Merry Christmas from our family to yours! We are blessed to be able to steward this land, and are so grateful to have such wonderful customers!
#mannixbeef
Had an incredible time with my Brother at The Union in Helena, Montana! Sitting at the counter by the wood-fired grill was such a treat. Watching the talented chefs in action and learning about the various meats they prepare was both educational and entertaining. The atmosphere was warm, and the passion behind the cooking was evident in every dish we watched them prepare! #buildingcommunitythroughland #TheUnionHelena #WoodFiredCooking #CulinaryExperience #landstewardship
We have had a couple of confirmed kills from a Grizzly bear in the last month. This is the first time in a couple years that we’ve had confirmed kills. I think that drought years are often tougher for foraging for bears, which can lead to more predation and livestock conflicts.
We’re working closely with our local bear biologist to hopefully prevent it from becoming a larger issue. It’s meant increased trips to the area to check the cows and create a human presence in the area. So its been some extra work for the local biologist, ourselves, and the range rider who helps with these things in our area. We’ve now moved our cattle out of the pasture where it occurred, so hopefully that too will help prevent more predation events.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
Project Season
As we get through haying and AI-ing, we will enter project season on the ranch. The spring and summer is too busy to tackle many of the infrastructure projects that build up over the year, so we tend to tackle them in the fall. We’ll be fixing leaky water tanks and broken water lines, replacing culverts and measuring devices in irrigation ditches, building new fence and repairing old, fixing equipment, etc.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
AI-ing
No... not artificial intelligence. Next week we will be “artificially Inseminating” our first calf heifers, or breeding them in the chute with semen from a straw.
Why AI? AI is a good tool when you want to introduce new genetics quickly, or are looking for more specific genetics to use with your herd.
We used it when we first started trying to change the genetics of our herd from a larger framed animal to a smaller framed, deeper bellied animal that would perform better on grass and need less inputs. Most of our genetics are now closer to where we want them, so we aren’t using it with the main mother cow herd. We are either purchasing bulls or growing our own to service cows naturally.
However with our first calf heifers we have been having some issues with calving ease. Part the of the problem may be our smaller genetics that I mentioned above. AI-ing allows us to select very specifically for calving ease bulls that we hope will reduce the number of heifers that need assistance calving. It also allows us to experiment fairly quickly with different bulls from one year to the next to figure out which direction we’d like to go, before buying a bull that will breed for several years and continue to influence herd genetics for years to come.
In this photo from last year, Erica is checking a pen of our heifers. You can observe the herd to see which heifers are coming into heat during the day, and therefor which ones are ready to breed. They also have little stickers on their tail heads which turn bright green when they have been rubbed off by other heifers like a lottery scratch ticket. This helps to alert us to heifers that we may have come into heat during the night or that we missed during our daily checks.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
Haying season is over!
This last weekend we finished stacking the last bales from this years hay crop. Now all that is left is servicing and putting away all the equipment for the year.
The Blackfoot Valley is in a pretty severe drought, but we were able to get a decent crop on most of our hay ground. We did decide not to irrigate, and not to hay, a few of our pastures to conserve water, but because of the easy winter last year, we will have plenty of hay going into the winter season.
Home raised hay makes up the vast majority of what our cows eat once we run out of winter grazing. We will purchase some alfalfa hay to increase the protein for our weaned calves.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
Last week the band of sheep from the Sieben ranch moved over the mountain to come graze on the ranch. For the next two months this band of 1000 ewes and their lambs will be guided around the landscape by their skilled Peruvian herder to target knapweed and other noxious weeds.
@siebenlivestock.co@oldsaltcoop
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
We are just starting to cut hay this week, so we’ve been preparing all the haying equipment. That means cleaning and servicing tractors, attaching balers and rakes, and discovering what breakdowns occurred while some equipment was parked for the winter. Weird how often equipment breaks when it is parked.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
For the last few weeks we’ve been turning out most of our cow/calf pairs to graze in summer pastures in the mountains, and this week are hauling out the bulls to join them. They’ll spend the next month or two grazing higher elevation pastures where the feed quality stays higher through the summer.
#mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef
It’s been a week since the 2nd annual Old Salt Festival! We had the most incredible time with the most incredible people.
Thank you from the entire Mannix family to everyone who came out for this wonderful event.
Huge kudos to the @oldsaltfestival@oldsaltcoop team for putting this all together.
#landiskin #mannixbeef #grassfinishedbeef #blackfootvalley #montanabeef #oldsaltfestival #oldsalt
Introducing the 2024 Old Salt Montana Producer Lineup!
The farmers, ranchers, and businesses listed below, whose products will be used in the meals provided at The 2nd Annual @oldsaltfestival , taking place on the Mannix Family ranch in Helmville, June 21-23, are highlighted because they produce Montana-grown food, or use it in their products. By using Montana Producers in their menu, Old Salt Festival creates opportunities to connect with the people who are growing and raising our food, and to build relationship with the land that it’s grown on.
Read more about these Montana businesses and others at: abundantmontana.com/2024-Old-Salt-Producers
Find out more about Old Salt Festival at oldsaltfestival.com and find more producers like the ones listed here on our Find Food and Farms Map!
#AbundantMT #EatLocal #OldSaltFestival2024 #OldSalt
