Before winter arrives, American ranchers are rushing to get cattle and calves settled and sorted.
That fall drive includes fall-calving cows. It’s a growing trend as more herds shift to delivering a fresh crop of calves ahead of seasonal snow showers.
“Oh, he’s a little one,” Tucker Shaw says as he and his son, Joe, hoist a calf to weigh it on a mobile scale. “He’s just 60 pounds.”
The Shaw Cattle Co. is nestled against the bleached bluffs of Western Idaho along the Boise River just outside Caldwell. With roughly 1,400 calves expected this fall, the Shaw team is on the hunt to tag and treat a new crop of babies.
“We’ll take off in the mornings and very first thing two or three of us will go in different directions to do inventory,” says Tucker.
“We’re getting 40 to 50 calves a day, every day and so it’s a nonstop job just to get through the calves to make sure everything’s healthy, mothered up and nursing,” explains Sam Shaw.
These calves are the future of an operation that began with their grandfather.
“He worked for a guy in high school that had registered Hereford cattle,” recounts Tucker. “That guy, when he graduated, promised him Hereford heifer.”
World War II came calling but when their grandfather returned home, that promise was kept.
“There was a letter waiting at his folks’ house when he got back from World War II that said, remember, I still owe you a heifer,” Tucker says. “That heifer is what got my family into the cattle business.”
They lived in McCall, Idaho, at the time but in 1959, the family moved from the mountains, south, to their current location just outside of Caldwell.
“We moved here just because of the winters,” explains Sam. “The winters were a lot milder than it was in McCall and this is great cow country.”
Plentiful irrigation water and abundant permanent pasture have helped the Shaw Cattle Co. thrive as a Hereford, Angus and Red Angus seedstock business.
“Our normal rainfall is about ten inches a year, so everything has to be irrigated,” says Tucker. “As long as we’ve got water, it’s a great place to be.”
Today, the operation sells roughly 500 bulls a year supported by a robust artificial insemination (AI) and embryo transfer (ET) program.
“We’re identifying those cows that are the elite cows in our operation and trying to propagate those genetics,” Sam says. “We don’t get just 1 or 2 calves out of them a year but we’re trying to get 10 or 15 calves out of them every year.”
They are also using DNA testing and genetic mapping to make selections and add depth to their understanding of the herd.
“Part of the registered cattle industry is that over the years, we keep adding more and more layers of data,” explains Tucker. “That gives us more information about our cattle and the breeding stock that we’re able to offer to our customers.”
As the latest calf crop lands hock deep in green grass, this ranch family is excited about the work.
“Today we probably have somewhere between 35 and 42 to tag,” Tucker says. “It looks like Monday we tagged 65 calves that day and so that was as big of a day as we’ve ever had.”
They’ll keep hunting newborn calves curled up and waiting to be discovered.
“I love seeing the next generation of genetics,” smiles Sam. “You get to look at these cattle and see, yeah, either we messed up or no, we did it right.”
That’s an important job and it comes with a long tail.
“The genetics we produce today, our customers won’t reap the benefits of for 3 to 5 years,” explains Sam. “Ultimately it’s to produce a better product for the consumer.”
This fall as each calf is checked, counted, cared for and celebrated this family of ranchers is driving forward with a focus on future seasons of the operation.
