull out of Rebel 34Y. The guy never transferred the papers, and after finally getting on his case, we got them and the bull was 95 lbs. and different epds. Said it was a printing error. It was a wreck, let me tell ya.

 

[Northern Rancher]

We used him to clean up about 150 head that had been A'I'ed cows and heifers-I don't remember ever helping one calve that was bred to him. I never met the people who raised him Ralph Sampson bought him over the phone at the Midland Sale. He bred 80 head between the two places as a yearling-he moved around like a cat.