Page 16 - Aug242023

Committed to Quality The Midwest Cattleman · August 24, 2023 · P16

by Lilly Platts

Triangle H Ranch, located in Finney County, Kansas,
is a multi-generation cow/calf, feedlot, and farming
operation owned by the Hands family. Sam Hands, who
heads the family’s feedlot operation, met with the Grant
Company to discuss his side of the business and the
Simmental breed’s influence.

The Hands family found lowed the family to diversify.
their way to southwest- Crops include corn, grain sor-
ern Kansas as cowboys and ghum, soybeans, wheat, and
homesteaders. The Triangle alfalfa, and the cow herd is
H business was officially es- used to clean up crop residue.
tablished in 1974 as a part- Hands leads the cow-
nership between Fielding calf, stocker, and finishing
Hands and his sons, Sam, programs, continuing his life-
Greg, and Cedric. The fami- long passion for the industry. to many breeds and facets of we’ve made extensive prog-
ly farm started generations His daughter, Marisa Kleys- the industry. Hands recalls, ress in the Angus breed for
before the current business, teuber, has also stepped in as “We decided that with the size and production efficien-
and Sam Hands got his offi- a managing partner, becom- development of the feeding cy, so there’s just a nice bal-
cial start in the cattle busi- ing the fifth generation to industry, feeder cattle were ance with Simmental for
ness when he was just nine farm and raise cattle. more fitting for our opera- getting carcass traits and
years old, purchasing a calf. After learning to AI in tion. We brought in Hereford feedlot performance.”
Today, the farming and the 1960s, Hands became an bulls for cleanup, and were The All Purpose Index
cattle operation complement early adopter of this technol- AIing with Charolais and ($API) is a valuable tool for
one another and have al- ogy. This work exposed him Angus at first. As continen- Hands. “The reason I use it is
tal breeds started becoming because we are going to keep
more available we tested all females back in the herd.
of the different breeds, and Feedlot performance and car-
we really liked what we were cass traits are very important
seeing with Simmental.” to us, but at the same time
The Hands family set- we’re going to keep females
tled on a SimAngus cross, back and look at frame size,
and have since balanced that milk, longevity, and fertility,”
cross to maintain perfor- he explains. “It helps bring
mance in the feedlot and on traits together and makes
the rail. “We’ve followed the life a little simpler.”
numbers and done our own In the late 1990s Triangle
research, and can say that H began marketing cattle
heterosis works. We get a lit- through US Premium Beef,
tle more ribeye, a little lean- which provides full carcass
er carcass, a bit more quality, data for each animal. This
and looking at bottom line has been valuable for Hands’
net profit, SimAngus works customers. “One of the rea-
extremely well for us through sons they feed with us is that
the feed yard,” Hands says. they [our customers] want
SimAngus females have also data back on their cattle to
worked well in the cow herd. see if there are changes they
“When we brought the Sim- need to make,” Hands ex-
mental cross females into the plains.
herd the conception rates got Triangle H has become
a little better.” a trusted feeder thanks to
Hands explains that Sim- their dedication to data and
mental has paired well with unwavering commitment to
Angus for a number of rea- making sure cattle are well-
sons, from the volume of data cared-for. “Our natural niche
available to performance right now is that we have a
traits. “The thing we wanted good ongoing list of clientele
to pick up from Simmental who want to feed cattle here
was heterosis, and also the and get data back.”
dual-purpose traits which Helping customers im-
provide good maternal and prove has strengthened
terminal performance. Now these customer relation-