DOTSON CATTLE COMPANY HOLDS DEEP ROOTS IN OKLAHOMA AND BRANGUS

Dotson Cattle Company

HOLDS DEEP ROOTS IN OKLAHOMA AND BRANGUS

by Deanna Nelson-Licking

In the Oklahoma land rush of 1893, James Woodson and John Morris staked land claims southeast of present-day Enid, Oklahoma. Their descendants have lived within a few miles of those exact properties ever since. The families have been involved in farming and livestock merchandising for over 100 years. James Woodson’s grandson, Stanley Dotson, married Oletta Morris, the granddaughter of John Morris and the couple carried on their grandparents’ agriculture beginnings. Stanley and Oletta operated a livestock hauling business for 40 years, farmed 1,500 acres of wheat and custom harvested wheat from Canada down to Texas. They also owned an agriculture trailer and equipment dealership and at one time owned a livestock auction barn business in Covington, Oklahoma.

Stanley’s son, Wes Dotson, is the fourth generation to farm the land and his children are raising the sixth generation now. Wes and his wife, Connie, have been married 44 years and raised two sons and a daughter. Son, Tucker, and his wife, Whitney, and children Drake and Bailey; son, Cody, and his wife, Chelsi, with their children Emmy and Declan; and daughter, Lezlie, and her children Lewy, Ellie and Weston, all live within 20 miles of their parents and everyone helps keep the operation running smoothly. “Everyone pitches in since we all have other jobs, but we work as a team to make things happen,” Wes said. “We have been in the same six-mile radius since the land rush.” “Well, we bought our first registered Brangus cattle in 1981, so 40 years in the business,” Wes said. “We bought 20 head from James Ottman of Rock Port, Missouri, and our first Brangus bull was purchased in 1980.”

From the 1950s to the early 1980s, the Dotsons ran English-bred cattle before Wes purchased his first Brangus. At the time, he chose the Brangus breed for their ability to perform on wheat pasture as stockers and their disease resistance qualities in the hot and humid Oklahoma summers.

“Over time we have required much more of our cattle

Three generations of Oklahoma cattlemen, Wes Dotson with his sons Tucker, Cody and Tucker’s son Drake. Wes Dotson back in his early days auctioneering cattle sales, something he has done for 40 years.

than these few traits, but they are the backbone of why we still believe in this breed. We have grown our focus to economic traits like fertility, consistency with performance, and carcass quality,” Tucker said.

At the time of his first Brangus purchase, Wes was also starting his auctioneering career in the seedstock business. So, he attended multiple Brangus sales which gave him opportunities to begin building his herd.

“We run about 225 females with around 100 of them being registered Brangus and Ultrablacks. We sell our bulls private treaty and occasionally through the Oklahoma Brangus Breeder’s Sale, of which I am the current auctioneer. I was in partnership with my dad, Stanley, for quite a while as my kids grew, we called it Wheat Belt Farms. My dad was on the International Brangus Breeders Association (IBBA) board in the 1980s and 90s but he is retired now. Tucker, Cody, and I run what is called Dotson Cattle Company,” Wes noted.

In 2012, the Dotsons began breeding Ultrablacks (Brangus x Angus) with the goal of taking the performance, muscle expression, disease resistance and longevity of the Brangus females and breeding them to high accuracy EPD Angus bulls. This cross has resulted in retaining the traits they demanded from the Brangus but with a more consistent and cleaner profile that their bull customers were requesting.

“About 80 percent of our females are Ultrablacks, we still like the Brangus and are believers in them, but in our country the Ultrablacks perform well and are very marketable,” Wes said. “Our cattle sure look a lot different from when we started, definitely more moderate and consistent.”

