The Rural Voice, 2003-09, Page 16Oa
The view from
Top Meadow
Kym and Carole Anthony and manager
Mike Geddes have a different view for the
future of the beef industry
Story and photos by Keith Roulston
Mike Geddes, Top
Meadow Farms farm
manager, has been part
of the farm's tremenddik
growth for the past five
years.
The view at Top Meadow farms is spectacular, about
as spectacular as the growth this Limousin breeding
operation has shown in the past decade. Across a
valley to the east is the Blue Mountain. Across another to
the west is the Niagara Escarpment. Four miles to the north
is Georgian Bay.
Unlike many farming operations, the setting is not
accidental but plays an important part in this farming
operation because it was the view that attracted Kym and
Carole Anthony to buy the farm.
As a young boy growing up in the Montreal area, Kym
spent summers visiting and working on his grandparents'
dairy farm and developed a love for farming. When he had
children of his own, the Toronto resident wanted them to
have the same opportunity to spend time in the country and
learn where their food came from. So he and Carole bought
the farm near Heathcote in Grey County and Top Meadow
was born.
What's happened in the past 10 years, however, is a
story of growth that has made Top Meadow a leading
source of beef genetics in North America and innovation
that's creating its own brand of meat products.
The farm started as a commercial beef operation and
after much research, a Limousin bull was selected as herd
sire, explains Mike Geddes, the farm manager. From there
12 THE RURAL VOICE
select Limousin females were accumulated. After the
numbers were built up, an embryo transfer program was
begun.
As the farm grew the need for fresh genetics in the
North American Limousin gene pool became, apparent to
farm management.
"That led us to go to France, the origin of the Limousin
breed to import semen and embryos," says Geddes. The
first imports came two years ago.
'About 20 years after the limousin cattle came to North
America (breeders) added the black gene and the polled
gene," Geddes explains. "Through time the look of the
Limousin animal has changed. In our opinion they lost
some of the carcass traits and overall performance that they
possessed when they were first introduced in North
America. We've reintroduced the original well -muscled
Limousin but with sound structure and easy disposition and
now we're seeing hybrid vigour within breed. It's
increasing performance and freshening the pedigree."
The move has benefitted the farm, says Geddes. "Our
bulls arevirtually an out -cross to standard North American
pedigrees and have great performance."
The new genetics have changed the look of the Top
Meadow Limousins. "They're rounder muscled and
not as sharp -fronted."
When they show animals in three or four big shows a
year, that look can put their animals at odds with other
cattle in the classes but that hasn't hurt. Top Meadow
animals have won nearly everything there is to win in
North America.
"We're taking these cattle to show the crowd, not so
much the judges, where our breeding program is."
And the reception has been very good by commercial
cattlemen and purebreed operators alike, he says. "They've
got volume, they've got muscle, they've got bone, they've
got performance. As far as we're concerned it's been a very
welcomed change. The last two years at our production
sale the high sellers have been some of our out -crossed
genetics."
The success of the breeding program is witnessed by
sales of cattle coast to coast in Canada, all over the U.S.
and exports of embryos and semen to Europe and South
America. Geddes has squeezed in the interview while
preparing for a visit from a group of beef producers from
Florida, where they annually sell 12-15 animals to
Tallahassee -area fanners. The visit includes customers who
have bought at past sales and their neighbours.
"A lot of our marketing is word of mouth," Geddes
says. "This year 70 per cent of the bulls we sold were to
neighbours or family of existing commercial producers."
As an exporter, Top Meadow hasn't gone unaffected by
the closed borders following the discovery of one cow with
BSE in Alberta in May.
"You know the last two years in our production sale
(held on the farm) we sell roughly 120 animals and 45-50
of those animals go to the U.S.," he says. "We sell a lot of
show females and breeding bulls to purebred operations
and commercial operations throughout the U.S. Take 50
animals and they'll average $5,000 a piece — it doesn't
take long to do the math. It's going to be a major economic
loss."
Still, he says, "We're going ahead with our sale