Volume 18 Issue 1 January 2019 What’s Inside Simmental Is A Good Fit For Long-time Commercial Producers — Percyview Farms
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From the Gate Post — Simmental You Can’t Afford Not To / Simmental –Vous n’avez pas le moyen de vous en passer
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Breed Improvement — Carcass Merit / Qualités de carcasse
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Vet’s Advice — Congenital Versus Hereditary Defects of Calves
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What’s Happening
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Commercial Country CC-JAN19.indd 1
Simmental is a good fit for long-time commercial producers Even with later calving the weaning weights are still there
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Story By Lee Hart
eing able to start calving as better spring weather arrives, and still be able to achieve excellent calf weaning weights in November, is one of the main reasons the Gordon families of Percyview Farms in southern Saskatchewan have included Simmental genetics in their beef breeding program for nearly 30 years. At one-time the fourth generation farm, which was actually a dairy operation for many years before transitioning to beef starting in the mid-1960s, used to calve in January and February primarily to achieve higher weaning weights on their then mostly British-cross beef cattle. “But once we introduced Simmental genetics into our program we were eventually able to move the calving season to start about April 15,” says Grant Gordon. “So we’ve been able to calve our herd through April and May and still achieve about a 610 pound weaning average on November calves. Simmental is a good all-round breed in a cross-breeding program, but achieving that weight and efficient rate of gain on pasture is the main reason we have stayed with the breed.” Percyview Farms were recognized by the Saskatchewan Simmental Association as their 2018 Commercial Breeder of the Year for their achievements in producing an efficient, and productive commercial beef herd built around Simmental genetics. The farm is located near Kisbey in south-central Saskatchewan, on the south side of the Moose Mountains, about 90 minutes southeast of Regina. While Percyview Farms has used Simmental for about 27 years in a cross breeding program with mostly Red and Black Angus cattle, Grant Gordon says it wasn’t exactly a love-at-firstsight relationship. He recalls a frustrating first-experience with the exotic breed in the 1960s. The Simmental breed was new to Canada and a bull named Parisien, a red and white spotted Simmental, had made his name as an amazing herd sire, so the Gordons bought a Parisien son to be used as a herd sire. “Well we had more calving problems using that bull then I care to think about,” says Grant. “We got rid of him and I swore I would never have another Simmental on the place.” Years later Grant accompanied a neighbour to a bull sale at Soderglen Ranches in Alberta. Grant was actually looking for a Charolais bull, but he noticed people were showing a lot of interest in a pen of excellent looking crossbred bulls, half Simmental and half Red Angus. Grant bought a Charolais that day, but the next year he returned to Soderglen and bought one of those cross-bred bulls, promoted as being easy-calving bulls. Grant liked the growth and performance results he saw after using the crossbred on their Angus-based cowherd. Trying that halfblood bull in the 1990s eventually led to a three-quarter blood and then to fullblood bulls and they have stayed with Simmental for 27 years.
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