Rancher says temperament factor for successful producers

By MONETTE TAYLOR | South Central Texas

October 25, 2001 -- Driving through the gates of the Eppright Ranch in Cost, you'd never believe that several months ago, before the August rains, the pastures were all brown, according to David Eppright, ranch manager.

Now, the fields are full of lush, green grass, and the cattle are in knee deep grass in the pastures.

"Our mother and father bought this place back in 1983, and we inherited it from them. It's a pretty simple operation. Our base herd is Brahman cattle ... straight Brahman ... primarily, J.D. Hutchins breeding.

"With that, we produce our own F1s. Mostly Hereford/Brahman F1s, but a few Angus/Brahman F1s. We keep most of those cattle and we put either a Charolais or an Angus bull back on those, and we feed all our own heifers and steers.

"We keep the F1 heifers for our own production, and it's been a pretty good program for us," said Eppright.

They recently started using Charolais bulls where they had been using Angus bulls for a number of years. Eppright said they were "kind of experimenting" to see which cattle they like best, although it is hard without a lot of carcass data.

The Brahmans are mostly registered, but the ranch did purchase commercial ones, earlier. Many of the cows are a combination of Angus, Hereford and Brahman or Angus, Charolais and Brahman.

"We've discovered over the years that temperament is probably one of the biggest factors that is probably overlooked, and it can make or cost you the most money. Cattle that don't have a good temperament...you just always have trouble with them.

"We don't try to tame each one, individually, but we try to keep each herd with a good temperament," said Eppright.

Throughout the ranch are pastures with cattle of various ages, and Eppright said they hope to pull all the calves in the next few weeks so the winter feeding will be easier and more economical.

"The old story for years has been that the Brahman cross cattle have always had a bad reputation because a lot of the feeders and a lot of the cattle buyers ... they can look at a pure bred, a half-blood or quarter-blood and they probably couldn't tell the difference.

"It's getting better. There's a lot of discounts, when you go up north. When they show too much ear or too much crest on their neck and show too much Brahman characteristics, the feed yards, especially in the Northern areas, tend to shy away from them, especially, in the fall, because there's a lot of prejudice about that," said Eppright.

Years ago, the reputation was that Brahmans couldn't acclimate to the cold weather, so the breed was classified as a risk factor for feed lots, said Eppright.

The ranch has been retaining ownership since the late 1980s, and does all feeding, locally.

"Since the early '90s, the weather patterns have changed. Probably since the late '80s, actually. Since '96, it's just been really severe. We've gone from drought to flood, to drought to flood ... . It seems we're getting two rains a year and each of them is over 14 inches," he added.

He said it has made ranching more difficult, and between 1996 and 2001, their ranch was probably over stocked, but they decided not to sell good cattle at "slaughter cattle prices."

Eppright's brother, Richard, lives in Shiner and is retired from Graham Land and Cattle and has a lot of insight to feeding and price protection for the ranch. John lives in Houston and is a network administrator and assists the ranch in that area.

"I'm the full-time brother, well, the maintenance man. I think that is really what I am. You get to work cattle a few weeks of the year, and the rest are spent fixing fence and chasing water leaks," said Eppright.

As long as the grass and grazing are good, the Epprights feed their own cattle and haven't sold any of their cows in years, he said. They feel that since they put so much effort into the calves, healthwise and genetically, there are few markets that will pay them for their production costs.

"Most of our cattle end up at Sam Cane's in Corpus. We have a good reputation with their buyer ... I assume ... since they keep buying them every year," said Eppright,

"Our main focus is not really selling breeding cattle. It's primarily feeder cattle. Ever now and then, we do open the gate and sell some of our better cows."

Ranching has been in the Eppright family since the 1800s and as Eppright says, "It's a business, but it can also be a way of life.

"We don't always do it the right way, but we try."