Why the big push for Angus cattle?

[Bird]

Well, I may have posted this before . . . but I guess that's part of getting older. Many of you have learned that cows have individual personalities just as people do. And I'll never forget about my Dad buying a Jersey named Popeye when I was 5 years old. Now Popeye was a very gentle and good milk cow, except . . . she wanted to fight my Mother. Dad asked the guy he bought her from and that guy said he guessed Popeye had never seen a woman wearing a skirt (my Mother never wore slacks or trousers; only skirts or dresses).

Dad's job kept him in Oklahoma City overnight every Wednesday night, so Mother had to milk the cow that night and the next morning. And the solution we found was for me (5, and later 6, years old) to take Popeye in the barn, put the feed in her trough, and then stand there by her head so she couldn't see Mother come in, sit down, milk her, get up, and leave the barn. I remember once when I was in the first grade in school, I came home one evening to find that Popeye had gotten through the fence somewhere and was out grazing alongside the highway. Mother and her best friend (who also wore skirts) had gone after Popeye, but Popeye chased them through the fence, so Mother waited until I got home from school. I just took a rope, walked up to Popeye, looped it around her horns and led her home.

Since Mother hated Popeye, Dad got Popeye bred to a Jersey bull and got lucky with a heifer calf on the first try. Now I don't know how Popeye came by that name, but we named the calf Sweet Pea. Sweet Pea was always a family pet, gentle for anyone to handle, and when she had her first calf, she became our milk cow and Dad sold Popeye.

 

[MacLawn]

It tastes good.

 

[tcreeley]

Our 4-H Guernseys were Strawberry, Sunshine, Blueberry, Cranberry. The prefix was always Round Hill for the Guernseys and Seekonk for the Holsteins. We did the names by the alphabet, a letter for the year.
I remember one time my cow Freckles (Holstein) had gone through the fence and sliced her tit lengthwise. It was milking time so I just put the cups on her and milked her out. She didn't fuss or anything. The next day the vet came. We sold her bull calf to a farmer down the road. I don't know how many times that last summer I had to go get him with a halter when it followed the farmer's cows home (the last of the herd to go when we quit the dairy business). Farmer like its disposition, sweet just like its mother, and her mother - halter trained too!

 

[vtsnowedin]

We are a reminiscing bunch of old sods are we not?

 

[CowboyRon]

We are a reminiscing bunch of old sods are we not?

Yes, when I was a kid we had all Herefords. I forgot all about the pink eye issues. We now have a registered Angus bull, and the only reason we have him is because black cattle bring more at the auction.
The whole Angus scam is geared towards the low information consumers. It's the same consumers that would think a Holstein would care if we ate more chicken.

 

[two_bit_score]

…………… geared towards the low information consumers. It's the same consumers that would think a Holstein would care if we ate more chicken.

:thumbsup: That's what most marketing at the consumer level is all about. :thumbsup:

 

[Bird]

It's the same consumers that would think a Holstein would care if we ate more chicken.

:laughing::laughing::laughing:

 

[houstonscott]

There is a tenderness gene in cattle. Only three breeds have it and are considered best for eating. Angus, Hereford, and Pinzgaur have the gene. The Pinzgaur is the most tender cut ever tested by Texas A&M. HS