RETSO HOLSTEINS Caring For & Breeding the Next Generation of Great Ones B
etween All-American announcements and Holstein Association USA releasing the top BAA herds for 2021, Retso Holsteins had a lot to celebrate ringing in the new year - nine cows nominated representing four breeds and a national ranking for BAA. And while these stats are impressive, they certainly aren’t the first and won’t be the last that Brian Oster and Cassie Chittenden have worked day in and day out for. Retso Holsteins, located in Schodack Landing, NY, is owned by Brian Oster and Cassie Chittenden. Brian’s family operated a 120-cow Holstein farm in central NY until 2014. Cassie’s family operates Dutch Hollow Farm two miles from Retso with 800 Registered Jerseys with a steeped history in breeding and genetics. Brian and Cassie met at the NY State Fair when Cassie was serving as the NY State Jersey
Queen and Brian was working for Kevin Ziemba. It wasn’t love at first sight then; however, Brian’s airport boredom led him to text the wrong ‘Cassie’ on Cassie’s birthday and a well struck conversation led to their belief that it must’ve been fate! They were married on the farm in June 2018. Brian and Cassie started milking in February 2016 with 6 cows, a portable milk pump, and bucket milkers. Each year, they have grown their operation by filling another section in the barn. Brian’s main role is overall cow and herd management along with client management including cow movement (incoming/outgoing), IVF/embryo work coordination, and overall day-to-day operations. Cassie oversees the calf and heifer program and manages all aspects associated with financial management. Retso also employs Bob and Serafina who assist with the day to day operations on the dairy; Bob with the cows and Serafina with the calves. Currently, they milk 90 cows spanning numerous breeds, with an RHA of 23,312M 3.9%F 3.3%P. The herd consists of 35 Excellent and 40 Very Good cows, and since they began in 2016, they have had 18 94-point, 17 93-point, and 10 89-point first lactation cows call Retso home, many of whom received those scores in their care. Over the last 5 years, 105 EX cows have made their home at Retso. These outstanding scores have also earned them a 113.5 BAA on 48 cows, which ranks them 19th nationally for herd size and 5th regionally. They have been in the top 20 nationally since Ms Ranson-Rail Beth-Red-ET (EX-91) was housed at Retso during the 2020 show season, ending in a Reserve All-American title. She was also the cover girl for the December 2020 Blondin Sires’ directory. Photo © Julie Ashton.
they began milking. “For us, a 113.5 BAA is impressive when 40% of our herd is 2-year-olds,” commented Brian. Along with a barn of high-scored animals, All-American nominations are also warranted. Since its inception, Retso has accumulated 33 All-American or Junior All-American nominations. In 2021, they added 9 nominations in four breeds. And for Brian and Cassie, these results are icing on top of a cake of hard work and determination. Retso was created with the intention of boarding cattle for others. “Our original goal was that we would be pleased to have 50% our animals and 50% board cows and to fill the barn half way in total. We started boarding cattle for close friends, including our mentor Kevin Ziemba. Along with him, he brought his contacts that he had previously boarded cattle with as well as his network. Over the years, our growth was simply due to word of mouth and producing results seeing that we didn’t start Retso’s active Facebook page until 2018. For the last year we have remained at having roughly 50 clients and 70 board animals in total. Our mentality has always been the same since day one, to treat each cow as if they were our own, and manage our client relations with transparency. Cows have always been our bread and butter; however, we have started to board more calves on milk and donor heifers over the last couple of years,” according to Cassie. Brian and Cassie expanded on how they work with the clients on cow management and breeding decisions: “Every client is different and takes different roles in the breeding and development of their cattle. We have some who are very hands-on, and others that are completely handsoff and have the viewpoint of ‘I pay you to handle all of it’ with the overarching common goal for the cow to excel. We try to manage expectations honestly, but
