F2-Lancaster Farming. Saturday, August 13, 1988
Building
BY LISA RISSER
LEBANON Daryl and Dar
ren Grumbine conduct themselves
with confidence and self
assurance that belies their youth.
One might attribute this to a know
ledge of their physical strength and
abilities that comes from being
football players and competitive
power lifters. Or, it could come
from being the sons of a successful
businessman, and the money they
earn working in their father’s
tractor-dealer store. Or, it could
have been attained by being breed
ers of championship Yorkshire
hogs. While all of these are contri
buting factors, their biggest suc
cesses have resulted from the hog
program.
This spring, they showed
purebred Yorkshires for the first
time. They exhibited at the Pen
nsylvania Yorkshire-Duroc Invita
tional and came home with the
reserve champion Yorkshire open
gilt. At the Pennsylvania York-
Duroc Summer Show & Sale they
exhibited the reserve champion
Yorkshire boar.
Daryl, 16, has been working
with pigs since he was three years
old. Darren, or Mootch as he is
fondly called by family and
friends, is 13 years old and began
showing hogs eight years ago. The
two began with the Berkshires
their father raises and as 4-H’ers
raised market hogs. Eventually
one thing led to another, and they
began breeding purebred York
shires in addition to their market
animals. Currently the youths have
eight Hampshire and Duroc brood
sows, 12 Yorkshire brood sows,
two Yorkshire herd boars, and sev
eral crossbred market swine.
The two wbrk as a team with
Daryl being the animal specialist
and Mootch taking care of the
feeding and field work. They grow
soybeans and com on the farm’s 60
tillable acres. Up until now custom
harvesters have taken the crops off
the field, but this year Mootch
plans to do the harvesting.
Using artificial insemination
Three years ago Daryl became
involved with artificial insemina
tion, shortly after the family
moved onto the farm where they
housed their animals. “It was a
new way to bring in new genetics
without bringing in a herd boar,”
explained Daryl. Average herd
boars cost about $BOO to $9OO,
according to Daryl, whereas
semen runs about $4O for two inse
minations. The semen he purch
ases is from boars worth about
$5,000.
To learn how to inseminate his
sows, Daryl read all that he could
and watched videos from Stoney
Creek Farms in Indiana. The first
lime he tried A. 1., Daryl planned to
breed two sows to a Yorkshire
boar. He knew one look, but,
because it was early morning and
he was still sleepy, he wasn’t
exactly sure he and Mootch had
inseminated the right second sow.
One cycle later, they found out that
all was well.
When Daryl and Mootch select
a boar’s semen, they look at the
structure and characteristics of the
sow. “If you have a tall, skinny
sow, you want a boar with extreme
width and bone to compensate,”
Daryl explained. “Hopefully her
offspring will carry ihe boar’s
bones and thickness and keep the
mother’s size, milking ability, and
litter size.”
Attaining marketable litters
Instead of attempting to breed a
litter of show*quaiity pigs' the
Grumbines try to get a litter that is
Successful Breeding H
they check on one that farrowed recently.
several market lambs.
marketable. Out of that litter, they
may select a piglet or two to keep
to show. “We try to get a uniform
litter,” said Mootch. “You want to
keep all feeder pigs alive and
growing at the same rate so you
can sell them together.”
Breeding consistency is impor
tant when looking at boars, “I look
at the boar’s offspring: are they
going to look like him,” said Daryl.
He looks at the sire, dar , era"-* '
and granddam to sec wnat appear
ance from each is passed on.
Once Daryl decides which boar
to breed to the sow, he watches her
for heat. “When I see her swell up,
I order semen and within 24 hours I
will have the semen. Within 36
hours, she’ll go into standing
heat.”
Before inseminating the sow,
the Grumbine brothers will run the
sow in front of the boar pen. Hear
ing and smelling the boar causes
the sow to stand still enough for
her to be inseminated. After
inseminating the animal, Daryl
and Mootch wait 21 days until she
cycles again to see if the sow is
pregnant. If she comes in heat, they
use the remaining semen. “About
80 percent catch on both insemina
tions,” reported Daryl. “It depends
on the time of year. For instance in
the summer, a herd boar’s sperm
count is low. Temperature also
hinders litter size.”
