EDMONTON — Raising cattle in the forests around Quesnel, B.C., takes special management and dedication.
Long-time Limousin breeder Erin Kishkan is willing to take that challenge on. Kishkan, a mother of three, was recently elected president of the Canadian Limousin Association and hopes to help rebuild the breed’s strong reputation for carcass merit.
“We have some mandates we want to uphold, like being the top terminal sire and a carcass breed. We want to stay in touch with our commercial base because that is our bread and butter. We have to make sure we stay in tune with their needs and what the market is demanding,” she said in an interview at Farmfair held in Edmonton Nov. 8-12.
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She is the second woman to lead the organization and the youngest president ever.
“The amount of support that I have had, especially from the older men has been amazing,” she said.
During her tenure, the breed is launching a pilot project to test Limousin steers at a feedlot near Beiseker, Alta.
Consignors pay $500 for their feed and the cattle are finished to market weight using the Grow Safe feeding system. Owners then receive feedback on the dollar investment and results on each animal’s performance during the feeding period. When the animals are slaughtered at Cargill, carcass results are returned.
“It is following the calf all the way through the system,” she said.
She has been involved with the breed since she was a girl and talked her father, Rob Swaan, into helping her buy Limousin 4-H heifers.
“4-H heifers turned into pairs and after a while it turned into a herd,” she said.
Her family had a dairy and eventually broiler chickens with a quota of 28,000 birds until 2000. Now Limousins rule at her Pinnacle View farm.
More than a dozen years ago she was a student at Olds College studying agriculture production. She earned an agriculture business degree in 2004. At the same time, she was raising and showing cattle.
She bought two Limousin show heifers from Express Ranches in the United States. The company offered a scholarship to young people who bought cattle from them and successfully showed them. She went on to win the junior extreme challenge show at Canadian Western Agribition in Regina, which provides a scholarship.
Further money came from Express Ranches.
“The scholarship from that particular win was $10,000. It financed my education,” she said.
The family has about 80 cows and includes crossbreeding to create Lim-Flex, a Limousin-Angus cross.
“We’re dabbling a bit in the hybrids. We find our commercial producers that are addicted to their Angus find it an easier transition to a continental breed when they have some Angus in them.”
