Ranching Returns Podcast

Brian Munger along with his wife and six kids run a diverse ranching business in Nebraska. They own and operate their own cow herd managed in a low input, regenerative model, they manage a ranch and cowherd for a non-operating land and cattle owner, they custom develops bulls for the PCC Nebraska bull sale and they direct market meat off their farm. Listen in to hear his ranch story and how they'v...

Ryan Usmar manages Furracabad Station in Australia and is part of the start of Pharo Cattle Australia. Listen to hear about their cattle station, their rotational grazing system, and how they brought PCC genetics to Australia.  Resources Mentioned:  https://klrmarketing.com.au/  https://www.rcsaustralia.com.au/  As always, check us out at Herd Quitter Podcast on Facebook and In...

Over the years Doug transitioned from a high input commodity dairy farm to a low input grazing based operation with a stop as an organic crop farmer in between. Hear how he made those transitions and how his focus has never been on dollars first but on stewarding his land resource and improving his soil. Even with a focus on improving soil, his farm has remained profitable and his lifestyle has im...

Today Kit shares how we can reduce the work required to run a ranch and make it more enjoyable! If a business isn't enjoyable it's not sustainable and there are some very simple changes that we can make to simplify our ranch businesses. The neat thing is that typically profitability comes along with these simple changes. As always, check us out at Herd Quitter Podcast on Facebook and Instagram as...

Ed Bezett came to our farm in 1981 as a foreign exchange student and wasn't afraid to tell my grandpa that he thought there was a better way of running our beef, sheep and cattle operation here in Goodhue, MN. This began a decades long journey to where we are today of being a low-input, pasture based production model and today we talk with Ed about his families farm in New Zealand and his time her...

In part 2 of our conversation with Seven Sons we talk to Blaine Hitzfield, CEO of Distribution for Seven Sons. He goes into depth on the transition from commodity production and marketing farm to a direct, diverse and profitable farm! He shares practical tips for people just starting down the path of direct to consumer marketing and for people who are well into their marketing journey!  Resou...

Seven Sons is a farm and food brand from Indiana that has focused on raising and marketing grass finished and pasture based meat products. Today we talk to Blake Hitzfield, Chief Ranching Officer for Seven Sons. He talks about the transition of the farm from a 1500 acre conventional crop and hog production model to the 500 acre grass finished beef, pastured pork and laying hen operation today. He...

Doug Ferguson is a cattle marketing expert, blogger under his blog https://mrcattlemaster.com/ and contributor to Beef Magazine in his column Dougs Market Intel. He has also built a stocker/backgrounder business of his own in southeast Nebraska. We talk about how sell/buy marketing allowed him to build a profitable business and get into the details of the sell/buy marketing process. Forgive the au...

This is our second conversation with Jim Howell, CEO of Grasslands LLC. Check out episode 13 of the Herd Quitter podcast to learn about Jim's story, experience and how he started Grasslands LLC. Today however, we dig in deep into three very different and unique ranching environments where he has implemented Holistic Management successfully at scale! First in the Northern Great Plains in western So...

I might be biased, but this is my favorite episode yet. Every time I talk with my dad about the history of our farm I learn something new! In today's episode, I sit down with my dad and get into the details of how our farm came to be what it is today. From our roots as a progressive, high input crop, beef and dairy operation to our transition to a low input beef grazing enterprise and all the stop...

Robert Pulliam has a history of diversified farming in Missouri, beef production in Iowa, 12 years in ministry, and then found himself managing a ranch in the mountains of Western Colorado. After all his experience in agriculture, it was a challenge to transition to a low input, high profit enjoyable ranching business model. But several years into the transition, he has no regrets. In this weeks e...

Whatever your goals in life, career or business plans, very rarely are we able to accomplish much entirely on our own. Building a network around you of people to bounce ideas off, share work load, and to learn from is essential and Kit Pharo realized this necessity early on in his career. In this episode, Kit talks about his start with 5 or 6 local ranchers and how he has grown his network to tens...

