Pollard Farms: The Cow Families Behind the Program

One of the things I enjoy most about this business is the people you get to know along the way.

I've known Jeremy Leister for quite a while, and I always enjoy the opportunity to catch up and talk cattle with him. Jeremy manages Pollard Farms in Waukomis, Oklahoma, and when you start talking about the Pollard program, it doesn't take long before the conversation gets back to one thing - the cow families.

That seems especially appropriate as Pollard Farms prepares for its annual female production sale on September 19.

Most Angus producers are familiar with the Pollard Farms name. Dr. Barry and Roxanne Pollard have spent more than three decades building a program recognized across the Angus breed for producing cattle that combine strong numbers, phenotype, and, most importantly, usefulness.

But it started pretty simply.

Barry grew up in Hennessey, Oklahoma, where his father taught vocational agriculture, and his mother was a schoolteacher. He went on to become a board-certified neurosurgeon, returning home to Oklahoma and opening his medical practice in Enid in 1982.

Ten years later, he purchased several bred heifers and yearlings and started an Angus herd.

A lot has changed since 1992, but I think one of the strengths of Pollard Farms is that the basic objective has remained pretty straightforward: to produce better cattle that can help their customers be more profitable.

Jeremy and I talked about the depth of this year's female offering, and there is certainly plenty to talk about. But something Pollard Farms hears repeatedly from its bull customers says more about the program than any sale listing ever could.

They buy Pollard bulls because they believe in the cow families standing behind them.

I think that's pretty powerful.

We spend a lot of time in the seedstock business talking about the bull and rightfully so. A bull can influence a lot of calves in a hurry. But behind every good bull is a cow, and behind the most consistent breeding programs are generations of females that have proven their ability to work.