Nissen Angus - Our Program

Our goal is to raise cattle that are easy fleshing and
easy calving, with muscle and maternal strength, while maintaining structural correctness, carcass traits and
good dispositions. We started in the registered Black
Angus business in 1990 and have steadily built up the
herd to its present number of 250+ cows. We calve
100+ head in the fall with the remaining 150+ calving
in the spring.

The start of our herd began with the acquisition of 20 heifers from Knudsen Angus in Bainville. From there we purchased several females from Birdtail Angus in Simms and Flesch Angus in Shelby. In 1996 we purchased our first herd sire, Leachman Checkmate. He carried the bloodlines of EXT and New Trend and was our main herd sire for the next seven years. He was a smooth, gentle, easy fleshing, fertile bull. He left us with a tremendous set of females which heavily influence our herd today. We still have many Checkmate daughters, granddaughters, and great-granddaughters in production.

In 1997 Tom and Gladys Walling approached us about running some cows on shares. We gladly accepted the offer, knowing what a great opportunity it would be to work with the Wallings. To this day we are honored and humbled by the fact that the Walling's trusted in us and our program to that extent. When the Wallings dispersed, we purchased many of the cows we had run on shares and as a result, a large portion of our cows trace back to Walling genetics.

We calve the spring cows at the ranch in Chinook from February through March. After AIing, we haul the cows to pasture on the Fort Belknap Reservation where they remain until the calves are weaned in October. The later calving cows are put out with the clean up bull as we need to get the cows to pasture and keep the calving intervals short. After weaning, the cows are turned out on grass hay meadows until winter warrants supplemental feeding.

Our fall calving program began in 1995 with the purchase of several Westwind Angus cows. We added more quality genetics to the program in 2007 with purchases from Sitz Angus in their fall dispersion sale. We started the fall program to lessen the labor in the springtime, more efficiently utilize our resources, and to be able to offer a more mature bull to our customers. The fall cows are calved out on native range from September through the middle of October on the Fort Belknap Reservation and wintered along the Milk River. The fall first-calf heifers are summered, calved, and wintered at the ranch. Our fall cows receive the same amount of feed throughout the winter as our spring cows. There is no creep and no extra feed. The fall calves are weaned in May. At weaning time, the fall calves are usually 75 - 100 lbs lighter than the spring calves. This is due to the fact that the calves have to go through the entire winter trying to grow, while competing with the cows for supplemental winter feed. Due to the timing of the year, lack of facilities, and location of the fall cows, we turn out two bulls during breeding season. We DNA all the calves to determine the sire. The first calf fall heifers are AI'd at the ranch.

We synchronize the spring heifers to AI them and AI the spring cows off their natural heats. We feel that by utilizing AI in our herd we are able to add genetics to our program that might otherwise be unavailable to us. We have also had several of our more notable herd sires collected for outside semen sales and our own use. Several years ago, we incorporated an embryo transfer program to capitalize on some of our more outstanding maternal genetics in both programs.

Herd Foundation

Spring & Fall Calving Programs