Cows and Equipment for the Beginner.

What happens if the economy collapses? If you’ve been worried about that and taking steps to become self-sufficient, you’ve probably bought some land, have a garden, and made some plans for your family’s survival. What about meat and dairy needs? If you are like us, you’ve probably considered raising cattle to be too difficult to learn and far too time-consuming, and therefore have dismissed the possibility. That leaves a gap in your survival plan which you may hope to fill by hunting wild game. That’s a problem, especially if lots of other people are doing the same thing. For those new to large livestock, we believe we have a solution to the problem of learning how to raise cattle.

The Cow Kit is a package of cattle and equipment that will get you started raising cattle and set you up for successful self-sustaining meat and dairy production while greatly reducing your time investment getting started and maintaining your herd. The kit contains gentle triple-purpose, heritage-breed cows, cattle-handling equipment, corral system, basic hand-milking equipment, books, instruction, and lore from our recent experience getting into the cattle business, These kits are designed for people who have little knowledge of

cows. If you grew up on a ranch, can rope a calf and brand it on the ground, this kit is probably not for you. If, however, you don’t have that ability, but you are nervous about the economy (or flat out expect a collapse like we do), and would like to raise cattle as part of your self-reliance strategy, this kit may be for you.

The Cow Kit includes everything you’ll need to get started raising cows for your own meat and dairy production, including the cows. While there is some preparation you must do prior to delivery, when we deliver your kit and assemble it with you, you’ll be up and running in a day. The kit is designed to minimize your direct exposure to cows when they are most agitated and your risk of injury is likely the greatest. The cows are gentle and hand-selected for each kit based on their temperament, and they produce healthy, delicious beef and milk. The equipment is topnotch, rugged, well designed, and capable of handling any type and size of cow or bull. The milking equipment will provision you for hand milking. The books will teach you about cattle, cattle health, pasture, grazing, diet, handling and stockmanship. We will work side-by-side with you to set up the equipment and provide you on-site instruction and introduction to your new animals. We will visit you before your kit arrives to pre-determine where the corral system will be installed and ascertain the preparations that are needed before delivery.

The Price.We’ll tell you up front; brace yourself, it’s expensive. In exchange for not making you wade through pages and pages to find the price, we ask that after you recover from the shock you’ll continue reading so that you understand the value you’ll receive and can make an informed decision about whether the

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

...when we deliver your kit and assemble it with you, you’ll be up and running in a day.

cost is commensurate with the value. The price is $37,800, delivered, and set up with instruction provided.

You must be asking yourself how in the world a cow kit can cost that much. Please read on and we’ll explain. For your money - and no doubt it is a lot of money - you’ll receive a lot. When we ran that figure by our rancher friends, they blinked, thought for a moment, and usually said something like, “about the price of a new pickup truck. That seems reasonable.” Reasonable? Well, yes, actually. If you knew what to buy and where to buy it, you could buy your own cows and equipment for about the same price and go it alone, and if you have the time and knowledge to start from scratch and do all that,

you don’t need us. You may not believe it, but starting from scratch will by all means be a full time job on top of whatever else you have to do. Do you have that much available time? We believe the time to prepare is short, which is why we developed the Cow Kit.

Cattle equipment is expensive. It’s mostly steel. Steel prices have gone up a lot in recent years and continue to climb - like everything else. A portion of this kit is a corral system constructed from individual corral panels. Very few companies provide a standard corral system with a price. One exception is

Priefert. To give you an example of the cost of a portable corral and pen arrangement, go to the Priefert web site in the products, cattle handling, corral systems section. Look at the prices. It’s difficult to make a direct comparison with the cow kit (but follow this link and I’ll try). The point is the price of the Cow Kit is reasonable in the cattle-equipment world. The picture above is a portion of the Cow Kit.

The Cow Kit Philosophy - Why What’s In It Is In It.The philosophy of the kit evolved out of our idea of doing everything on the cheap, like many of our neighbors. This came at a cost of an incredible amount of work, time, injury risk, and stress on the cattle. It’s a trade of time and labor for money, and to various degrees you manhandle the cows to make up for missing/inadequate/broken equipment. Raising cows with marginal and/or minimal equipment can be

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

done, but it’s a full time-and-a-half job. You’ll exchange the money you save for lots and lots of time and effort and injury exposure and help from your family, friends, and many favors from your neighbors, and repaying those favors, and a constant stream of equipment repairs, and .... The kit is designed to get you started quickly, with top-notch equipment that minimizes injury risk and stress on the cows, and provides years of trouble-free operation. Don’t get me wrong - there is still work involved on your part, but that will mostly be in the form of learning - knowing what to look for and knowing what to do about it.

