The_Ledger_Winter_2022

Meet the Rancher: From Australia to Minnesota

BY HANNAH GILL, CONTRIBUTING WRITER

W hen Gary and Terry than 15 years ago, they contacted Peter and Jeanette Stebbins of the Australian Lowline Cattle Association. They were merely looking for embryos or semen after reading an article about the Stebbins’ line of Austra lian Lowlines, never suspecting that would initiate a 10-year partnership and allow the Gilberts to import top genetics into their already-established Angus seedstock operation. “I was really interested in the pure ness of the breed,” Gary Gilbert says. “The American Angus are large, and we know that they’re not pure any more – they’re not the original Angus – and it intrigued me to have some thing that was pure.” The breed’s purity came from the Australian Lowlines being involved in an extensive research project, starting in 1929 when top Aberdeen bulls were imported to Australia from Canada. From there, the herd pro gressed, became a closed herd and was eventually divided into three groups based on yearling growth rate – highlines, which had higher growth rates; lowlines, which had lower growth rates; and control lines, which were randomly selected. After 15 Gilbert of Hermantown, Minn., first started to pur sue lowline cattle more

years, the lowlines were about 30 per cent smaller than the highlines, but efficiency was same for both groups. In 1993, the lowline herd was sold on the open market to seven purchasers, one of whom was Jeanette Stebbins. Jeanette was known for promot ing the breed overseas and, in 2006, she and her husband made a trip to the United States to visit 13 different states and 18 different cattle opera tions in an attempt to find someone like-minded to partner with so that their genetics could further the breed in the United States. The Australians left Minnesota feel ing confident that the Gilberts were who they were looking for and the Ausmerica partnership was created, with cattle imported to the United States from Australia in 2006, 2009 and 2013. “Ardrossan Jamberoo was a bull that we imported; Genevieve was a bred heifer that we imported; and then there were four cows that came over,” Gilbert says. “We were very, very fortunate to have the partnership we had with Jeanette and Peter Steb bins, and the quality of cattle that they have in that Ardrossan line.” The partnership dissolved in 2016, as the Stebbins were nearing retire ment. In the dispersion, the Gilberts purchased a number of fullblood

American Aberdeen. Today, they raise and sell fullblood American Aber deen, percentage American Aberdeen as well as registered Angus cattle, last year marketing a combination of around 30 bulls and 75 bred females. “We’ve done very extensive embryo transfer and flushing of our cows, along with AI breeding,” Gilbert says. “We’ve tried to stay on the very top of that end of technology. The cattle we imported for the most part were 5, 6, 7, 8 years of age and, be fore you know it, they get old on you.” Terry, Gary and daughter, Jillayne, have been raising American Aberdeen cattle since 2006 when they created the Ausmerica partnership with Peter and Jeanette Stebbins.

Continued on page 18 

Imported cattle from 2013, turned out to grass in Minnesota.

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