The Summitcrest Farms dispersal auction!

I went to an auction with my dad Friday. The name of the farm was Summitcrest Farms. The original owner and founder was owner of Summitville Tile company. Over time he got into the beef business and decided to make a change and set a new standard in the industry.

If you have ever heard of Certified Angus Beef then you already know a little about Summitcrest Farms. The founder of this farm also was co founder of the Certified Angus Beef program. They developed and bred the large majority of the best Angus beef known in the world today. A little while back the owner passed away and his children have decided to go their own directions and in the process decided to disperse the majority of the assets of the farming corporation. This included most all of the cattle and the bulls!

You can learn more about it at www.summitcrest.com! The farm is about ten minutes from ours and I knew of them but never really knew much till I went with dad to the auction.

I went to the auction to look at equipment with my dad to help him set some prices for bidding on a couple of items. Everything went really high so once the equipment sold we headed across the farm to look at the cattle they were going to sell on Saturday (yesterday).



I originally wasn't looking for cattle. My dad and brother were. However, as I am walking through the pens and looking at the almost 400 head of cattle to be sold and talking to my dad and brother about the cows one caught my eye!


In the one pen of 5 year old bred cattle there was one standing slightly away from the others and looking at me. So I got in the pen and walked up to her and she wasn't spooked and just casually walked away. I looked her up in the sale book and watched her for a while and realized she was one of the best looking cows in the herd. So I went home and talked to my wife. After some convincing, which was easy due to the fact she really likes Angus cattle, we decided to see if we could get her at the auction yesterday.

So we went to the auction early and checked out the cows and the bulls. One was extremely huge! He was approximately 3000+ lbs. and was as tall as I am.


After looking at the animals we headed upstairs of the main barn and the American Angus Association had a complete breakfast waiting for everyone. The barn was amazing inside. Downstairs were pens for the bulls but upstairs was completed into a convention/meeting hall and was beautiful!

After a quick snack we headed over to the sale ring to watch the show and wait for my cow to come into the ring. It was a long sale that lasted almost five hours.
You can see my wife beside me in the right of the photo. My brother is next to her in the red shirt and my dad is in the blue at the end of the same row.

The cow I was waiting on was number 181. She was about 2/3 of the way into the sale list so it was almost 1pm before they got to her pen. Bidding was quick but in the end I got her!!!!! Her name is Summitcrest Erica and her tattoo number is S196. She will be six years old this February when she has her calf. She is from the very good "Erica" bloodline and is an awesome looking cow.

At this point I wanted to by another one but money wouldn't allow it right now so the wife and kids and I headed out. My dad and brother stayed for the rest of the sale. My brother purchased a cow, a bred heifer, and a yearling heifer. My dad bought a yearling heifer. Due to the large number of cattle sold they were not able to load everyone out yesterday so I went this morning and picked up my girl and my dad and brothers cattle.

I was so excited to get her home to add her to the herd. As soon as we got her home we let her out. She was immediately greeted by one of the feeder pigs at the corner of the barn. After a couple of moments of nose to nose staring she decided she would figure out what the white things were later and took off out into the pasture.
Everyone wanted to see who the new girl was and followed her around.
After making a few quick loops to see where the fence limits were she came back up to sample the food buffet.
She sampled the local foods and quickly headed around the barn to further investigate the little "white things"!
Here she is standing just outside the pig shed looking in at them to see what they are and what they are doing there!

She has already blended right in with the herd and was packing down some good eats when I closed up the barn for the night. She will make a great addition to the herd and the family and I am very pleased and happy to have her here.

A little update outside of this. We were able to sell a couple of the little steers that I got from dad and we sold Crazy B., her little girl, and thing 1 and thing 2 to a young starting up farmer down in Sugarcreek last weekend. I know what it was like to be starting from scratch and I know they will do him good. Plus, it made room for a new addition to the herd that will be much better for our program down the road!!

Goodnight all!!

Kenny

Good morning!

Well dinner was great as usually. Everyone made it this year and everyone had a great time. I totally got caught up in everything and didn't take the pictures I intended to. Maybe next year!

Today I am headed to a farm auction with dad. There are a couple of items he has needed for a long time that are being sold and we are going to go see what they bring and maybe get a couple of them!

Wish us luck. I should have some pics of that for sure!

Kenny

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I am going to post a couple of quick pics but will have some more tonight. We are having thanksgiving dinner at 5pm this year so my sister can bring her boyfriend with her. So, since we are starting later I went out and got all the chores done that I needed to do today so we wouldn't have to worry about it tonight after we are stuffed.

