Candid pictures from June 6 - 7, 2008 Piedmontese Field Days in South Dakota
Piedmontese Field Days in South Dakota – June 2008
Piedmontese breeders and enthusiasts from around the world, as well as many commercial cattlemen intrigued about the breed, made their way to the Lake Andes region of South Dakota for the Piedmontese Field Days. A crowd of some 80 cattle-persons – from as far away as Italy, New Zealand, Mexico and Canada and from the States of North Carolina, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Oregon, Kansas, Florida, Nevada, Wisconsin, North Dakota, Nebraska and Montana – gathered at Lake View Piedmontese on the morning of June 6th.
Our day began with tours to the pasture to see large numbers of Embryo Transplant calves with their recipient mothers. Both Fullblood and Naturalean Piedmontese calves were represented, including some solid red and polled Naturalean. It was a sunny day with a good breeze to dry up some of the “excess” moisture in the Lake Andes area. The grass was tall and the calves were outstanding ! At each stop to see different groups of breeding stock, Jerry Hofer of Lake View would address the crowd and answer questions about the ET and AI programs; synchronization of recipients and management practices on the ranch. Jerry received many interesting questions from commercial cattlemen on the attributes of the breed, and one question usually led to two more !
Lake View Colony presented a delicious lunch for the group, and entertained us all with several songs – sung acapella – in beautiful harmony ! Don Anderson, Prof. of Montana State University, led us all in prayer before our meal.
Following lunch, the group moved off to tour the Feed-lot. Capacity for the entire feed-lot at Lake View is some 1400-1500 head, but several liners of Piedmontese-crosses had been recently shipped off so we were able to see approximately 1300 head, sorted into different feeding pens. The ultra-lean continental crosses and the British-breed crosses were fed separately to better hit the different targets of the branded beef companies, Laura’s Lean Beef and Montana Ranch Brand. Jeff Russo of Laura’s Lean Beef explained how best to raise cattle for their all natural market and how the grid payment programs give true premiums back to producers for the lean high yielding Piedmontese-continental crosses. Ralph Peterson, CEO of Montana Ranch Brand, also explained the expanding Montana Ranch Brand program which markets certified Piedmontese beef. Raising cattle for this all natural market was of extreme interest to the commercial producers and Ralph fielded many questions about how best to start.
Next, an informal appraisal was given by a panel of International cattlemen and specialists in the breed, as they reviewed a 2-copy polled red Naturalean herd sire. Special guests, Dr. Albino Pistone, President of the Italian Association, and Dr. Andrea Quaglino, General Manager of the Italian Association, remarked that they found this bull to be of good over-all quality even though he was not a fullblood Piedmontese ! They remarked that his muscling was more smooth and “less pronounced” than an Italian fullblood would normally exhibit. The lack of the full black skin pigmentation was noted, but the quality of bone was considered normal.
Dr. Humberto Garza, President of the Italian White Breeds Assoc. of Mexico, commented that he found this bull to be extremely long bodied but perhaps too large or heavy for natural service on the smaller cows of his region ....