Breeder Profile - Three Hills Ranch
By Brenda Black
Q: How did your operation get started and where are you located?
Through hard work and a lot of heart, David Morehead started building an agricultural empire at 16 years of age. His first venture was a partnership with an elderly widow to manage her cattle and hog farm, which grew ten fold by the time he graduated high school. At her passing, the family immediately sold out, leaving Morehead to start over. He started renting again, then bought some land, only to lose it during the 1978 farm crunch.
In 1982, with a young family and $550 bucks in his pocket, he began his operation a third time with a herd of Angus and crossbred cattle. “In 1990, my neighbor D.L. Stevens, who at one time had the largest registered Hereford herd in Iowa, downsized.” Morehead bought his cows and made another significant expansion with the Jim Baker herd, providing decades of elite Hereford genetics.
About 12 years ago, with family returning to the operation, Morehead needed to increase income without increasing the landbase.
That’s when Three Hills Ranch in Bernard, IA pivoted from a commercial herd to a Horned Hereford seedstock business. Acquisitions from renowned breeders like Holden, Cooper, Johansen and Van Newkirk have influenced the operation’s gentle, rugged and productive genetics conditioned for longevity.
Q: When and how do you market cattle from your ranch each year?
The Morehead family hosted their 5th Annual Registered Horned Hereford Bull and Female Sale in December in a brand new facility on their ranch. So new that Morehead was still working on it in early December during the National Finals Rodeo, which he has historically participated in as a professional rodeo stock contractor. “It was the first time since the National Finals Rodeo moved to Las Vegas in 1985, that I didn’t go,” he said. Come sale day, 270 lots were penned and displayed with over 300 people in attendance to bid and buy Three Hills Ranch genetics.
Registered cattle aren’t the only product offered, though. Black baldy heifers by Three Hills Ranch Herefords are marketed for breeding stock, and steers have sold private treaty to the same private cattle feeder for the last five years. Anything not sold off the ranch is retained through the feedyard and sold on the rail. The marketing plan going forward includes developing and maintaining those loyal auction and private treaty transactions, while expanding reach.
Q: What is one unique way you serve your customers?
“We are doing a little more with our genetics on the carcass side, hoping people who feed cattle sired by our bulls will get premiums on the rail.” Morehead said. “Horned Herefords have a lot to offer, so that part is easy.”
“We use our own genetics so when our customers buy something, it is not a guess on how they will perform. We know maternally and in the feedlot both,” Morehead said. Three Hills Ranch has a buy-back heifer program with their top bull buyer, and is exploring options with local sale barns to create a broader buy-back program that will benefit the ranch, the barn and Three Hills Ranch customers.
Q: What management strategies have provided the greatest benefit to your operation and why?
“My people all know how to do everything,” Morehead said of his family. “I let them make decisions from a young age, so everybody knows how to do everything in management and skills.” His son Jake, grandsons Sam & Cade, and wife Marla all contribute to the daily management and operations, along with a hired-hand. Sharing the load is essential to ensuring the various agriculture and equine entities the family operates all run smoothly.
Q: If your ranch could be known for one thing, what would you want it to be and why?
“Fairness and integrity,” Morehead said, “That’s the goal with customers, whether in rodeo business or the livestock business. It’s the unconditional guarantee on our bulls.”
“Three Hills Ranch is built on decades of resilience, honesty, loyalty, and respect for the land, the cattle, and the people who depend on them,” said Morehead’s daughter Lindsey. “Dad’s mindset has never been about doing things halfway. His motto, ‘go big or go home’ is more than a saying – it is a way of operating. He studies, he puts in the time, he refines, and he commits fully, always pushing toward excellence rather than settling for adequacy.”
Q: What new innovations or opportunities are you looking to pursue for your operation in the next 1 to 3 years?
To stay relevant in the industry, Morehead plans to incorporate more social media marketing for each business. Specific to the cattle operation, he intends to do more intensive AI and ET work in the herd, including dividing the cowherd into groups of 20 and using selective matings to create a more uniform and higher quality calf crop.