By Sarah Hill
Photos courtesy Lacy family
Lacy’s Red Angus, Drexel, Mo., has worked for decades in the quest to breed the “perfect cow.”
Red-hided cattle don’t get enough credit in the beef industry. These cattle feed millions each and every day, and yet they’re often overlooked in favor of black-hided animals. However, that’s not the case at Lacy’s Red Angus, Drexel, Mo. The Lacy family has been committed to raising high-quality, red-hided cattle for 70 years.
Seedstock Operation
Dale and Kay Lacy got into the seedstock business in 1955, but the family has lived in West Central Missouri, since 1869. The family purchased registered Polled Herefords, which is the breed that current operation owner Dan Lacy grew up with. The family currently owns 1,200 acres of pastureland and rents another 320 acres.
“In the 1960s, Dad was utilizing artificial insemination and began experimenting with Simmentals,” Dan Lacy said. “The first calves were so impressive that the decision was made to breed all of our Herefords to Simmentals.”
As time went on, Dale experimented with other breeds, including Gelbvieh, Red Poll, and Red Angus but always remained committed to the Polled Herefords. Dale was diagnosed with cancer in 1990, and the Polled Hereford herd was dispersed in 1991.
“At the time, it was considered a very successful sale,” Dan said. “The timing was right, and we had a lot of Victor Domino bred cows, which were very popular at the time.” When the dust cleared, the only livestock remaining on the ranch was 17 Red Angus cows.
A few years later, Dale seemingly had defeated cancer and added another 40 Red Angus heifers to the herd. Over the next decade, the Red Angus herd grew to nearly 300 mature females. In the meantime, Dan chose welding as an occupation and began a career in the building trades as a millwright, eventually specializing in power generation, performing maintenance inspections on large turbine/generators throughout the United States, first with Westinghouse and later Siemens Energy.
As time went on, Dan wanted to continue the Red Angus operation, but was unable to find a way to financially make it work, but did maintain a handful of his own cows. Just prior to Dale’s passing in 2011, he sold his entire Red Angus herd to Jon Marshall of Katy, Texas.
During fall 2013, Dan contacted Marshall about buying back some of the cattle. “Mr. Marshall agreed to let me pick out 40 head,” Dan explained. “I was out-of-town in the middle of an outage, so I had a good friend make the trip to Texas on my behalf to ensure that the cattle and the deal was sound.”
“I picked out about 60 cows based on pedigree, since I knew the most maternal cow lines from my dad were out of CCF Gold Bar 0251 and 5L Signature 5615,” Dan said. “They got here just before Thanksgiving.”
“The cows were thin and all open. We synchronized, AI’d them, and got them all bred with the exception of two or three,” Dan recalled. With that, Lacy’s Red Angus was back in business. Dan left his position at Siemens to focus full time on the cattle herd. “We started saving replacement heifers and growing the herd,” Dan said. “The next thing you know, we went from 50 to 60 cows to over 200.” Bulls and heifers would be developed, and the bulls were sold primarily through private treaty offerings.
He also consigned females in the Missouri Red Angus State Sale as a way to get the word out that Lacy’s Red Angus was back in business.
Breeding Program
The Lacy’s utilize embryo transfer on a select few cows, implanting about 30 to 40 embryos each year. Today, the vast majority of the Lacy herd has the LACY prefix going back multiple generations—a fact that Dan is very proud of.
“In the beginning, I was using bulls that Dad had still in the tank, but I always felt like the calves out of our cleanup bulls that we raised ourselves were as good or better than the ones we got from the highly touted AI sires,” Dan said. “My dad was very particular, a bit of a perfectionist when it came to his cattle. He knew what he wanted, and he wasn’t satisfied until he achieved it. I never felt comfortable talking to someone about sires that I wasn’t knowledgeable about. At that point, I decided to utilize LACY bred bulls into our program and did just that moving forward. Eventually, we had to introduce some new genetics and have been doing so over the past couple years. Starting with this year’s sale, customers will start seeing a few new sire groups.”
In 2019, Dan and Kelly sold nearly 100 head of registered Red Angus cows to Nick, Callie, and Stetson Curtis with MC Livestock, Archie, Mo. As part of the purchase, Kay leased nearly 500 acres to MC Livestock and Dan agreed to help the young couple with developing and marketing their bulls. In 2019, the Curtis family joined the Lacys for a joint sale.
“We develop and market bulls together, and I’m very happy to partner with the Curtis’,” Dan said. “They both grew up in the business, have an exceptionally good eye for cattle and an excellent work ethic. Without them, we wouldn’t be having a sale.”
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Dan had the opportunity to buy some Polled Hereford cows whose genetics went back to one of Dale’s original cows purchased from the 1991 dispersal sale. Dan bought 10 pairs from Jim and Linda Reed, Green Ridge, Mo.
“Perhaps I was a little nostalgic, but I’ve always liked red baldie females,” Dan said. “We use the red baldies as recip cows, and there’s good demand for them. It’s been fun to recapture some of those old genetics, but it also allows us to offer all the tools to produce beautiful red baldie females. If I ever decide to put together a commercial cow herd, they’d be nothing but red baldies.”
Although Dan said the Lacys don’t consider themselves “show” people, the family has exhibited pen cattle at the National Western Stock Show (NWSS) and Cattlemen’s Congress the past few years, exhibiting the Champion Pen of 3 Heifers in 2016 NWSS and Reserve Pen of 3 Heifers in the 2022 Cattlemen’s Congress.
Today, Dan runs the operation with the help of his wife, Kelly. At 88, Kay is still active on the farm. Dan’s son, Derek, and daughter-in-law, Amy, are raising their three children on the farm, ages 10, 8, and 6. Dan’s sisters, Debbie Wheeler and Sherri Keegan, are also involved in the operation. Debbie and her son, Steve, focus on the Hereford side of the herd and plan to take over a larger role in the near future.
Focus on Maternal Strengths
“My dad was always after the perfect cow,” Dan said. “He always told me that you’ll earn every dime you ever make selling bulls, and he was right.”
Dan focuses on matings focusing on maternal strengths, good udders, teat placement and fertility. Because they live in the fescue belt, Dan prefers cows with fine hair that slick off easily.
The current herd is split into two calving groups, with one group of 80 cows calving out during the first week of September, and another 45 cows calving around March 1. Typically, the cows are synchronized using a seven-day CIDR protocol and AI’d on standing heats for about four days, turning in the cleanup bulls after that.
The cattle graze year-round and are supplemented with hay that the Lacy family puts up. The cattle are on a good mineral program and are occasionally fed protein tubs. Although their pastures are primarily fescue, Dan tries to maintain a presence of legumes, utilizing red clover as well as lespedeza. Dan said that he tries to feed brome hay to the lactating cows.
Calves are typically weaned in early October and late April for the respective groups. The Lacys develop their own yearling bulls and females, which are also offered during the sale or sold by private treaty in the spring.
Heifer Strong
Recent drought conditions have caused Dan to reduce his herd in the past year or so. This year, Dan is offering their entire 2023 heifer crop. “We were heifer strong last year, so we’ve got more than 50 heifers to sell,” he said.
With more manageable cattle numbers, Dan can focus on getting his grandkids involved in the cattle business. All the grandchildren receive a heifer for their 8th birthday.
Annual Production Sale:
Saturday, October 26, 2024
1:00 pm - Drexel, Mo.
learn more at www.lacysredangus.com
Comments