Lester and Yvonne Vanhill are not your typical cattle breeder, raising beef cattle like many who raise and sell cattle either as feeders or finished cattle through auction markets, to feedlots or directly to the packer.
The raise Highland cattle, or more properly known as Scottish Highland cattle, and they are very easily recognized for their long shaggy hair coat and big upswept horns. They are a somewhat smaller breed as well. Cows are generally 900 to 1,100 pounds in weight and bulls 1,200 to 1,500 pounds. They come in a variety of colours, including red, yellow, brindle, dun, white and black.
So why do Lester and Yvonne Vanhill raise Highland cattle? Well, for one thing, Lester says he likes them and their docile nature. Plus, they are very well-suited to their farm location and the harsh winter climate near Cross Lake east of Flatbush, with lots of tree cover all around and wolves and bear to contend with. With their shaggy coat, they keep warmer in winter than most breeds, resulting in lower feed intake and less feed costs. Lester says they also do well on lower quality feed than other breeds. He has found fencing costs are less, as the Highlands are not aggressive and tend to respect fences well. And those big horns can be a good deterrent for wolves and bear. One small deterrent to the big horns for him is special equipment is needed to handle them. He can’t use self-catching head gates and uses tombstone-style bale feeders to keep them from catching and breaking horns.
Another feature Lester likes about the Highland cattle is longevity, with most cows still productive at 14 to 15 years of age. His oldest cow is still raising calves at 18 years of age.
Lester says he started raising Highlands in 2013 when he purchased five steers. Liking what he saw, he purchased a registered Highland bull, nine registered young cows and bred heifers and four heifers in 2014. That was the beginning of the Fuzzy Wuzzy Cattle Company.
Today, the Fuzzy Wuzzy herd has a little over 40 registered Highland cows and bulls and 30 unregistered. He mixes old bloodlines from the 1980’s and 90’s with larger-framed modern bloodlines. Historically, he adds, some Highlands had poor feet and udders in some bloodlines, but that has most been bred out through selection in the last 25 years.
Currently, Lester says he has two embryo heifers and one more coming in May of this year, with another 10 embroyos in the tank to be used on select cows at a later time. He also has 200 semen straws in the tank at DBK Genetics Inc. (Sturgeon County). He says this is partly as insurance in case something happens to any of his bulls.
Being outside the regular cattle production realms, are they worth it? He says he can sell weaned heifers for anywhere from $5,000 to $25,000, depending on the bloodlines. Registered yearling bulls will fetch $3,000 to $5,000 and registered young cows from $3,000 to $10,000, again, depending on the bloodlines. Steers are sold privately through a buyer who finds the markets for them. Lester says the meat quality is excellent.
We may not see a lot of them around, but in Alberta today, there are 98 registered Highland Breeders, Lester said. Most have under 10 head, with the average herd size anywhere from 10 to 50 head. Across Canada, there are 342 registered Highland breeders; again most are herds of less than 10 animals.
According to information on the breed on the website, Highland cattle originated in the Scottish Highlands and Western Isles, where the harsh climate and North Atlantic gales created a process of natural selection. The first mention of Highland cattle was in the sixth century. The Highland Cattle Society was formed in 1884, and the first herd book was published in 1885. Highland cattle are now found all over the world. Highland cattle were first imported into Canada from Scotland in the 1880’s; with one bull by the Hon. Donald A. Smith (Lord Strathcona) in Winnipeg, and one bull by Robert Campbell of Sinclair, Manitoba, who later also imported five females.
