Local Cattleman Gather This Weekend
Every year the North Park Stockgrowers host their Annual Meeting in Mid-March, before calving gets in full swing for most of the local ranchers.
The Annual Meeting hosts many local, district, state and even federal agencies to come and share important updates on the upcoming year and discuss issues in the agriculture industry. There are speakers who discuss topics such as water issues, mineral rights, calving problems, cattle selection, oil well drilling, minerals, AgrAbility, future of Agriculture, etc.
The Annual Meeting is a great day filled with lots of information and a great place to catch up with other folks in the (Jackson) County who you might not get to see very often. We start our meeting at 9:00 am and have a delicious lunch catered by the Wrangler’s 4-H Club. We adjourn at 4:00 pm.
The evening kicks off our Banquet with an Attitude Adjustment Hour, sponsored by Mountain Valley Bank. This year we will be enjoying a great BBQ catered by Cowboy Vittles and the North Park Stockgrowers sponsored by SandRidge Energy. We will enjoy music and Dancing by KVSR Sound Creations.
At the Banquet we present the winners of the North Park Stockgrowers/ North Park CattleWomens Scholarships. We give two $1000.00 scholarships to North Park Seniors. We also present our Business/Professional and or Special Award at our Banquet.
The North Park Stockgrowers is a local organization made up of many local ranchers and livestock producers as well as anyone who has interest in the livestock industry. The object and purpose of our Association is to champion, promote and protect the livestock industry. We sponsor and support county and youth organizations relating directly to the industry; cooperate with all national, state and other county organizations of the livestock industry and initiate, sponsor or promote any business, service, social event or informational program for the benefit of the Association and its members.
Currently we have a membership of 93 members. Our association was started on March 15th, 1899, when membership fees were only $1.00. There were 64 members in the Associations first year.
Beef production is a big part of North Park. Based on the Colorado Agricultural Statistics for 2014 there were about 24,000 cattle in Jackson County. In 1985 Kenneth Carlstrom donated his stock brand 7V to the North Park Stockgrowers, President Blaine Evans then thought of the idea to start a cowherd. Blaine felt the cowherd should be jointly owned by the North Park Stockgrowers and North Park CattleWomen. A committee was put together to create a set of procedures and policies as to how the cowherd would operate. A representative from each organization was selected to administer the cowherd. In the Spring of 1985 the first fifteen heifer calves were donated to the cowherd. All of the cows are kept on different ranches throughout North Park. In 2016 we had 16 head of cattle in the cowherd.
At the North Park Fair there is a class called the North Park Born & Raised class. For animals to be eligible to show in this class their steer must have been born and continually raised in North Park. The 4-H or FFA member who’s steer is chosen as the North Park Born & Raised champion wins a $500.00 Scholarship from the North Park Stockgrowers and the Producer of the steer receives a belt buckle from the North Park Stockgrowers.
In 2014 the North Park Stockgrowers and North Park CattleWomen decided that we would like to see more beef being served at the North Park School Lunch Room. So the two organizations decided that we would purchase a buy back steer from the North Park Fair and donate the beef to the School Lunch program. In 2014 & 2015 we purchased buy back steers and then in 2016 we thought it would be neat if the beef came from the North Park Cowherd, so a steer being raised by the Allnutt’s was processed and donated to the School Lunch Program.
Check out our North Park Stockgrowers Website and like us on Facebook.
