Would you ?

[Ryan]

Two of our 4 herd sires are home raised. And the yearling bull we're using as clean-up on a few is home raised. Just sold a bull last month that was home raised and we'd used him til we sold him (he was an '05 model). Have had quite a few that we raised as herd sires throughout the years.

Ryan

Just curious... with the direction you've taken with your breeding program do you still have many options as herdsires outside your own genepool?

Honestly, there aren't many options. But I see that more of an industry problem, rather than an issue because of our chosen breeding direction. Although, this could be due to how strict I am on bulls. I think for a bull to be used he should be exceptional. This is the first year we've tried A.I. and we'll see how that goes. We bred 3 or 4 heifers to an outside bull. I use the term "outside" loosely because he has already influenced our herd significantly, we just don't own him. Its getting about that time for us to look for another bull for next spring, I think. The Bossman might think differently, but I think for us to improve our herd we'll have to look for a bull that might offer something a little different than what we already have. Its just tough to have very many bulls when you have as little number of cows as we do.

Ryan