Developing a breeding program
When the Grumbines decided to
start a purebred swine operation, at
first they weren’t sure which breed
they wanted. “We wanted some
thing other than Berkshircs, which
used to be the top breeding hog and
was dwindling m popularity,”
commented Daryl.
“We wanted a breed that was
popular around here and in Ohio,”
added Mootch. “You have to go to
Indiana for a Berkshire show.
Also, the Berkshircs don’t sell for
the same kind of money a York
shire does. There are a lot more
Yorkshire breeders today.”
Grumbine Brothers
*•? ' V
In the end, Yorkshire was the
breed they settled on. In addition to
its regional popularity, the Grum
bines liked that it could be crossed
with Hampshire or Duroc hogs to
produce good feeder pigs.
Using money earned from sell
ing market animals and winning
show prizes, the young men pur
chased the champion and reserve
■' jii open gilts at the 1985
Pennsylvania York-Duroc Sum
mer State Show & Sale. “Not
many people were bidding against
us and we got the gilts for a bar
gain,” reported Daryl. “They were
right for us and right in the judge’s
eyes. I think a lot of buyers were
looking for bred gilts too.”
The following spring they added
a boar to their small herd. They
waited until this year to enter com
petition because “when we hit the
show ring, we wanted to be con
tenders,” said Daryl. “We didn’t
just want to go there, we wanted to
win.” Added Mootch, “We wanted
to take something that would put
our influence on the breed.”
Raising Dorset sheep
Shortly after beginning their
4-H careers, the Grumbines diver
sified their interests and began
raising market lambs. As with the
hogs, it developed into a breeding
program. The youths selected
Dorsets to raise. “They seemed to
be an up and coming breed,” said
Daryl.
The Grumbines learned all
about hogs from their father, but
when it came to sheep, they turned
to Ronnie Miller, the manager at
Wey Farms.
Currently they have 45 head of
breeding stock including two
rams. They also have 15 market
animals. “We usually keep eight
ewe lambs per spring,” said Daryl.
Of these, they’ll eventually sell
most and put a few back into the
flock.
When they started buying ani
mals for their herd, their father,
Sh
which 60 are tillable.
* * *
f)
fjtmi
Daryl, right, Is the animal specialist of the two brothers.
Darren, or Mootch, Is In charge of feeding and fieldwork.
Dennis, presented them with 12
ewes. The rest were purchased
from project earnings. Instead of
buying champions, they bought
animals that possessed qualities
Cornell Launches Clinic
ITHACA, N.Y. More than
150 beef producers from New
York and neighboring states will
gather at Cornell University’s Ani
mal Science Teaching and
Research Center at Harford, some
15 miles cast of heje, on Sept. 10 to
learn the latest techniques for beef
production.
The “Cow-Calf Clinic,” the first
of its kind ever sponsored by Cor
nell, will focus on the latest
research findings in beef produc
tion, management recommenda
tions, industry trends and market
ing programs, according to Wil
liam M. Greene, who is
coordinating the day-long prog
ram. Greene is a beef specialist in
the College of Agriculture and Life
Sciences at Cornell.
Topics include:
• Techniques for evaluating
superior bulls used for breeding
beef cattle.
• Use of ultrasonic scanners to
measure fat thickness and other
characteristics of live beef cattle.
• Results of cattle feeding trials
conducted at Cornell.
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they liked. “Champions don’t
always pass on what they have,”
explained Daryl. “The whole
livestock industry is a gamble.
Some things work, some don’t.”
• Marketing options and prog
rams available to beef producers in
New York State.
The program also will feature a
tour of hillside grazing areas near
theh center’s beef research unit
and demonstrations of live animal
evaluation in terms of structure
and type.
Greene said that New York beef
producers had about 120,000 head
of beef cows as of Jan. 1, a record
since 1977. According to the New
York Agricultural Statistics Ser
vice, Steuben County ranked first
in the state with 6,100 beef cows,
followed by Dutchess with 4,500
and Chautauqua with 4,300. Cat
taraugus and St. Lawrence were
tied with 3,600 head each.
Registration for the clinic,
which is sponsored jointly by Cor
nell’s Department of Animal Sci
ence and Cornell Cooperative
Extension, will begin at 8 a.m. The
program will start at 9 a.m. and
conclude at 5 p.m.
For more information about the
program, call Greene at (607)
255-2856.
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