From Our Blog

Cattle Farm Tour

This week on The Land Show I interviewed three different cattle farmers in our state to look at different types of cattle operations.  First, I interviewed Jeffrey Hardy a part time and new cattle farmer from Tallapoosa County.  Jeffrey is a Land Agent with our company, Southeastern Land Group.  Jeffrey and his wife, Amanda live behind our office on Hwy. 280 in Dadeville.  I own some clear cut property behind their house.  Jeffrey approached me around a year and a half ago about maybe clearing up around 35 acres of this cut area and running some cows on it.  So, after a lot of hard work by Jeffrey and some of his friends, we had around twenty five acres in grass and under fence.  A few months back, we bought six bred Heifers(not pure bred; just good looking black cows).  Three have calved; so, we now have nine cows and are expecting three more.  We will buy a bull in the spring and maybe sell a couple of our steers next year.  Right now we are not looking to make any money.  We hope to make a little money by 2017.  It has been fun and for someone like me who does not have a lot of time to look out after cows, Jeffrey has been a great partner to have in our fledgling venture.  Jeffrey grew up around cattle farming with his Grandfather and has been in our business for around ten years.  So, if you are looking for land in Tallapoosa or surrounding counties, Jeffrey is your man.

Robert King, 5th Generation Cattle Farmer, stands in front of his Black Angus Cows

The next Cattle farm that I talked about on the Land Show was the King Cattle farm in Clay County, where the King family has been raising cows for four generations.  Robert King, Associate Broker with Southeastern Land Group owns part of the original farm and has been running cows on his father’s place for as long as he can remember.  Robert got out of the business for a couple of years while he established himself as a leader in Poultry and Cattle farm sales in Alabama and Georgia.  Robert has just bought a little herd of about thirty cows from some friends in the South Alabama, the McCreary’s.  These are really nice Brangus cows (see the pictures on TheLandShow.com).  Robert, through his training both on the Farm and at Auburn has a laser focus on buying and breeding genetically superior cows that will produce today and will produce offspring that will produce even greater yields in the future.  If you are thinking about a large cattle or poultry operation anywhere in Alabama or Georgia, Robert is the man to talk to.  You can check him out at: selandgroup.com.

The last farm that I visited and talked about on The Land Show was the Dansby Farms in Lowdnes and Montgomery Counties.  Michael and LaDon Dansby farm about 200 acres on the original family place in Lowndes County and they have expanded their operation to include a beautiful 878 acre farm just across the county line in Montgomery  County on the Alabama River.  Michael is running around 150 cows on the Lowdnes County place and he is growing a herd on their newly acquired place that I helped the Dansby’s  buy, by brokering the deal through our company, Southeastern Land Group.  Michael’s family’s cattle farming story is similar to that of many leading Cattle farming families in Alabama.  Michael’s grandfather was a railroad Engineer, who started off with just a few cows.  Michael’s father grew the business, while practicing law also.  Now, Michael and Ladon have taken the family cattle business to a new level.  Soon, they will be running four to five hundred cows on their two farms and building an even greater legacy for their children.  The Dansby’s have focused on big framed cattle that will produce both at the sale barn and in the type of calves they will produce(see the pictures on TheLandShow.com).

Michael Dansby in front of his Family’s Cattle Farm in Lowndes County

I think the most heartening thing to me in thinking about my interviews with these three different Cattle farmers is that they are all relatively young.  It is great to see younger men building a family heritage by the sweat of their brows and their God given ingenuity.  Who says that the American Dream is dead.  It is not dead; you only need to look to rural Alabama to find families like these who are building a future for their families while helping to strengthen the already healthy Cattle industry here in the U.S.