saboranch.com » Dairy Cattle

Field Day June 19th- information

saboranch — Fri, 07 May 2010 21:27:47 +0000

SABO RANCH FIELD DAYJune 19, 2010 11:00AM-4:00pm 303 Pony Rd, Harrison, MT

(just 3 miles off MT Rte 287, between Harrison and Pony, MT)

PROGRAM:

11:00- Cow Milking and Welcome and Wander

12:00- Tour of Sabo Ranch Cattle (Devon and Jersey) and other Livestock, and Off-Grid Living.

Tour Topics will include Off-Grid Living, Heritage & Grassfed Cattle breeding, A2 Milk development, Eating seasonally, Management Intensive Grazing, Redeveloping Locally Grown Food Sources.

1:00- All Local Food Lunch

(2:00-4:00)- Free Afternoon Classes

- Good Food/Good Health- Eating Local all Year Long

with

Tanda Cook and Sarah Marshall of Clearwater Health

- Family Dairy Animals- Keeping Your Animal Healthy, and Your Milk Clean

with Jenny Sabo, and Dave Scott of Whitehall,

Adults: $15.00 each, Children FREE

Only 80 spaces available,

Reserve your space now- (406)685-3248, saboranch@gmail.com

Much of this event is OUTSIDE, dress accordingly. Please leave dogs in your car, to keep them safe from protective mother cows. There will be a safe field for dog walking about 1/4 mile away from the cattle.

Bring your swimsuits and towels, and stop for a relaxing soak at Norris Hot Springs on the way home, just 13 miles south, near the junction of Hwy 287 and Rt 84.

Internships available

saboranch — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 15:26:30 +0000

Rebecca Kurnick milking Cupcake on a December morning, 2009.

SABO RANCH INTERNSHIPS AVAILABLE

March 2011 onwards, positions available, 2 references required, written or telephone interviews.

MINIMUM STAY, three months, unless you come with serious experience on another cattle operation. We recognize that there is lots to learn here, and we love teaching. However, the teaching requires lots of time and energy from us, Mark and Jenny, since we want to make every intern position at Sabo Ranch worth YOUR time as well.

TUITION FEES: $100.00 USD per week for the first three months (3 month minimum stay), which covers room and board, and time spent teaching.

Once a student is competent enough, we might choose to leave for an overnight trip, at which point we will pay the intern to cover the ranch in our absence.

If a student is also competent enough, there is the option of staffing a Farmers Market booth for Sabo Ranch, which is also a paid position

If a student is also competent enough, there is the option of staffing a Farmers Market booth for Sabo Ranch, which is also a paid position.

BENEFITS:

Daily delicious food, much of it raised on our ranch or by our direct friends. Eating LOCAL every day of the year!

Experience living in an off-the-grid home

Heritage breed beef cattle management

August & Sept will include embryo transfer work within our herd

Grassfed Jersey dairy cattle management (milking, breeding with AI techniques, caring for milk)

Mob Grazing with livestock

Pastured Poultry

Pastured Pork

Farmers Markets, including fresh food and frozen meat sales

Field to Table management training in our Grassfed Beef program

Publish your thoughts as you learn on our Intern Blog

Questions about our internship, or reference needed for us?

Contact Rebecca Kurnick, rakurn@gmail.com, who interned with us May-Dec 2009.

Sabo Ranch Intern Diary – Rebecca Kurnick

saboranch — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 18:16:21 +0000

October 18, 2009

Lena has been showing signs of limping. Her left hind foot seems to be the problem. Vet Will Oliver came by to doctor her toe, which is a lot longer than it should be to begin with. It seems she has a genetic crack on the inside of her right toe. An infection was begining to make a home. Will Oliver filed down the dead material and used Bovibond to apply a plastic cap to cover the toe. Jenny puts great effort into keeping the herd as chemical free as possible, however Will used a local antibiotic in the fat pad to assist with the healing. After the visit we continued treating Lena by fasting her and giving her a dose of crushed garlic (approximately 2 oz) in the morning and evening based on Newman Turner’s (1950′s English organic farmer) philosophies, (“Cure Your Own Cattle”, Newman Turner, republished by Acres U.S.A, 2009).