Cows, no matter the temperament of the breed, can vary in disposition. We kept a friend’s steer for a month when we were receiving our Red Poll herd. At the time, all we had was a make-shift corral constructed of horse panels, barbed wire fence, and a couple of feeder panels we found. The steer was a little bit nervous, but we didn’t think much of it. When it came time to load that steer into our friends trailer... well, we learned a lot. The steer did not want any part of loading into the trailer. We named it El Steer Diablo - The Devil’s Steer. On our first attempt to separate it from the other cows, it snapped an electric training fence on its way toward and through a five stand barbed wire fence. We repaired the fence and left it alone for the night and tried again in the morning. After gathering all the spare gates and panels we could find, we thought we had him. Nope. The steer decided the best escape route was through the feeder panels. Note the orange feeder panels in the picture at right, and note their new shape. While the steer didn’t make it through the panel, it snapped off the two support posts, bent the panel, and escaped around the end of the panel in the new gap created when the length of the panel became shorter. The moral of the story: equipment makes a difference. The kit is primarily equipment. The equipment will make it easy for you to handle a few cows during the period when you know little about cattle and their behavior, and will make it simple and quick to handle more cows when your skill and knowledge increase. Whether you have 3 cows or 300, the core handling equipment in this kit will do the job.

From day one when your kit is delivered by us, you’ll be set up for success and have all the equipment you need to be on your way to beef and dairy self-sufficiency that won’t require you to be a full-time cattle rancher. This is critical if you still have a job aside from your ranch. You will have minimal direct-contact-with-cattle risk exposure while you learn about cattle, and when the economy collapses, this kit will greatly increase your self-reliance ability and reduce the time needed to handle cattle. This is a huge advantage. Handling cows means moving them to where you want them, and milking them, and taking care of their various disease prevention or treatment needs. You will be able to

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

handle the cows with minimal direct exposure to the cows in close quarters when the cows are most likely to be agitated. A broken arm or injured spine in a normal situation is an inconvenience, but in a survival situation, injury can be a great burden to others at best and possibly life-threatening directly or indirectly.

Philosophy: The Cow.The breed of cow is critical for those looking to achieve self-sufficiency in a period of economic trouble or collapse [1]. After much prior research and current first-hand experience, we believe the Red Poll is the perfect cow for this mission. Typically noted as a dual-purpose cow (beef and milk), it is in fact a triple-purpose cow - beef, milk, and burden - heritage-breed cow. The Red Poll were a favorite of the pioneers, and for good reason.

Here are some of the Red Poll cattle characteristics:

• Gentle, tame, have a delightful disposition, and are easy to manage. A typical commercial cow, purchased from an auction house, or perhaps from a neighbor, is most likely a range cow. A range cow is just one notch more tame than a wild cow, and can be difficult and dangerous to handle.

• Medium-sized. They are about 80% the size of a typical commercial cow and less intimidating. Having raised both Red Poll and commercial cows, we can attest to this personally. A Red Poll cow typically grows to about 1200 pounds as opposed to a commercial cow of 1400-1500 pounds. This smaller size, while yielding less meat per four hooves, yields plenty of meat for a family, is easier to handle, and is easier on your fences and equipment. The quality of meat is superior.

• Hornless - (i.e., polled), which is much less intimidating and safer.

• Produce healthy, great-tasting beef on natural grass feed. The beef of the Red Poll is marbled, which is unusual for grass-fed cows. Grass-fed beef has excellent health characteristics that rival farm-raised salmon. Surprised? Please reference this article.

• Calve easily without assistance. Typical first-calf commercial heifers often require assistance (that is, the calf must be pulled from the cow) during calf birth. Red Poll cows rarely require assistance. Characteristically, they deliver a lower birth-weight calf that grows quickly.

• Efficient grazers. The Red Poll can thrive on almost any natural grass pasture.

• Are great mothers to their calves, providing protection, grooming, and nursing.