Today they use the top Brangus and Angus sires in the nation to artificially inseminate and embryo flush their females, thus producing some of the best Brangus and Ultrablack bulls in Oklahoma. They market about 20 to 25 bulls a year. “Within about an hour drive of us there are about 2,000 bulls for sale, so our bulls have to be really good to make it through the culling process,” Wes added. Replacement females are selected based on performance and disposition and are developed on wheat pastures before being artificially inseminated to proven, low birth weight sires. These heifers are pregnancy checked by ultrasound before being offered for sale. The Dotsons feel that generations of artificial insemination with the best bull genetics have paid off in impressive carcass ultrasound scores and overall performance. Wes has been AI’ing cattle for 35 years and Tucker for over 20 years. “Our first group of cows came with semen, so it’s been part

“OVER THE PAST 40 YEARS, of our program from the beginning. We believe artificial insemination is BRANGUS AND ULTRABLACK CATTLE the number one herd management decision we make every year,” Wes

HAVE BEEN THE FOUNDATION said. The Dotsons have also done a great

OF OUR REGISTERED AND deal of custom AI’ing for other cattle producers over the years.

COMMERCIAL HERDS DUE TO Carcass quality is also a must in their program today. They ultrasound

LONGEVITY, HARDINESS, AND not only their registered cattle but the commercial females they retain as DISEASE RESISTANCE.” well. This focus has been successful in creating cattle that bull and feeder buyers demand. “We have built long term relationships with our bull, bred heifer, and stocker buyers for decades now, so they know what they are getting when they buy our cattle,” Tucker said. Just last year, Tucker’s son Drake entered a pen of steers in the Oklahoma Junior Cattlemen’s Steer Feedout competition in 2020 and finished second with his three steers. His steers had a premium of $102.79 above the average cash price. The carcass data and feedlot performance were also collected on each animal and explained to the youth so they could use the (continued on page 20)

(continued from page 19) information to learn how to select and cull their herds.

“On the registered side of our business, 90% of our registered genetics go back to Brinks Brangus bloodlines, where the 675, 468, 55, and 881 cow families heavily influence our herd. Today we do occasionally purchase herd sires from GenePlus and CDP Partners to add new genetics, but most of our bull battery is retained out of our own program,” Tucker said.

The Dotsons were also very active in the International Junior Brangus Breeders Association (IJBBA), with all three of Wes’ kids showing cattle locally and nationally up until college. “For years our vacations were the national junior shows. Many memories were made during those shows and they created strong work ethics in our kids,” Wes said.

“Over the past 40 years Brangus and Ultrablack cattle have been the foundation of our registered and commercial herds due to a couple core reasons. Longevity, our females that are Brangus and Ultrablack influenced, produce deeper in age than other breeds with which we have had experience. Also, hardiness and disease resistance, which has allowed them to excel in the extreme weathers of heat and cold in Northwest Oklahoma. These few characteristics have been a given in our herd since the beginning,” Tucker added. “Over the past 20 years we have focused heavily on consistency, moderation with performance and carcass quality. We feel like we have been successful over the past 20 years in combining these qualities with the strong qualities of longevity and disease resistance in Brangus cattle to produce an outstanding set of registered and commercial Ultrablack females.” The Dotsons are truly a family operation with three generations all helping to keep things running smoothly. Today, their operation is 100% focused on cow-calf production. They usually start calving around the middle of January and go through the first half of March. Farming is performed just to produce wheat pasture for their stockers and to grow hay to winter the cattle. “Private treaty bulls, bred heifers and especially commercial feeder cattle are our final results. The adrenaline really flows when we take a load of steers to market,” Wes said. The region of Oklahoma that the Dotsons call home is called the “Wheat Capital of Oklahoma” for its immense grain storage facilities and while, at one time it was very agriculturally based, the number of family farms is diminishing. “I feel fortunate to still live out here. It’s a good life and we have had fun,” Wes said. Wes has had a successful career as a land and cattle auctioneer which has led to many opportunities to travel and see quality cattle. Tucker is director of sales at Ditch Witch and Cody is the general manager at Enterprise Grain. No matter the pressures and demands of their other jobs, raising quality cattle is still the most important thing to the families who comprise Dotson Cattle Company.