Agricultural News
Owners of Basin Angus Ranch in Montana Honored by CAB for Commitment to Quality Seedstock
Tue, 24 Oct 2017 14:47:26 CDT
Don't call Basin Angus Ranch a "carcass" program-.or not just a "carcass program."
"The cattle we sell to our customers are used to produce really good quality replacement females. That's been the backbone of our program," said Doug Stevenson of Basin Angus Ranch. "When somebody buys a bull from us, they know they're gonna have a bull that's gonna raise good quality replacement females. That's what keeps them in business; that's what keeps us in business."
But Stevenson and his wife Sharon, know that the ultimate goal is to produce beef that meets consumer demand.
To watch a video featuring Doug and Sharon Stevenson's Basin Angus Ranch, who recently received the Certified Angus Beef® (CAB®) brand's Seedstock Commitment to Excellence award, click or tap the PLAYBOX in the window below.
"It's been a long-term approach that it's taken to do that. We don't single trait select. We don't chase extremes," Stevenson said. "We've been very fortunate to end up with some cattle that rank as, at levels that most people would call extremes on the carcass traits. But we did it not by chasing extremes. We did it by continuing to follow our basic core beliefs in easy-fleshing, feed efficiency, structural soundness, deep-bodied range cattle."
The rancher watches the American Angus Associations data updates every week and evaluates the live animals constantly. His cattle are more the product of study than luck.
"We started doing structured carcass testing thirty years ago," he explained. "And it's been something that we've stayed the course with through all that time. Ultrasound has been a great tool, but ultrasound is an indicator trait, it's not the direct data. And so, although it is really helpful, we still have to do structured testing. We have to gather all the real data that we can. And that's key to making progress."
The ranch location is different. The next generation is getting involved with more and more decisions, and cooperator herds helped build numbers. But for all the changes, teamwork with their buyers has remained constant.
"We had customers that were figuring out that they needed to differentiate their product and we had a desire to try and make a positive impact in making cattle that were the superior carcass cattle but really had all the good things that we need to have for good range cattle, and it just went hand-in-hand," Stevenson remarked. "And those customers that wanted to make changes in that manner--we work well together. We've ended up being--developing really strong relationships with those herds. They rely on us and we rely on them."
Basin Angus Ranch received the 2017 Seedstock Commitment to Excellence award at the Certified Angus Beef brand annual conference in September.
Source - Certified Angus Beef
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