 |
The Black Belted Galloway ... The Dun Belted Galloway West Rutland, Vermont |
||
|
Richard C. Anderson (802) 438-2346 |
Bruce D. Anderson (802) 438-2052 suebru@sover.net |
Robert Stimson (802) 438-5278 |
|
|
|
The Black Belted Galloway ... The Dun Belted Galloway West Rutland, Vermont |
||
|
Richard C. Anderson (802) 438-2346 |
Bruce D. Anderson (802) 438-2052 suebru@sover.net |
Robert Stimson (802) 438-5278 |
|
Bolebec Dun Controller |
We
were sitting in the farm office after the NAILE show last November, when
Vance Oatley asked me if I could relate how we got into the Dun Belted
Galloways that have played such a major role in developing our bloodline.
Vance believes, as do others, that the Dun has a slightly different conformation
than the Black. In our own herd that difference has narrowed considerably
since we brought over the Dun bull Controller.
To go back, we bought our first Belted Galloways in the late '70s and ran into a number of problems stemming from our inexperience and my limited knowledge; I guess you could say we started the hard way. To improve my grasp, I called Meda McCord to seek counsel. She put me in touch with General VanFleet, Richard Stein, and Alfred Chatfield. They were helpful and encouraging, and soon Ingrid and I were off to Aldermere, where we spent two days with Mr. Chatfield and made our first purchase of two animals, the cow Violet (out of Michael, and the best we had until she died after stepping into a woodchuck hole) and the bull Carlos. As I acquired insight from hard experience, I decided to develop our own bloodline by going to Scotland and England in 1987, where at Mr. Chatfield's suggestion, I visited the herds of Flora Stuart, George Sproat, Helen Hamilton and Christopher Marler. I also attended my first Royal Highland show, and it was there that I walked the show line and came across a powerful Dun Belted Galloway bull, Bolebec Dun Champion, two-time winner and champion of the Royal Highland, the Royal and the Greater Yorkshire. To my eye he had a powerful body, heavily muscled and straight -- also a heavy, squared-off rear quarter and a broad and somewhat shorter head than I had seen in the U.S. -- he epitomized the breed standard. I then visited Bolebec in Buckinghamshire and saw a nine-month-old bull -- Controller, who a year later would win the junior championship at the Royal Highland and had the same powerful qualities. This occasioned a very simple idea: what if I crossed these Duns into my small herd in Vermont? This idea took hold, and I went back to Scotland in 1988 and bought Controller and a Dun heifer from Christopher Marler of Bolebec, and four two-year-old Black heifers from George Sproat of Boreland. It was clear to me that this cross was the move to make. We brought the animals over in November 1988. Now, our trip backward in time. Sometime during the late '40s, a mismarked Dun Belted Galloway heifer bred at Boreland by Faed Sproat was sold to Murray Usher, Cally Estate, Gatehouse. She was sold after a year or two to Will Hogg, Inc., next to Creetown. When bred to Black Belted Galloway bulls, she had well-marked Dun Belted heifer calves four years running. They were then sold back to Faed Sproat of Boreland. At Boreland, Mr. Sproat bred these Dun heifers back to Black and Dun Belted bulls and founded the Boreland Dun Belties. In 1978 Christopher Marler then purchased four Dun Belted females from Boreland and the bull, Guardsman, and founded the Bolebec herd. The infusion of the Black Galloway bulls at the end of the war, the continued exposure to Dun Belted Galloway bulls and subsequent establishment of the Bolebec Dun Galloways, started a line from which Anderson Hill has continued. Recently we purchased 50% of the bull Boreland Golden Oriole and last year, 50% of Bolebec Dun Concord, both standing in England. We maintain worldwide semen rights to the bulls; they cannot be exported. Please visit Anderson Hill Farm. You will see the animals all over the hills, where they do so well. We all enjoy showing the farm and the animals. --
Dick Anderson
Click each photo for larger image. |
Anderson Hill Dun cow with Black heifer calf |
|
Bolebec Dun Concord, Buckinghamshire, England |
|
Anderson Hill Nashua, Grand Champion, 1995, 1996 |
|
Anderson Hill Robert, Grand Champion 2000 |
|
Anderson Hill Farm, Best Six Head at NAILE 2000 |