Don't look at this if you are over 40

hey  I said don't look. (lol)  The other day i was driving around the fairgrounds at Louisville, not sure where I was at or where I was going.  When I seen a relick from the past.  It was once thought to be extinct on the north american continent, but now we know that there is at least one.

For you youngsters  under 40 you may have never seen one.  But here he is.  This is how the show steer started its change from the little no growing cattle to the point we are today.  Back to the little no growing cattle.  Just kidding.  Had to say it.  The picture below is of a yearling purebred Chianina.  I seen this guy walking across the parking lot and had to look him up and take a pic.  I had a great visit with the Johnson family and thanked them for bringing him to Louisville.

I think nearly everyone in the show steer business in the late 70's and early 80's may have had one of these on their farm.    Not always good results during calving season but this is the start to where we are today.

Wow , that 'll take ya back. Couldn't get them tall enough fast enough. What the hell were we thinkin?

Would have been fun to find one of today's new clubbie bred yearling bulls and taken a side by side picture.

Walter Mize still has a bunch of them south of Stephenville, Tx.  I go by them fairly often

We there and saw this too!  It was unbelieveable how tall it was!

looks like a short one to me. lol

couple of things to notice with that bull.  toes are straight forward, tail set looks nice, smooth from back through shoulders, not cow hocked for how tall he is, cant tell from the pick about the tail head if that's bone sticking up or not.  all in all, a decent calf.  maybe a little roman nosed. another thing people liked about the chi's back in the day was the shape of the poll.  at a show once, we frosted the entire body that gray color with the foam dye shaving cream stuff.  didn't goop it up and the judge made a special point to muss it all from front to back. 

How was his disposition?

GB

We're tied right beside him.  Thats my chute in the background.  His actial birthdate is Sept. 2, 2009.  We're got a late May heifer calf in our string that can walk under him without ducking.  His disposition is more like a puppy dog than a bull by the way. 

we have a ton of them in our area, and they get HUGE, people use them for pulling cattle and are the breed of choice.

TDR Simmentals said:

We're tied right beside him.  Thats my chute in the background.  His actial birthdate is Sept. 2, 2009.  We're got a late May heifer calf in our string that can walk under him without ducking.  His disposition is more like a puppy dog than a bull by the way. 

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Awesome! I remember some that the Bodenhammer girls over at Mountain Home showed ( Ildeno influence, according to the stall card) that would look you in the eye and kick you in the kidneys at the same time,  in the blink of an eye.

GB

Diamond said:

we have a ton of them in our area, and they get HUGE, people use them for pulling cattle and are the breed of choice.

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Weren't they draft animals in Italy, tracing back to the Roman Empire?

GB

Thats what Chi still like here still a few around if your fences are big enough. Had one guy not that far from me used to bred Chi x Romangolas now they were big and mean.

How was he for thickness?

Diamond said:

we have a ton of them in our area, and they get HUGE, people use them for pulling cattle and are the breed of choice.

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and pulling out of cows as well.

ROMAX said:

How was he for thickness?

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He was pretty thick. I saw him alot during the weekend. It was actually pretty impressive.

i saw that calf! Reminded me of my calf who was really tall.

Our best show steers on our farm are usually those with Chianina somewhere in their pedigree. Not all get the Chi attitude but those that do, watch out!

That does bring back memories.  I'm not over 40, but my Grandpa, that butchered for 30 years, had a farm that he had to go to that had a Bull just like him, just more mature.  That dude was Massive.  We didnt live on a farm then and showing cattle wasnt on the radar, but the sight of that bull is one that I will never forget.  I remember Pa keeping one eye on his knife and one eye on the bull...... and he was two pens away.  I just remember him looking over there quite a bit and just shaking his head.  Hard to explain to my students just how tall the old Chi's are/were. 

Mixed memories when I see a bull like that - some good and bad - the bad has been discussed but the good was you could breed one of those fullblood chi bulls to a 46" 1000 to 1100 pound Angus cows that were in abundance and with the great hybrid vigor and growth you could reasonably expect them to wean at least 60% of their body weight - you never had to worry about a sluggish calf at birth and even though some of the birth weights were pretty big they were designed pretty well for calving - could sell the good steers very easily - however the next dumb thing was that we kept some of the heifers for replacements, because they looked so cool, not realizing that their role was a terminal cross - to me there is still not a more efficient beef machine - just that now days there are not many of those little cows that are  small enough to make it work and the reputation of the chi cattle make people wary - it was interesting that many of the fullbloods were actually relatively gentle, with Ildeno being an exception as I recall at Ohlde's when the bull was 16 years old or so he would still charge at you when you walked up to his pen and rattle the panels, but when you crossed them with Angus it was often like a match and gasoline.

Thanks for the photo.