In part 2 of our two part conversation with Jim we discuss the differences in environment, and management of grasslands in arid Western environments and Midwest and Eastern high moisture environments. We discuss how every location has it's own advantages and disadvantages and how to work with them. Jim shares grazing infrastructure and management tips and wisdom and wherever you ranch there is som...

Jim Gerrish is an experienced grazing expert and well known author of Management Intensive Grazing, and Kick the Hay Habit. In part 1 of a 2 episode series we discuss the expense of making hay and how to reduce hay making through extending your grazing season. We also talk about how to manage your grazing during drought, which many of us across the country are in today! Resources Mentioned: Kick t...

August had his eyes set on building a profitable angus cattle operation operating in the old school way of high inputs and labor. After getting started he quickly realized it wasn't as easy as it seems. A coworker recommended he look up Gabe Brown, Greg Judy, and Ray Archuletta and from there is regenerative grazing farm journey began. Today, he and his wife Katelyn are taking their family land ba...

Wes ranches in the Chihuahua Desert of Southeast New Mexico. Of all the people I have talked to, his environment might be the toughest to run cattle in. It's dry on an average year, and he's currently in the 3rd year of a drought. Grass is in short supply and his cattle have to travel several miles to water when they aren't out eating brush and cactus to survive. We discuss how he got into ranchin...

Kit and I discuss the role that debt plays in a ranch business. It certainly can have a place to help a business when used wisely. However, Kit believes, and I agree, that it's not a necessity and that freeing yourself from debt can lead to a more enjoyable business with more peace of mind. He talks about what he thinks may be acceptable uses of debt, and what is never ok to borrow to own.  A...

Wally joins us for a second week to discuss the Bud Williams sell/buy livestock marketing concept. We discuss how it is applied to stocker enterprises and cow/calf enterprises. We get more in depth on a few of the things we discussed last week like understanding the value of different classes on cattle. This is one you'll want to listen to more than once to fully absorb the information he shares....

Wally Olson says the primary thing an individual needs to be concerned with is profit. In this episode, Wally discusses the many things he has found to help ranches increase profitability. He shares how he implemented them in his ranching career both working for and operating his own ranch.  Resources Mentioned: Ranching for Profit How Not to Go Broke Ranching - Walt Davis Knowledge Rich Ranc...

Bobby Thomans family got out of the cattle business long before he wanted to bring it back, leaving it to him to research and determine the right course of action for his cattle enterprise. He was intentional about selecting a type of animal that fit his goals for his ranch and worked hard to build both a direct to consumer meat market as well as a seedstock business. He has since become a coopera...

Joshua and Tara never planned on going back to the family ranch. They were told it wasn't a viable option, and Tara wasn't sure that's the life she wanted. But after a number of experiences and connections made them realize that they could make a living on the ranch and they began to understand the connection between food and our human nutrition and mental health, both Tara and Joshua agreed that...

Kit Pharo and I discuss heifer development programs, and how a low cost program can make heifer development a profitable enterprise despite the percent bred. We also discuss how a low cost development program produces heifers that will thrive on the ranch for many years to come and how high input heifer development programs can result in unintended consequences such as early fall out rates, and hi...

Jim Howell is co-founder and CEO of Grasslands LLC. In this podcast we talk to Jim about his family ranch in the mountains of Colorado, his experience traveling the world and the country visiting ranches and how he implemented principles learned on those trips onto his family ranch. We then get into a discussion on his management company managing hundreds of thousands of acres from the south Flori...

Logan Pribbeno, manager of the Wine Glass Ranch in Southwest Nebraska, along with his family have developed a business around forage harvesting where the primary method of forage harvesting is not done with choppers, balers, haybines, and mergers but rather with livestock. He discusses how they keep their business adaptable, where the dominant class of livestock varies based on the current market...

Jenny Drake and her husband Darrin have built a diverse pasture based ranch business in Tennessee. Faced with challenges from shortages of labor, to steep slopes, endophyte infected fescue and extreme summer heats, it's fascinating to hear how they have developed genetics that thrive in their environment and a successful direct market business. She also discusses their unique internship program th...