Bad weather setting in October 18, 2009. Dairy Cows still on green grass

One characteristic of the Sabos is their commitment to the overall health of their animals, despite resistance met towards alternative methods of healing. Lena is a Jersey cow bred for her milk production and butter fat content. Naturally very thin and hard to keep weight on, she is not an “easy keeping” cow. Easy keeping is one of the biggest traits I have been looking at the past few months. Jenny said what you want to look at in a good cow is the “belly, bag, and boots”. With Lena I am seeing the negative effects of having poor feet.

Cupcake is maintaining about two and a quarter gallons a day. This week Cora had a snotty nose and was looking a little down so we fasted her for a day, giving us a spike in milk from Cupcake.

Jersey/Dutch Belted heifer for sale

saboranch — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:41:28 +0000

Sabo Cora, Jersey/Dutch Belted heifer, at 18 months old, January 2011

Sabo Cora, at two days old, July 9, 2009. After her weaning at 9 months old, Cora will be for sale in early Autumn 2011 as a bred heifer (Planned Sire: Jersey bull Beledene Dukes Landy). (More photos of Cora coming soon

Sabo Jersey cow Cupcake, age 6 or 7, is a small framed (46″ shoulder height), easy keeping, gentle cow. Cupcake is hand milked once daily, tied to any post we choose, without hobbles or any other restraint. Her 2009 heifer calf, Cora, pictured here, is Jersey/Dutch Belted (another grass-based, high butterfat dairy breed). Cora will spend her first month with her mother, 24/7, then gradually less each month as she grows (and drinks more of Cupcake’s milk!), nursing at will and learning proper herd behavior. Cora will finally be weaned at 9 months old, when we dry up Cupcake in preparation for her next calf, due June 11, 1020.

Field Day- Sabo Ranch- June 19, 2010- 11:00 to 4:00

saboranch — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:07:07 +0000

Jenny and Mark Sabo

: Sabo Ranch Field Day 2009

Come Meet the Sabos and Tour the Sabo Ranch – Saturday, June 19, 2010, 11:00am-4:00pm. Tent Provided this year for dry/shaded eating!!!

100% Grassfed DEVON and JERSEY Cattle, Management Intensive Grazing, Off Grid Living, Eating Local Foods, Grassfed Beef, Pastured Pork, Pastured Poultry. Only 150 Spaces available, Local Food Lunch served.

After Lunch SEMINARS: 2:00-4:00pm

1. GOOD FOOD/GOOD FUTURES- How to Source Great Local Food HERE!, Keep yourself Healthy all year on Local Food, and Why Your Purchases will Change our LOCAL ECONOMY for all of us.

2. FAMILY DAIRY ANIMALS- How to Choose the Best Genetics for Family and Friends, How to Keep Animals and Milk CLEAN AND HEALTHY.

Tour with Jenny and Mark Sabo will discuss:

– Breeding Jersey cattle to A2/A2 New Zealand bulls, tightening breeding season towards seasonal milking.

– Rotokawa Devon cattle: Harvesting embryos from “Sabo Abby”, our first Rotokawa Devon, implanting in other Sabo Red Angus previous recipient cows, using seasonal fertility patterns in cattle. Testing for A2/A2 status in Devon Herd.

– More Management Intensive Grazing (MIG)practices with beef cattle

– MIG with laying hens

– Sabo Ranch Interns- the importance of training future Sustainable Farmers/Ranchers

– Direct Marketing Grassfed Beef

– Devon Burgers for fresh food sales added to Bogert Farmers Market activities Summer 2010.

ALL LOCAL FOOD booth!

– 1/4 Carcass Beef Harvest, single week harvest, for compacted beef sales, premium Omega 3 levels in the grassfed beef

Tour and Meal: $15/Adult, Children 12& under FREE.

