Big Gully Farm

06/08/2026

Corn is seeded for grazing winter 2026/spring 2027. Thanks to Kyle Newsted of Maidstone for floating fertilizer and One29 Ag Services Ltd of Neilburg for high-speed tillage and seeding. We chose to pause about a week to simplify management here while one of us was away. Cows were removed from grazing the residue about 4 days ago. We are curious to see how each of the 3 hybrid varieties develop and what conditions the growing season provides us. Grazing corn has become the overwhelming proportion of our winter feed for pregnant cows and pairs, while having treated us very well during the many consecutive years of droughty conditions recently.

06/05/2026

The 2026 Beef Improvement Federation Symposium in Boise, Idaho was an excellent and informative event with great speakers, topics and hospitality. A valuable opportunity to meet new folks, while visiting friends and mentors involved with genetic advancement of beef cattle. A broad and substantial rain occurred on the trip down through Alberta and Montana, already appearing to make a noticeable difference on the way home. It was also enjoyable touring an operation that has made a sizeable impact on our own herd for many years.

05/24/2026

We appreciated Chad Nicholas of McCoy Cattle Co. for dropping off NJW 202C2912 RANCHWARE 147M ET yesterday afternoon-a bull we jointly purchased possession of in spring ‘25. We have his initial set of progeny developing now and will anticipate a larger group coming up next winter from both our heifers and cows.

05/16/2026

We currently have three groups of cows spread across different corn paddocks during this moisture event. Two groups have a bull with them while cleaning up corn residue and being supplemented with pellets. We are still heat detecting and artificially breeding a third, larger group that are solely grazing a fresher piece of corn. It appears to be a pleasant week ahead for the rain and snow to be put toward pasture and hay growth.

04/21/2026

Shari and I made a rushed trip to Manhattan, Kansas over the weekend to enjoy my 2006 Livestock Judging Team Reunion as part of the 10 year teams recognition at the Kansas State University Judging Teams Banquet. Our K-State Team had 13 members, along with two assistant coaches (Brandon Callis, Garrett Parsons) and our head coach-Dr. Scott Schaake. The 13 of us grew up in Alabama, Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Six team members and their spouses, along with Dr. Schaake, were able to visit Friday night at Austin & Emilie Fink’s. We had supper and looked through their boys’ show pigs and cattle. Then we all hung out together Saturday and attended the banquet that night before heading home Sunday. At the banquet, we also visited with my coach at Dodge City Community College-Jeff Nemecek, whose 1996 team was also being recognized. Another former Dodge City teammate, Spencer Jones and wife Cassie, were at the banquet-along with several past professors. Current K-State student from Saskatchewan-Colt Blacklock was honoured for the 2025 team with brother Waylon and mom Jamie there as well.

Age and experiences provide perspective on how valuable, rare and enjoyable these opportunities are. We had a great time seeing Christie Gabel, Mark & Jess Flory, Austin & Emilie Fink & boys, Cody & Rachel Miller and Dr. Schaake throughout the weekend. It was invaluable to recall a life changing experience among an extremely close group of friends/family, including thoughts about each of those who were unable to be there with us this weekend.

04/09/2026

On Monday, a quick trip was made to North Dakota that resulted in the purchase of SR STANZA 105N from Stuber Ranch. Recently, we have aggressively increased the polled component of our herd and consequently it had been 5 years since purchasing a horned bull. However, one sire group that had consistently impressed us at each of the 5 herds we viewed progeny at, either last fall or this winter, were the Churchill Stanfield 3122L’s-the sire of this bull.

Similar to his brother’s and sire, 105N is performance oriented with powerful shape and extra center body dimension. Weighing 1515 lbs ahead of the sale, he ranks in the top 2% of the breed for weaning weight, yearling weight and ribeye area. His scan ratios were favourable for backfat, ribeye area and in particular-percent intramuscular fat.

His dam is a full sister to a bull we used via AI recently as well-SR DOMINATE 308F.

The intent with 105N, will be to sample on a group of horned cows post AI to generate some later born progeny that would subsequently be offered as commercial two-year old bulls in our BGF Bull Sale.

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04/07/2026

As a follow up to the heifer breeding post, we considered 3 sires to AI the females to-but ultimately decided to settle on just these two maternal brothers. We purchased Ranchware last year from NJW Polled Herefords and about 1/3 of the heifers were mated to him. The remaining 2/3 were matched up with Steadfast, a sire distributed by ST Genetics. Both these homozygous polled half-brothers offer a balance of calving ease and performance, elite udder quality predictions, strong fertility figures and appealing end-product merit.

The final picture is our new sire from Coyote Ridge Ranch-CRR 380 LANDER 508. He will be turned in with the heifers in mid April for the duration of the season.

04/02/2026

Yesterday, we AI bred the replacement heifers after utilizing the 7&7 Fixed Time Heifer protocol for the first time. With the help of Cache Schiller, who we are fortunate to be paired with through the Cattlemen’s Young Leaders Program, we were able to get through them in the afternoon. Cache is developing a custom breeding enterprise, while working for Trouw Nutrition and forming a purebred Simmental herd of his own, along with his family’s commercial herd.
Due to persisting drought, the heifers have been developed just outside of Maidstone at Forty Mile Livestock this winter. Scott McClelland has done an excellent job of growing them out for us and providing his facility to make multiple trips through.

03/27/2026

Just over two days away to pick up a pair of new privately purchased sires, attend an excellent bull sale and make a few quick stops in the Billings vicinity. Dramatic change in temperature from 27-28 degrees at the sale in northern Wyoming on Wednesday afternoon to -18 degrees last night upon arriving home.

12/23/2025

This past Saturday, I attended the Crittenden Land & Cattle Complete Dispersal west of Imperial, SK. Howard & Sharon have both been tremendous mentors and friends to us, like many others-being particularly helpful to young breeders. Howard was on the Saskatchewan Hereford board with my Dad and he always thought very highly of Howard. Shari enjoyed ultrasounding their cattle for a number of years and we have purchased several herd bulls-always with exceptional follow up. Few polled hereford operations have been as committed to advancing the breed by marketing commercial bulls as Crittenden’s have. As this picture depicts, we all enjoyed serving with Howard on the CHA board, his insight and priorities proving invaluable. Sharon has always been extremely hospitable and inclusive, be it during visits to their farm or while traveling. We look forward to both continuing our friendship and seeking out advice well after this highly successful event has concluded.