meet your neighbors Quality Females for the Future

By Julie Turner-Crawford

Ryan and Holly Shoffner want highly-fertile and highly-maternal females

The cattle industry is nothing new to Ryan and Holly Shoffner.

Ryan’s family raised cattle in the Camden County, Mo., area, and Holly’s family raised Angus and Maine Anjou in Arkansas.

The couple, who met as students at the University of Missouri-Columbia, are now working to build their own herd and reputation.

“I worked for Cargill out of college and lived in west central Illinois,” Ryan said.

“We moved back to (Holly’s) hometown in Northwest Arkansas, but we wanted to have our own farm.”

The couple left Arkansas and returned to Missouri. The move to their Montreal farm allowed the couple to start their cattle operation.

Ryan described the farm as “pretty run down,” over hayed and needed some TLC. It took some time before they could run cattle, but by 2021, Shoffner Cattle Company was in business.

They have carved out a pad- dock system for a 20-acre rotational grazing system, including the dozing of about 15 acres of wooded areas, with hopes to reclaim more land. They also acquired property across the road from their home that is cut for hay once a year, followed by strip grazing. In all, they have a total of 70 acres.

In addition to fencing and waterers, Ryan and Holly worked to improve soil fertility and no-tilled fescue and orchardgrass into the paddocks. They have also frost seeded clover.

When selecting a breed for their operation, the Shoffners opted for a breed they were familiar with.

“Angus is a good foundation, and you can breed anything to it to get what you want,” Holly said. “They are also highly marketable and have that good foundation.”

Shoffner Cattle Company currently runs 25 females and focuses production on high-quality females that are highly fertile, structurally sound and have eye appeal.

“You have to select good cattle, and you can’t go just with EPDs,” Ryan said. “Cows have to do their job first.”

Possessing the desired maternal traits is crucial for the Shoffners. They have an exclusively AI breeding program.

“We’re asking a lot from our cows from a maternal standpoint,” Ryan explained. “Not having bulls presents a set of challenges. Fertility is a big deal on our farm, and to get it done time after time without a clean-up bull, we need them to be highly maternal. We are also focusing on what a cow should look like, that phenotypical structure. Is she going to have the longevity we are going to require? We can’t be culling cattle out after just five years.”

Ryan and Holly added EPDs do have a place in their herd, but it’s not the main breeding factor.

“We want good EPDs for carcass merit, calving ease, and maternal traits, but we