• Provide plenty of milk for their calves and for dairy use. These cows can supply milk for your family and still nurse a calf.

• There is a claim that children who are allergic to milk can drink Red Poll milk, but I have not been able to independently verify. An article in Mother Earth News does indicate that the milk has smaller fat globules, as does goatʼs milk.

• Hardy and adapt to new climates quickly."

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

The Red Poll used to be a top beef and milk cow, but specialization developed larger breeds for commercial beef production (Angus, Charolais, ...), and larger milk capacity (Holstein, ...). With specialization, the dual-purpose breeds fell from favor. The commercial producers did not need a dual-purpose cow (and with the advent of the tractor, a triple-purpose cow was not needed). However, for the self-sustaining farm/ranch, dual-purpose is highly desirable. Specialization in commercial cattle often means that the cows require human intervention to produce and survive. Learn more here.

Philosophy: The Equipment.Conventional thinking says that if you have a few cows, you need less equipment, and it can be lower quality and have fewer features. There are some good reasons for this convention in normal situations. However, for a novice cow handler and/or in a survival situation, other factors must be considered.

Cattle equipment used by cattle ranchers primarily reduces the time (i.e., man-hours, or number of cowboys) needed to vaccinate, brand, and treat various ailments. They have hundreds of cows to process, and reducing the manpower needs reduces the costs of raising cattle. The reduced injury risk is usually a secondary concern among cowboys. Most of them have handled cows all their lives and know the situations that are dangerous and how to avoid them. Equipment makes it easier and faster and safer. They have the knowledge and skills to do everything with a rope and a horse, a few extra hands now and then, and perhaps a handy tree. I (and likely you) don’t have that knowledge. A person new to handling cattle can be in a dangerous situation and not even know it, and being new to handling cattle probably covers 5 years or more, depending on who you are working with and learning from.

Thus, the equipment needs of ranchers are mainly driven by economics - less time and less people per cow adds to the bottom line. If you have hundreds of cows, that’s a big deal. If you have three cows, taking 15 minutes per cow rather than 3 minutes is no big deal. Risk of injury is another matter. Your risk of injury from each cow is a fixed value and relates to your knowledge of cows, your experience detecting danger and knowing how to avoid or escape it, the equipment you are using, and your luck. The cattle-handling equipment you use has a huge influence on the risk factor and can compensate for lack of experience - top notch equipment is a good strategy to avoid injury; depending on luck is not a good strategy.

For the full-time rancher, the quality of the equipment relates directly to time. Ranchers make trade-offs between cost, quality, the impact of broken equipment, and how much time the rancher has for maintenance. From my observation, maintenance is often ignored. Many ranchers have little time for maintenance, so equipment rugged enough to perform all the time with little or no maintenance is a plus. The equipment is used until it breaks, then patched together to keep going until quick repairs are no longer effective, at which time the equipment is replaced and the old equipment sits in a stack yard for a few years, then is donated to neighbors like me, sold at auction, or scrapped.

In a survival situation, the quality of your equipment becomes critical on many levels, safety being paramount. All other factors relate directly back to safety. If your equipment breaks - and cows are hard on equipment - you’re spending time repairing it that should be spent elsewhere and probably increasing risk in those other areas. Replacement parts will probably be unavailable. If you can’t repair it, you’ll be using riskier cattle-handling methods. I’ll repeat: it all relates back to safety and risk reduction.

High-quality equipment makes your job easier and takes less time. Quickly and effectively dealing with the maintenance needs of cows that come up from time-to-time saves you time and effort, and reduces worry. Treat an eye? No problem. Daily milking? No problem. Branding or tattooing? No problem. Pregnancy check, artificial insemination, vaccination, ... you get the idea. If the equipment is available and easy to use, you’ll be able to provide exceptional care for your animals without extraordinary effort.

Well-designed equipment reduces the number of people needed to handle cattle. Two people can do it. One-person operation is possible. That can be extremely important for all kinds of reasons in terms of

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

self-sufficiency and survival situations. We strive for single-person operation; of course, the skill of that person is pertinent.

Cattle may not be particularly intelligent, but they do have extraordinary memories and can be trained. However, they can also be extraordinarily stubborn, even to their own detriment. Our cattle-working system is designed so that you can pass the cattle through it for nearly everything you do: feeding, milking, sorting, branding, vaccinating, treatments, etc. If the cattle’s first few passes through your handling equipment are positive, for instance, they get fed, they will move through the equipment easily and be less likely to balk at the thought of walking into your squeeze chute. Your cattle will already be familiar with and trained to pass through your equipment.

