The Mina 836 cow was a unique individual who was an outlier in many ways. She was a 3.5 frame score cow that would weigh 1400lbs at the right time of year. She combined exceptional easy fleshing ability while staying very fertile and productive, which is an anomaly in nature. For many years Monte would steal a flush out of her after she calved in the spring and before bulls were turned out, and she would re-breed on schedule with the rest of the herd. She maintained a calving interval of 368 day while regularly being an embryo donor and raising her own calf. She flushed well and her embryos always had an above average sticking percentage. Mina 836 was highly intelligent, but was also had a peachy temperament, always happy for a scratch. Monte identified her early on as a young heifer that brought beneficial traits that were highly valuable to the gene pool.
MH Mina 836 had a very productive career leaving impactful sons like MH Tank 54 and MH Tyson 769, as well as the MH Tubby 56 who has sired some of our most beautiful cows at Edie Creek Angus in Manitoba, Canada. MH Mina 836 also left beautiful daughters like MH Mina 609. We are currently AI’ing to both MH Tank 54 and MH Tyson 769. Monte recalls that she was the most productive and easy fleshing cow he has ever had, hands down. Mina 836 also had a very tidy udder and great feet that were hard, black, and shiny. Her calves were high-immunity animals: never sick, they were those shiny-coated, thriving calves that grew quickly. She surely was one of those cows with high butter fat milk and ideal hormonal balance.
Dixie Erica of C H 6053 (Dam of 113) was purchased as a mature female (over 11 years of age) with Larry Coleman of Coleman Angus, because of the strength of the cow family behind her. 6053 is a maternal sister to the great Dixie Erica of CH 1019, who was a distinguished foundation cow in the Ohlde Cattle Co. herd in Kansas. If you are familiar with Shoshone pedigrees you may have noticed that Larry Leonhardt used a full brother to Dixie Erica of C H 6053. The Dixie Erica cow line is well known for longevity with many raising calves into their late teens. MH Dixie Erica 113 was the prettiest and most productive of the Traveler 6807 daughters out of the 6053 cow. Dixie Erica 113 was picked as a herd favorite by Jim Wilson of Crook Mt Angus (even though he is not a fan of her sire Traveler 6807), which shows that she bred true to the type that her reliable cow family had repeatedly proven.
We are currently using a 7yr old son of the 113 cow as a Herdsire–MH Hulett 61. Hulett 61 is a direct natural calf of MH Dixie Erica 113, sired by Cole Creek Full Bore 730. We are also using another 113 son: the MH Turbo 780 bull through AI—Turbo is a calving ease son of OCC Homer 650H. She raised Hulett 61 as a 15-year-old cow. Monte describes her as: Really feminine, nice headed, long necked, good uddered and good footed with black shiny hard hooves.
Her daughters turned out to be more productive than she was: 113 was an average producer whose cow family strengths really shine through. She was 17yrs old when she was sold. All the cows for 4 generations in her maternal down-line raised calves into their teens. She carries the banner of longevity and functionality set forth by great breeders like Dale Davis of the Rollin Rock program and John Hamilton of the Cedar Hills program. Although it is neither flashy nor exciting, the ability to raise calves in a low-input, grass-based system into the teenage years, requires cows that raise average calves. In nature, ruminants can milk themselves out of a job. MH Dixie Erica 113 was proof that balance and optimization to your environment (which results in Longevity) is a key to profitability.
Monte toured the DDA cow herd in the mid-90s on the recommendation of Fred Saunders to try to find their best cow and bring her home. Monte decided that Melisa 545 was the clear choice. She was a moderate 4 frame cow that weighed 1300lbs. She was a consistent producer, but was not a real heavy milker. Her disposition was good, and she was an attentive mother. Melisa 545 proved to be highly fertile, usually catching on the first try any time she was bred AI.
Melisa 545 ended up also playing a large role in the DDA herd with her daughter DDA Melisa 824 who stayed in production until age 21. The 824 cow had excellent progeny, including DDA Emblazon 27C, and DDA Lodge E5H. DDA Melisa 824 is sired by Shoshone 130-6357, who happens to be a son of the Shoshone Frances 6357 cow who is the last foundation dam mentioned on this webpage.
Monte considers his friendship with Larry Leonhardt of Shoshone Angus to have been a great privilege. “Larry was always really good to me” Monte recalls. In 1999, in pursuit of the functional, feminine cow that had become his ideal, Monte hand-picked 30 cows out of Larry’s herd of roughly 600 cows at the time and one of those cows was the Shoshone Frances 6357 cow. At that time, she was an 11yr old cow. 6357 had already raised 3 herd bulls for Larry that were working in other purebred herds, including the Shoshone 130-6357 bull who had a great impact at Diamond D Angus. Despite her prominence within the herd, Larry allowed Monte to choose her out of respect for his goals of creating fertile maternal Angus cows. Frances 6357 was an angular 1250lb cow at 3.5 frame score, and was a slighter made cow in terms of structure, unassuming perhaps, and not flashy. Slower maturing cows are the ones that last into their teens, and often go unnoticed until they are 5 or 6 years old. When she died as an 18yr old cow, she had many excellent daughters, and she herself still appeared as young as an 8-year-old cow: perfect feet and udder—you never would have guessed her age. Her sons and daughters consistently carried/transmitted her qualities: very high udder quality, shiny, hard black feet as well as excellent fertility and longevity.
Daughters have all been long lived. Two good examples of that would be MH Frances 2126 (an OCC Anchor daughter who is the Granddam of MH Frances 720) who was 17 and MH Frances 089 who also raised calves until she was 17, plenty of longevity. The Frances cow family also consistently demonstrates the high intelligence that the Shoshone gene pool is known for. This manifests itself with cows that instinctively move into brush when storms are coming, or have an idea of where you want them to go before you start pushing them there.
We continue to infuse the Frances cow family into the herd through AI with bulls like MH Poncho 4194, MH Titus 703 and Shoshone Solomon 316.
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