Little Cedar Beef

Maternally selected and feed efficiency tested Red Angus and Tarentaise breeding stock.

• Our History
• Breeding Program
• FEMALES
• SIRES
• Horses
• Contact

2024 brought us another example of how God's timing is perfect and His plans are better than ours, even when circumstances may not make sense at the moment. We had been looking for a few good horses for a while, but various things kept happening that prevented us from getting any. We were beginning to think that we'd be checking pastures on fourwheelers forever.Then we came across Sassy and Stormy, two “Breeding Stock Paint” mares who were raised a mere 5 miles away, but up a road that we've never had a good reason to travel. We've always tended to do business in Osage, and their breeder, Les Perry, always tended to do business in Riceville, so we had simply just never met! Purchasing these two horses was the beginning of our horse enterprise.

Wade riding Sassy

Les Perry grew up working cattle on horse back. He started breeding Quarter horses in the early 1970's, which were predominantly influenced by Magnolia Bar, Grey Badger II, and Sonny Dee Bar. He incorporated Paint bloodlines in the last 10 or 12 years leading up to his retirement dispersal, which included a son of KT Black Ty Affair. Sassy and Stormy got to stay on the farm, as they were a couple of the family favorites. Les was fond of the “Skipper W” bloodline too, and recommended that if we were to look for a stallion, to seek out his influence.Les's recommendation to seek out a “Skipper W” influenced stallion prompted Phil to ask a Montana rancher, who's purchased some of our Tarentaise bulls over the years, of his opinion, as he is a horse breeder too. He simply said, “I like them. They're useful horses with some muscle and bone.” Their advice led us to finding some Skipper influenced Paint horses for sale on the internet. What was interesting, is that a few of them were bred and raised by Ann Bowman, of Rice Lake Quarter Horses in Hollandale, MN, which is about 55 miles from here. After two phone calls and a visit to her farm, a friendship quickly developed and turned into a partnership on all of her Paint horses.Ann has been raising Quarter horses “with extra chrome” since before the American Paint Horse Association was formed. She was also a personal friend of Hank Wisecamp, which resulted in numerous Wisecamp stallions and mares being used in her herd. Most of the horses we're now partners in, have pedigrees that are linebred to the studs: Skippers King, Skippa String, and Three Bars. We've read that Hank Wisecamp's horses were well known for their speed and athleticism, and his breeding philosophy was very similar to how we breed our cattle. Our goal is to produce foals with a well-mannered temperament, that have a smooth ride, and have the strength, structure, and stamina to handle any task the rider asks of them.

Our History

We are blessed to be able to work daily among the beauty that God has created. We don't know how one could look at the sequence of events in Phil and Rebecca's lives, and deny His existence and the faithfulness of His grace. Often when we think about the great things that have happened in our lives; we know that they would not be possible had we not gone through prior hard times or bad situations.In 2004, upon his return from his first tour of duty in Iraq, Phil started our Tarentaise herd by purchasing half of the JBK Acres (Gary James) herd. Our next growth spurt was in 2006, when 25 bred cows were purchased form Ray and Eunice Gienapp. Our Tarentaise bear the prefix AF, for Anderson Farm.In 2013, we decided to start a Red Angus herd for multiple reasons. One was that some of our comrades were turning their herd black, and we believe the red hair coat provides many advantages for a cow-calf operation. Another was, to offer sound Red Angus stock for customers to cross breed with Tarentaise, in an era when so many "self-proclaimed breeders" are simply picking by numbers (EPD's) while ignoring structural issues and maternal traits. Our Red Angus are registered under the name Little Cedar Beef, prefix LCB, as we realized that there may be a day in the future that the operation might be owned/operated by an heir whose last name isn't Anderson. And, our main pasture lays along the Little Cedar River, southeast of Little Cedar, IA.In addition to fertility, longevity, sound feet and legs, and a functional udder... calf care is a maternal behavior evaluated in our herd. Once we know we've got good ratings for maternal traits, we then evaluate individual feed efficiency and carcass merit. From 2016-2020, we worked with Green Springs Bull Test, to collect individual feed efficiency, carcass data, and pelvic measurements on our bulls. In 2020, we switched to working with Werner Feed Efficiency Testing Center, for evaluating those traits.More photos and information are available on our Facebook page, which can be viewed even if you don’t have a Facebook account.https://www.facebook.com/littlecedarbeef/

Breeding Program

First of all, our cattle are not perfect. But, we can't count the things that we would rather be doing, than helping a 2 year old heifer pair up with her new born calf. In today's economy, there is becoming less labor available and profit margins are getting tighter, which means less cattlemen are taking care of more cows. Speaking of profit margins, feed costs are one of the greatest expenses for almost every operation. This is why Little Cedar Beef has been actively selecting for highly maternal behavior since 2011 and feed efficiency testing bulls since 2016.Our cattle graze as many days as possible throughout the year, whether on pasture or fields of crop residue after harvest. Late in the winter and through the muddy spring season, we like to feed predominantly hay, but often find ourselves extending our hay inventory with baled cornstalks and a little supplemental protein and energy. We generally run 45 day breeding seasons, varying slightly with weather events and labor available. At calving, cows (including first calf heifers) are evaluated for “maternal drive”, udder quality, and docility.We rarely use bulls out of young cows, as we like bulls that were raised by “old” cows that have proven themselves by raising calves annually with no assistance. Our bulls have a sound athletic structure, so they can cover ground efficiently and hold up over time.

Our Red Angus cattle are an out cross to most of the breed today. They have absolutely zero influence of GAR Precision 1680, Mytty In Focus, or PCC Colorado Hobo. Only one cow family has a slight trace of B/R New Design 036 and Red Fine Line Mulberry. The presence of Canyon 4912 and Nebula are also fairly low in our herd. Prominent sire lines in our herd include: Rambo, Pay Day, Julian, Lancer, and Dominor. We've also incorporated (black) Angus sires like: EXT, Prime Time, Really Windy, Marshall Pride, and Black Cedar.Our Tarentaise cattle are held to the same standards as our Red Angus. They have a strong presence of Ignace, Isidore, Boby, and Belliqueax sire lines. We believe that in most environments, there is no better female for a commercial cattleman than a Tarentaise – Red Angus cross. If you're concerned with Altitude Sickness, Heart Failure, or Feedlot Heart Disease... all of our Tarentaise cattle are guaranteed to PAP score 41 or less at 7,000 ft elevation.We view epd's and genomic/DNA testing simply as extra tools in the box. We don't get too excited about either of them. If a calf doesn't survive to sale day... great epd's won't make it profitable. Last time we looked into DNA testing related to feed efficiency, it was only 50% accurate, which means 25% of the time the test would say an inefficient animal is efficient, and 25% of the time it would say and efficient animal isn't efficient.

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Contact

Little Cedar Beef - Phil Anderson
2741 390th St.
Osage, IA 50461
(641) 832-8874General email questions can be sent using this form.

Thank you

Thank you for contacting Little Cedar Beef. We will respond as soon as we're able.Phil Anderson
Little Cedar Beef
641-832-8874

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