Milk Creek Reds

Milk Creek Reds A family operation that strives to offer quality Red Angus cattle bred to function efficiently.

Last Friday was embryo transfer day. From thawing embryos and keeping records to implanting recipients, it takes teamwor...
06/24/2026

Last Friday was embryo transfer day. From thawing embryos and keeping records to implanting recipients, it takes teamwork and attention to detail every step of the way.

Happy Father’s Day from Milk Creek RedsToday we thank God for the fathers who faithfully answer His call to lead, provid...
06/22/2026

Happy Father’s Day from Milk Creek Reds

Today we thank God for the fathers who faithfully answer His call to lead, provide, and serve their families.

Ranching has a way of teaching lessons that mirror faith—early mornings, hard work, patience, perseverance, and trusting God through seasons we cannot control. Fathers live those lessons daily, showing the next generation what it means to work with integrity, love sacrificially, and remain steadfast through both blessings and challenges.

We are especially grateful for the dads, grandpas, and father figures who have helped build this ranch and pass down not only a way of life, but a legacy of faith, family, and stewardship.

06/03/2026

We started June off by putting CIDRs in our commercial cows. These cows are considered recipient cows as we will be transferring embryos into them later this month. We use the 7-day CO-Synch+CIDR protocol for this group so we also administered GnRH.

If you have a recipient herd, what protocol do you like to use?

Today at Milk Creek Reds, we pause to remember and honor the brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our...
05/25/2026

Today at Milk Creek Reds, we pause to remember and honor the brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country. 🇺🇸

The freedoms we enjoy each day — the ability to raise our families, work the land, and continue the ranching way of life — were made possible because of those who served so selflessly.

This Memorial Day, we are especially grateful for the heroes who never made it home and for the families who continue to carry their memory.

From our family to yours, we pray you have a meaningful and reflective Memorial Day.

05/23/2026

On Wednesday we gave prostaglandin shots to the first group of heifers that we bred today. We also spray painted them according to their AI sire, similar to what we did with our registered cows.

The heifers aren't used to the sound that the spray paint cans make and thus move around a lot more while they are getting painted which makes it a little more difficult to get a couple layers of paint in the same place. After a couple years of being painted they eventually get used to the noise and realize that it won't hurt them.

05/22/2026

Monday we started the process of turning clean up bulls out with cows and needless to say some of them were pretty excited to get back to work!

We will use DNA to parent verify any calves that are born in the "gray area" where they could be AI sired calves or clean up sired calves.

05/19/2026

By the time we get done AI'ing our registered herd, these pairs will have been processed through our facilities 5 times. Once for branding, once for putting CIDRs in, twice in one day when we pulled CIDRs and gave prostaglandin shots 8 hours apart, and the last time for AI.

Most people shy away from AI in general and then also from the 5-day CO-Synch+CIDR because of the amount of trips through the shoot. Artificial Insemination is something we truly believe in and is a technology that benefits our herd. Thus we have developed facilities that make working cows and sorting pairs easier.

A few years ago when we added on to our corral system we built a calf sort gate off of our round corral. This gate has the bottom half open but the top blocked off so that calves can go underneath while the top part blocks the cows from being able to go through. It is also adjustable so that as the calves grow, you can create a larger opening that they can fit under. One person (usually Tena) stands at the gate and directs cows to one side which takes them down an alley and into a pen. As the cows walk down the alley the calves that make their way through the calf sort gate can walk along side the cows but in their own pen. The pairs don't initially realize that they are being separated from one another which makes the sorting process less laborious.

What facility upgrades have you implemented to making working cows go smoother?

05/17/2026

Friday was AI day! We are so grateful for all the wonderful help we had to make the day go smoothly!

We started the day by gathering the registered herd and then sorted the calves from the cows. We then sorted the cows into their different AI sire groups. Thankfully we could still see what colors we had spray painted them which made sorting go a lot smoother!

Once the cows were all sorted we had one crew of people start AIing. This consisted of two people breeding, one person thawing semen, loading guns, and checking cow numbers off, another giving the GnRH shot while someone else spray painted the cows again according to which clean up bull they would be with, and one more person bringing cows into the alley way. 6 people in that crew!
We had another 4 people sorting calves according to which clean up bull group their mom would be in. That way when we got done AIing we could put the right calves back with the right cows and then move them to different pastures where they will be managed until the end of breeding season.

We couldn't have done it without the wonderful crew we had!

We got to AI to some tried and true sires that we have really appreciated their offspring and are blessed to get to make more of them. We were also able to use some new sires that we are excited to see what their progeny will do for our herd and our customers herds!

Its crazy to think that calving season just wrapped up not too long ago and here we are already making the next generation!

05/15/2026

Tuesday we pulled CIDRs on our registered herd. Like we mentioned before, we use the 5-day CO-Synch+CIDR which means that Tuesday was a long day!

We pulled CIDRs and gave the first shot of prostaglandin and then 8 hours later gave the second shot of prostaglandin.

When we pull CIDRs and give the 1st shot we also spray paint our cows. Pretty weird right? The lady that rang Bruce up when we bought the spray paint thought we were weird too when his response to her question about having a fun project was that we would be painting cows.

But here is why we paint our cows, on AI day we use 7-10 different sires. If we didn't sort our cows, we would have to write down each cows tag number in the order that they came into the alley, then find which sire they got bred to, then thaw that semen, and make sure the right cow got the right semen when she came into the AI barn. This creates a lot of room for error, and means everyone has to be on their A game.
By painting our cows we are able to quickly sort our cows into their different sire groups . So if she had blue paint, then she gets bred to Bull A and all the blue cows go into 1 pen, if she had green paint then she gets bred to Bull B and all the green cows go into and different pen and so on and so forth. We are then able to bring a whole pen of blue cows that all get bred to the same sire into the working facilities and we know there are X amount of them and thus we are able to thaw semen and AI cows much quicker which allows us to stay within the 4 hour breeding window we have with the protocol we use.

Now we still do some double checking by reading the cows tag number off when she comes into the barn and checking her off a list, but that goes pretty quick.

Would you ever spray paint your cows? What systems do you use to stay within your breed window when you AI to several different sires?

05/14/2026

SOLD!

27 Commercial Red Angus 1st Calf Heifer Pairs available.

Many of the 1st Calf Heifers are AI sired and most of the calves are AI sired. All the calves were born in a 31 day window.

There are 14 steer calves and 13 heifer calves that have been branded and administered Vision 7 with SPUR and Nasalgen 3 -PMH. 1st calf heifers have been administered Bovi-Shield GOLD FP5 VL5. Vaccinations and branding occurred on April 25th, 2026.

This is a complete dispersion of all our commercial 1st calf heifer’s that we had planned on keeping.

Please give Bruce or Tena a call at 406-778-3819 if interested or to discuss price.

Address

Plevna, MT
59344

Telephone

+14067783819

Website

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