HISTORY

OUR STORY

The History of Howrey Angus and Edie Creek Angus has been intertwined since 2014 when Stefan & Jonathan Bouw first travelled down to Monte Howrey’s Vale, SD ranch to meet him in a last-minute rendezvous that almost didn’t happen due to a number of circumstances.

In the winter of 2021/2022 Monte approached us with the offer to sell his cow herd to us. We were grateful for the opportunity, so with great excitement we expanded our breeding program by purchasing the Howrey Angus cowherd in Sterling, North Dakota. Monte Howrey has been a great mentor to us and his cattle have adapted & excelled in our low input, maternal-focused Edie Creek Angus herd in Manitoba, Canada.

Back in 2014, Stefan and Jonathan had already been in pursuit of the best forage-adapted maternal genetics possible for nearly a decade, and had established the Edie Creek Angus cowherd back in Manitoba, which was improving as quickly as the school of hard knocks was handing out lessons. Click here to learn more about Edie Creek Angus.

The search for a combination of grass-efficiency and maternal function had Edie Creek Angus immersed in the bloodlines of Ohlde Cattle Co, focused on the Traveler 6807 lines with a touch of the Rainmaker/OCC Focus line to start on a slight outcross. The best thing to happen at that point was the purchase of & 3/3 successful implants of a set of OCC Great Plains 943G-sired embryos.

Throughout the years, we would catch wind of Howrey Angus bloodlines, always having heard good things about them. When we fortuitously met Monte Howrey one late October afternoon, we connected and understood that Monte was a breeder who was purely focused on making the best cow possible, and in a replicable manner—for the good of the commercial cow industry. Monte spoke, (among other things,) of a mature herdsire named MH Titan 752, and our interest was piqued… (Monte urged us to extend our travels west to Wyoming to meet Larry Leonhardt, and offered to call to arrange the meeting, but unfortunately we weren’t able to squeeze it in at the time, and Larry passed away soon afterwards, to our great chagrin.)

Some time after our visit with Monte in Vale, South Dakota, we found out that there was an MH Titan son breeding cows in Saskatchewan called MH Winner 932, alongside a handful of MH females that had been imported into Canada. We went to see these cattle and were very impressed with the athletic ability of that Titan son, his overall soundness and breeding prowess. After seeing MH Winner 932, we knew if we could get MH Titan 752 up to our herd, he would have a great impact on our cows. We also bought two of the MH cows from Saskatchewan.

Stefan tirelessly persuaded Monte that since Titan was already 7, and then 8 years old, he surely could let go of him, and we could prove his worth further in a different climate… Eventually the export paperwork was done, and Titan immigrated to Manitoba, Canada, where he bred cows until he was 13 years old.

Titan made a very useful cross on our heavily (Traveler) 6807-influenced cowherd, and brought all of the utility of the Emulation line through his sire, OCC Great Plains 943G, along with the stabilized maternal type of his Dixie Erica of CH 1019 granddam and the MH Melisa 357 dam.

Over the years Stefan and Jonathan toured many herds including Ohlde Cattle Co, Sinclair Cattle Co, Diamond D Angus, Dimond Angus Ranch, JAD Angus, Cole Creek Angus and Pharo Cattle Co. After touring Montes cows in different locations in North Dakota and South Dakota, we felt like he had the best cow herd that we had seen in our travels. Montes ability to take the strengths from different gene pools and blend them into an ideal grass land cow was masterful, and we were compelled to infuse more Howrey Angus genetics into our Edie Creek Angus herd.

Our next Howrey connection was the purchase of 28 open heifer calves from Monte in the Fall of 2016. Those heifers were bred here by the Edie Creek Great One 79Y bull, who was one of those successful embryo conceptions from the OCC Great Plains 943-sired embryos mentioned above… A large percentage of the 28 heifers turned into some of the best cows to ever walk the Edie Creek Angus pastures, and year after year, their daughters turn into excellent cows.

Another 11 females were purchased in winter of 2018, and those cows strengthened both our Edie Creek cowherd as well as our confidence in the quality and consistency of the Howrey Angus program. These cattle were more fertile, better uddered, and had the intelligence and maternal excellence that we valued.
 

This cow herd was built with the sole focus of creating profitable, low input Angus cattle, that excel in maternal performance traits and have always been required to work for a living.

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