Finally, value. Top notch equipment retains it’s value. Would you like proof? Go to a ranch equipment auction and note what used squeeze chutes and cattle corral panels sell for. If you decide cows are not for you, you’ll be able to sell your equipment and recover a lot of your equipment costs. Wait 5 years, and you’ll likely sell your equipment for what you paid for it or more. For proof, I again point you to local farm/ranch equipment auctions. You’ll be surprised at how prized this equipment is. Your equipment will be attractive and capable for any cattle operation and should sell easily to a wide selection of potential buyers. Your neighbors may come use your equipment, which is a good trade for the knowledge and advice they are sure to provide for you.

The Package: specifics.

• One bred (i.e., pregnant) Red Poll heifer.

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

• One bred and calf-birthing-proven Red Poll cow (a cow that has delivered a calf unassisted) and her still-nursing bull calf, converted to a steer at your direction. We guarantee that the cows will be pregnant. If either cow is not pregnant, we will pay for artificial insemination or bring our bull to your location to breed your cows.

• Handling equipment: We are proud to feature products from Sioux Steel, as their equipment designs are astounding. Sweep tub, adjustable alleys, squeeze chute, palpation cage, and water troughs. You might be asking yourself whether you need all that. Yes, you do. Once you understand the function of the squeeze chute, itʼs easy to comprehend its value. The full value of the alley, sweep tub, and corral system are not so readily apparent but are equally as important. Immobilizing an animal in the chute

doesnʼt do you much good if you canʼt get the animal into the chute. All equipment is first-rate, rugged, portable and can be made permanent. The sweep tub, alley, palpation cage, and squeeze chute can handle any number of cattle, and these components are sheeted to block the cattleʼs vision to keep them calmer. Note that we do not include a calf table in the standard kit. The calf table is optional and is an additional expense. Your standard kit will contain one calf which will be big enough to handle in the squeeze chute.

Youʼll likely only have a few calves to deal with each year as your herd increases. Young calves too small for the squeeze chute can be handled quite safely by hand, although youʼll want an assistant or two. Injury sustained by handling a small calf is usually no worse than annoying, like wrestling with an 8 year old boy. If you plan to process lots of calves, or if youʼll feel more comfortable having this equipment, we can help.

• Corral System. We are proud to feature products from Powder River. Sorting pens, isolation (a.k.a., hospital) pen, loading area, collecting corral, feed panels, and gates. The corrals and pens are sized for 10-12 cows. The corral system is completely portable and can be made permanent. This system is built from rugged durable

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

components; the corral system is not the place to use light-duty cheap components from a big-box store. Powder River has earned a reputation for quality and durability. Attend a farm/ranch equipment auction, and the premium paid for used Powder River equipment will amaze you. Powder River provides the widest selection of corral components. Should you decide to modify or expand your corral system, they provide the widest selection of components, bar none.

• Hand-milking equipment: seamless stainless-steel milk pails, milk carrier, milk strainer, and a shopping list for the consumable supplies that you will need.

• Scale. A scale is an important instrument to help you assess the growth rate and health of your cattle, especially while you are training your eye to assess whether your animals are gaining or - and this is particularly important - losing weight.

• A recommended reading list of books and articles covering cattle handling, cattle health, grazing, diet, stockmanship, and more. When you place your order, weʼll send you the list, and you can order from your favorite book source.

• Suggested strategy for growing your herd for self-sustaining supplies of beef and milk.

• Resources for buying more Red Poll, and sources of Red Poll semen for artificial insemination. You can always raise a bull, but be forewarned that a bull drastically increases your infrastructure requirements. Why? You have to keep the bull separate from the cows for portions of the year if you want to control the calving season. Further, a bull, by itʼs size and nature, is rather intimidating.

• Entry into the Red Poll association. This is important should you decide to keep your herd pure-bred Red Poll and registered (highly recommended, at least until the collapse).

• Instruction. When we deliver your kit, we will show you how to use it. There are on-line demonstration resources available. Sioux Steel has excellent videos available for their squeeze chutes, alley and sweep tub, and more.