My wife brought the piggies a little treat and I took a pic of her before Alex and I headed out. She was sporting her barn boots which I have only seen her wear a couple of times since she got them! She ends up spending most of her time in the house dealing with stuff there and I handle everything outside. That being said it is still nice to have her help once in a while!
my son and I haven't had time to go for a good tractor ride in a while so we went up on the neighbors hill and got a couple of corn stubble bales to bed the barn with. He fell sound asleep on the way back. So when we got back I set them to the side for tomorrow and put a bale into the cows.

I have had days like this where I just say the heck with it and stop and take a nap!! I usually leave my shoes on though!
While he took a nap I went and fed the pigs and finished with the cows and then headed for the house with Alex and we had a snack.

I will take some pics of the feast tonight to post here so everyone can see what our version of a thanksgiving feast is like!

To me it is a celebration of the end of the harvest season and a chance to spend time with family and give thanks for what we have!

Kenny

My wife's early christmas present to me!!

So, a package came in the mail today for my wife. She couldn't wait till Christmas so she gave me my gift early.

I recently had my belt that I wear for work break at the buckle. So my wife purchased me a new one last week. Well in the mean time she found me a new buckle!!


I also took a pic of hers next to mine. I like them both!

Sold some cattle today.

Well, I sold my three littlest steers Monday night. They needed to go to a home where they could be with some calves their own size. They family that bought them had a little jersey calf at home that lost his buddy to illness and felt they would make a great group!

Today I have a gentleman come pick up Crazy B. and her calf and my two little Angus x Shorthorn heifers. He is starting his own heard and was looking for some good girls. They have pasture ground and such and I think Crazy will do well there as will the little girls that went with.

I was sad to see them go but happy at the same time to know they were going to where they can lead a great life and be happy.

I also put in a very long day today at work trying to complete a tree planting before the rain hits. We got it done, planted a semi load of quite large norway spruce today. They look awesome!



That being said I am very tired and very sore. So I am gonna head to bed.

I wish my girls the best of luck and lots of green grass to eat!!

Kenny

Finally got all the COW PICS!!!

Finally had a beautiful sunny day that wasn't cold so I went out and got pics of all the cows and calves.  So here we go!

This is John, one of our shorthorn cross steers.  All of the shorthorn cross steers came from my dad.  These first two were in trade for hay work last year.  The others were from this year. 

 This is Jeff, another shorthorn steer.

 

 This is one of many steers I got in trade from dad for helping with his hay this year.  He is a shorthorn hereford cross.

 This is a Shorthorn/angus/x cross from dad.  He is actually a bluish color, not black.  I hope to get a color like this from some of mine some day.

 

 Another downside to the weather this year!  When we made first cutting the ground was very wet and I had a lot of muddy spots when baling.  Unfortunately when baling in these wet spots some mud managed to get on some of the hay and spoiled parts of some of the bales.  When I get one like this I let them eat what they want and then put the rest out for them to pick through and lay on. 

 Here we see 50 (left) and Sally shorthorn (right) picking through and eating the same hay they wouldn't touch minutes before in the feeder.

 This is a good shot of 50.  We purchased her in 2007.  Her first calf was a heifer but was not able to be bred so we had to sell her.  She is an awesome mother.  Very easy going and even likes to be scratched from time to time.  She is also the matriarch of the herd.  The herd follows her every move and she is clearly the boss!
 


This is Precious.  She is 50's second calf.  I am anxious to see what her first calf looks like as she looks quite good herself.  She is bred to Thunder, our Charolais x Angus cross bull we have now.  She was born in april of 2010 and has grown very well.  I look forward to her offspring as she shows great potential!
 
 This is 50's third calf.  He will be used as a steer.  His father is dad's shorthorn bull.  He is growing very quickly and looks great!



This is Chilli.  We purchased her in January of 2010.  She is a purebred Angus but is quite small.  She is a great mother and very easy going but looks like she will produce smaller finished weight calves.  This is not always a bad thing as a smaller cow eats less for the amount of meat you get in the end.  She is currently approx. 1000#'s whereas her counter part, Koyuki, is probably 1200'#s at the same age. 

 This is Chilli's first calf.  Her name is Thing 2.  My wife and daughter named her and her counterpart after thing one and thing two off of Cat in the Hat!  If you look closely you will see she has little orange tufts of hair in her ears.  Her father is a shorthorn bull by the name of Scotty.  Very good well proven bull.