**$7.50/Young Farmers 12-21(free with reservation before 5/1/10)**.

Calves and their Friends

saboranch — Sun, 24 May 2009 21:49:15 +0000

Since our dairy calves spend at least half of each day away from their mothers so WE get some of the milk, we make sure that each calf is raised with a companion. Here, friends Devon steer calf Adam and Jersey heifer calf Ladine share a nap and a snuggle on a warm spring morning. (Sabo Ladine is an A1/A2 calf, sired by Beledene Dukes Landy)

Sabo Faline – Jersey heifer

saboranch — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:19:59 +0000

Faline, age 12 months, on a crisp February day. Newly weaned, Faline shared her 8 year old mother Folly with two Devon/Angus calves for Folly

Owner Riley Sabo, age 9, with Sabo Faline at 21 months. Faline has spent the winter with our Devon beef herd, in the open fields at 5000

“Sabo’s Faline”, born March 2008 (photographed March 2009), sired by New Zealand Jersey bull Beldene Dukes Landy. Sabo Faline is an A1/A2 calf and will be bred July 2010 to an A2/A2 Jersey bull, LIC Sire 190JE0038 Hawthorne Grove Zeus. For more information about A2 milk, see http://curezone.com/blogs/fm.asp?i=1259149 .

Faline’s dam, Folly, is an extremely “easy keeping” Jersey/Limousin cow who fostered two extra Devon calves last year without losing any condition. Folly produces about 2 – 2 1/2 gallons of milk per day on a once-a-day milking, 100% grassfed.

Questions?: Contact us at saboranch@gmail.com

Sabo’s Ladine

saboranch — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:16:42 +0000

“Sabo’s Ladine”, born October 2008, (photographed March 2009) sired by New Zealand Jersey bull Beldene Dukes Landy. Sabo Ladine is an A1/A2 Jersey calf and will be bred here to an A2 Jersey bull. For more about A2 milk, see http://curezone.com/blogs/fm.asp?i=1259149 .

Ladine’s dam, Lena, is our highest producing, most slender Jersey/Guernsey cow. Lena gives about 3 – 3 1/2 gallons of milk per day on a once-a-day milking, 100% grassfed.

Watching a New Calf Nurse

saboranch — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 02:16:32 +0000

Our baby dairy calves live with their mothers for at least three months (longer if they will be replacement females in our grassfed Jersey dairy herd). This gives them the benefit of learning proper herd behavior, which plants are best to eat, and provides each calf with the crucial nutrients for lifelong good health.

We host many different visitors at our ranch, year round. Here, Kiril, Zach, and Keats learn the particulars about where milk originates.

Photo: Harriette McPherson

Managing Our Cattle

saboranch — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 20:13:40 +0000

Our cattle are 100% grassfed, and also consume apple cider vinegar, kelp meal, and a cultured yeast , free choice, for greater health. We use fencing and management of our livestock to keep our watercourses clean and our land welcoming to wildlife.

Our Devon beef cattle herd is a mixture bred from our North Devon bull and Red Angus cows. We continue to select over time for gourmet, tender, flavorful 100% grassfed beef. We use no hormones or backgrounded antibiotics, and have no feedlots of any kind.

Our calves are born in the spring on green grass, in May and June, and are not weaned until they are at least 9 months old. North Devon cattle, in particular the Rotokawa Devon herd that sired our bull, are well known for tender, gourmet 100% grassfed beef.

Our Jersey influence herd of cattle is also 100% grassfed, grazing out in the fields all summer, and supplemented in the winter months with the most nutritious hay we can grow. Our breeding program seeks out the most adapted genetics for 100% grassfed Jerseys, slowly building a top quality herd for creamy milk and tender gourmet meat.

We milk our cows only once a day, and calves live with their mothers at least part time until they are 4 months old, then nurse once daily until they are at least 9 months old. Each Jersey cow, depending on her conformation, is given at least 2 months rest from lactation before she calves again, allowing her to dedicate her energies to the healthiest calf possible.

For more information about our grassfed beef, see the Guidelines and Philosophies page.