• Support by phone. Weʼre available to help you with everything we know, or weʼll help direct you to other resources to solve your issues. We want you to be successful.

• Optional equipment: a trailer for moving your squeeze chute and alleys, and a calf table.

Requirements.In order to buy a cow kit, there will be a few requirements that you must meet. This may seem a bit strange, but you are spending a lot of money and we want you to have the greatest chance of success. There is a short application in order to be considered for a kit. Please don’t be put off by this. As I mentioned previously, the kit reduces the work by a large factor, but does not eliminate it. There is still much to do on your part and a certain amount of aptitude. You’ll need certain resources on your property, and you will need some support from neighbors who know cows because, and trust me on this, you’ll have plenty of questions and will need someone who can come over, take a look, and offer advice. We will likely only be available by phone, and there will be times you’ll need more than we can offer from a distance. The requirements relate to your willingness to learn, pasture and feed availability, space for the equipment, and the willing support of cow-knowledgeable close-to-you friends and/or neighbors. If you actually have experience and/or knowledge of cows, we’ll take that into account.

Applications and Orders.Applications are being accepted, and upon acceptance, reservations for delivery will be made when the deposit is received. Supply is very limited: 6 kits - first come, first served. We will maintain a waiting list if you are not one of the first six; again, first on first off the list. A 10% deposit is required at order, which will be non-refundable if another customer cannot be found to take your place within two months.

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

Our story.We have owned our 40-acre ranch in western Colorado for 4 years. We are Christians and believe God led us to this ranch, and we believe these kits are part of our calling. We have been preparing for an economic collapse since the spring of 2009. Due to our nation’s out of control borrowing and spending, we believe that collapse will happen - it’s just a matter of time, and we want our family to be prepared so we can do better than just survive.

We did not think we could raise cows for a living; we thought there was too much to learn. All the ranchers we know have been in the cattle business all their lives. In February 2012, with the encouragement of local ranchers, we changed our minds and decided we could learn this business. Raising cattle on our ranch for meat and dairy would complete our strategy for self-reliance and would put our family in a better position to survive an economic collapse. After deciding on this path, my employer offered a voluntary layoff - I had been a software engineer for 30 years - with a good severance package. The timing was perfect, so we volunteered and took the plunge. We didn’t retire, we changed careers. Yes, we just might be crazy.

We started with the idea of raising cows for the grass-fed beef niche market and began researching cattle breeds for that purpose. For self-reliance reasons we also sought a dual-purpose heritage breed. Our search led us to the Red Poll cattle, and it quickly became apparent that the Red Poll met all our requirements, and more.

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

The idea of the cow kit came to us shortly thereafter, and we believe it is one of our callings to develop and provide these kits. We’re in a unique position to help other people get started raising cows. Having recently started in the business, we’re acutely aware of the learning curve. Our rancher friends, who have provided all kinds of help to us, have done this all their lives - they have no idea what it is like not to know what they know. All the things we’ve had to learn to get started are fresh in our minds. We jumped in with both feet, raising both commercial cows and our Red Poll herd. We’ve asked questions, read books, and performed many experiments. We’ve been bruised and sometimes battered, and have laughed a lot. It has been a joyful experience and a challenge getting our business started through the worst drought the local ranchers have ever experienced.

We started out to do everything on the cheap - minimal equipment - mostly used, either donated or bought at auction, and mostly worn out and requiring rebuilding; temporary everything. The commercial cows were a learning experiment to become acquainted with the regular business our neighbors do every day, and to understand the similarities and differences with the small Red Poll herd we keep close at hand on our ranch. The commercial cows will hopefully provide some income while we build the Red Poll herd. For the commercial cows, we employ standard commercial practices - brand, vaccinate, and turn them out on the range. For the Red Poll herd, we are experimenting with newer management-intensive grazing techniques. In all cases, we are using Stockmanship handling practices rather than “smack ‘em around and make ‘em do what you want” techniques. We borrowed equipment for our cows, and helped our neighbors with their cows at every opportunity. We tried out many different types and brands of equipment. We quickly learned that good equipment is not optional. As time and money now permit, we are transitioning from barely adequate to well equipped.