 This is Candy Apple.  She was purchased at auction with Crazy B., Chilli, and Koyuki.  She has had one calf.  I have to admit I am partial to red cattle.  I get that from my dad.  As soon as I saw her I knew she was a keeper!  When she had her first calf this year I made the decision to name all her calves after Crab Apple trees.  I am a landscaper during day so it fits!

 This is Prairie Fire, Candy Apples first calf and a heifer.  She has to be one of the cutest calves I have ever seen.  She is doing very well and I can't wait to see how big she gets in her first year.

This is Koyuki.  As stated above we got her at the auction.  She is a full blood Angus cow.  She just had her first calf this year and is both are doing great.  Another easy going good momma cow.

 
 This is Thing 1.  Koyuki's first calf.  She is a lot fluffier than Thing 2 but also has the little orange tufts in her ears.  She also has Scotty as a father as well.

 

 And here we have Thunder.  He is our Charolais x Angus bull that I purchased in march of this year.  He is pretty easy going and has an interesting color to him.  I will use him this year and possibly next year for breeding and then sell him.  After a bull reaches 2-3 years of age they begin to get territorial and one day will decide they want to take over the herd.  Till that point I am the boss / #1 in the herd.  After that day he will take any opportunity he can to challenge me for dominance over the herd.  I prefer to not give them that chance and will sell them before this becomes an issue. 

 This is an angus steer that I purchased with thunder in the spring.  He will be ready in February/March

This is another of the shorthorn steers I got from dad this year.

 This is Stormy.  He was Jane's first calf.  He will be ready to eat in February/March.  We had to sell Jane last month as she was having frequent foot problems.  I really didn't want to but had little choice.  I was hoping to at least get a good price for her at the auction to use the money towards barn repairs.  However, I didn't even get enough to cover the vet bills I had from treating her foot.  That is why I do not like auctions. 

 This is Jane's second calf.  Her mother was a Hereford x Holstein cross.  She is going to be heading back to the farm that her mother originally came from.  I am giving her to my cousin in exchange for all the bale wrapping he did for me this year.  She should do her mother proud.  He is in need of some good beef cows and she fits the bill for his herd.


This is the smallest of the steers I got off of dad this year.  I have had him penned up for a month or so with the blue steer to make sure he gets enough to eat but it was a beautiful day and a weekend so I decided to let them out and clean and re-bed the barn.  I will put them back in tomorrow before the weather turns bad again.  The problem is he and the blue one are just a little two small yet to eat well from the feeder.  Another month or so and they will be good to go!

 This is Fussy Prissy.  She is a brindle heifer that I got from dad in the trade this year.  I know her father is shorthorn.  Other than that I have no idea what her heritage is.  I just liked her color.  I still have to go look at one more heifer.  He still owes me one more calf and I am letting my daughter pick her out.  She wants a white one.  He currently has one entirely white calf but is unwilling to let her go.  He has since had another one that is almost all white.  I am going to let my daughter keep the one she picks out for her own.  I want her to learn about the cows and such and this will be a good opportunity to start young.

  This is Crazy B.  We named her that after we got her due to her being a little nutty after she had to be treated by the vet the first week we had her.  Now that she has had her first calf she has calmed down a lot but still doesn't want to be touched.  Excellent mother, just likes to be left alone!

 Here is Crazy B's calf, CB2
 
 This is one of the steers I got from dad in trade for doing his hay for him this year.

 

 Couple more pics of Candy Apple

 This is Sally Shorthorn, I bought her off of my father a couple years ago when I was starting up the herd.  Very good mother and I like the look of her.

This is Frosty, Sally shorthorns first calf.





  This is big red.  He is Sally's second calf.  His father is a very good Gelbvieh bull.  I plan to use him to breed the herd once he is old enough.  He is growing very fast and looks awesome!
 

Sold some of the piggies today.

Well, trying to generate some income going into to winter.  Put a lot of money out this year and hoping to get some coming back in before end of the year.  Sold eight of the piglets today at the auction.  They averaged 20lbs. / piglet.  We got $3/ pig.  so after they take out commission for selling them we will be left with about two or three dollars.  Yea, that is gonna help!

Anyway.  I will be posting pics of all the cows this weekend.  We are gonna to let go of some of the herd.  I want to start picking for the specific traits that I am looking for in my cattle.  I am planning on listing online for sale and will be taking pictures of everyone for our records as well as to go with listings I will be posting on line. 

On another note, I have been baling bedding for the neighbor the past week.  We finally got a week without any rain and that allowed him to get a lot of the grain harvested and get the bean and corn stubble ready to bale.  got around 120 bales so far.  Hoping the forecast holds so we can make some more before the snow hits.

Kenny