We do not own horses. For our Red Poll herd, they are not needed - an ATV is adequate. For our commercial cows which we turn out on the range, a horse is clearly a must. If we continue raising commercial cows on the range, we’ll have to have horses. Commercial cows on the range are only a small step away from wild cows in temperament. Gathering them up and herding them in rough terrain without a horse is near impossible.

Contact us:The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd.Randy and Carol Bremmer970-931-2818

www.bremmercattle.cominfo@bremmercattle.com

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

End Notes[1] James Wesley Rawles, How To Survive The End Of The World As We Know It (Plume, 2009) Livestock, p.139-140.

[2] Cattle Handling means moving them to where you want them, sorting them, milking them, and taking care of their various disease prevention or treatment needs.

[3] Stockmanship is low stress handling of livestock. Reference: Steve Cote, Stockmanship, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Boise Idaho.

[4] Red Poll Information Links: The American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, Mother Earth News, The American Red Poll Association and it’s publication, “The Red Poll Beef Journal”, A somewhat odd collection of Red Poll information that actually starts here, and of course, you can always perform a web search on Red Poll Cattle.

[5] Squeeze chute, a device which immobilizes a cow or bull in order to treat the animal in a manner which is safer for the animal and the handler.

[6] Cattle Alley, a narrow passage which lines cattle up single-file and prevents them from turning around. An adjustable alley allows the width of the alley to be adjusted for different size cattle, calf to full-grown bull.

[7] Sweep tub, a.k.a., crowding tub, is a means of forcing cattle down an alley and/or into the squeeze chute and minimizes human exposure to the cows for safety reasons, and to reduce stress for the cows. Observations shows that sheeted sweep tubs and alleys that block the cattle’s vision has a great calming effect (source: The Beef Handling Handbook, BCH-9003, “Cattle Behavior During Handling and Corral Design for Ranches”, Temple Grandin, p.6, Restraint principals, paragraph 2)

[8] Palpation cage, an apparatus which allows easy access to the rear of a cow for pregnancy testing, artificial insemination, semen testing, or whatever else you need to do at the rear of the animal.

[9] Calf Table. A calf table is in concept similar to a squeeze chute, but is specialized for small calves. The calves are immobilized and the apparatus tilts, laying the calf on it’s side as if it were placed on a table.

[10] Feed panels, a special corral panel which allows cattle to access feed outside the corral. These are important to prevent fouling the feed with fecal matter.

[11] Heifer. A female that has not yet had a calf. Usually these are young, and probably under 14 month-old animals.

[12] Steer. A bull calf that has been castrated. Most beef comes from steers. A bull also provides good beef if they are slaughtered before they breed cows.

[13] Core handling equipment. The “core” of the corral system is the handling equipment, which consists of the squeeze chute, palpation cage, alleys, and sweep tub. The pens around the core equipment holds cattle before and after handling.

[14] Priefert corral system comparison to the Cow Kit. The reference to the Priefert corral system is intended as an example of the typical cost of cattle corral systems constructed from portable cattle panels. The referenced Priefert corral system and the Cow Kit both have holding pens, alleys, and sweep tubs. Beyond that, the comparison is difficult. The Priefert system is best viewed as a subset of the Cow Kit. A fair comparison lies somewhere between the 35 cow solid sweep system with one pen at

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012

$21,626.00 and the 200 cow solid sweep systems with 6 pens at $39,047.00. Do not compare the open sweep system as the Cow Kit uses a solid (sheeted) system to block the cow’s view and keep the cows calm. The point is that, in the cattle equipment world, the cost of the custom-designed Cow Kit is reasonable, especially considering all the additional equipment, setup, and instruction that comes with it. Cow handling equipment is expensive, no doubt. The good news is good equipment stands up to hard use and lasts for decades.

The low-end Priefert systems have one pen that holds 35 cows, while the Cow Kit has seven pens that , as a system, handles 10-12 cows. You’ll soon learn that you can’t have too many pens. Pens are needed to sort cows for any number of reasons, isolate sick animals, gather cows, feed different sets of cows different feed, and many other reasons. As the Priefert systems adds pens, the costs go way up, primarily because more pens means more bow gates, and bow gates are the most expensive component in a portable corral system.

The Priefert system does not include the squeeze chute, palpation cage, cows, milking equipment, set up, instruction, etc. The squeeze chute is usually the most expensive component.

The Bremmer Cattle Company, Ltd., Cow Kit, 2012