Carolina Cattle Connection
Published by the North Carolina Cattle Association
Article: Morrison Farm
Myra Neal Morrison has come a long way from her childhood in Washington, D.C. where she grew up as the daughter of corporate law attorney, Dr. Fred W. Morrison. Now she is owner and operator of Morrison Farm where she farms 1100 acres and keeps 250 to 300 head of cattle. Morrison Farm is located in Rockwell, NC, and consists of 500 acres in Cabarrus County, the original tract, which was joined 15 years ago with 350 acres of Rowan County land. Myra’s father was a Cabarrus County native and purchased this land in 1945. His brother, John A. Morrison, ran the farm for his brother until his death in 1957. Myra then told her father that she intended to farm whenever her aunt gave up the management. She graduated Carolina and went to Law School and Graduate Business classes waiting to move to the farm. Myra took over the farm management from her aunt in 1965. She had never driven a tractor before moving to the farm. She had to learn everything very fast. She now does almost all the fieldwork herself. Myra became the sole owner of the farm after her father’s death in 1985.
The cowherd was originally Angus but the cows had been inbred and many problems had developed. She bought a Brahman bull to put on the herd and he cleared up all those problems. She used some Simmental semen artificially back in the 60’s and 70’s using bulls like Abricot and Caufi. She purchased some Simmental cattle at the Sunbeam Sale in 1985 and more at the Dispersal in 1986. In fact, some of those original cattle are still in her breeding herd. She has many Simmental cows breeding twelve or more years old. Myra liked what the Simmental breed has to offer, she thinks they complement Brahman program very well. She now has built her Simmental herd up to 200 purebred Simmental cows and about 60 Brahman. She regularly purchases Simmental at the NC Fall Harvest Sale and was one of the volume buyers at the recent Hunt-Hawley Dispersal. Myra says she selects cattle that will make good dependable brood cows. She prefers red and white Simmentals but will buy reds if they are the right kind of cattle and the price is right, she does occasionally acquires a few black.
Myra calves year round because of her marketing system. She has her own feed lot and has developed a good market for freezer beef. The majority of her bull calves are steered and fed out to1100 to 1200 pounds for freezers. The purebred bulls are fed to 1000 lbs or mare and if they are not sold as Purebreds, they go to hamburger. She feeds all her cattle in a central location in five separate groups daily. “It is so much easier to bring the cattle to the feed rather than taking feed to the cattle.” Says Myra.
All the Simmental heifers are bred the first time artificially to Simmental bulls. She is currently using bulls such as Caufitime, Bold Future, Bold Leader, Doubletime and High Tech. The resulting females will be registered and kept as replacement heifers. The best producers will continue to be bred artificially to Simmental bulls. The others will all be bred to a Brahman bull to produce F1 calves. Myra markets these F1 crosses as replacement females to commercial cattlemen and the F1 steers go into her feed lot. Myra says that she has found that the F1 steers can handle full feed but the purebred steers, whether they are Brahman or Simmental, do better on limited feed. The best bull calves are sold as herdsires by private treaty.
Myra grows all the feed utilized on Morrison Farm. She handles all the row crop work and that includes 150 acres of corn, 130 acres of barley, and 130 acres of soybeans. She also uses about 300 acres for hay. Myra’s friend, Joe does the combining and baling as well as all of the grinding. He also handles switching the cattle groups and feeding them. A neighbor helps cut the corn for silage and fills Myra’s 780-ton upright silo. The remaining corn is shelled and ground with the barley.
The system Myra has developed for cattle identification is easy and functional. She fire brands everything with a number on their hip that number corresponds to their tattoo. Their brand on the shoulder corresponds with what color of ear tag they have. Her home raised cattle always have Green tags, but all purchased cattle keep their identification tags from the sale. (As any cattle farmer knows, ear tags do come out) The ear tags are color coded by Myra’s system that dates back to the origin of each cow and yellow ear tags are for the F1 crosses. Each calf gets a tag when they are born and they get another tag after they have been tattooed, branded, dehorned if needed, and vaccinated. This way Myra can tell just by looking if a female calf has been calfhood vaccinated.
Myra has also developed her own computer database for her herd complete with spreadsheets to track her cattle. She keeps complete calving, breeding and vaccinating information on her computer for each cow and can link back to each cow’s five-generation pedigree. In her own words, Myra was pulled into computers “kicking and screaming.” She says she eventually ran out of note pads and kept losing papers so she had to keep up by using computers. Like everything else she does, Myra put all her energy into mastering the computer and now is very efficient with her computer system. She uses a laptop at the head gate when they are working cattle. In fact, Myra has been instrumental in getting the NC Simmental Association their website. Myra’s daughter, Shirley Maxwell designed and maintains the web page for the NC Simmental Association and the Carolinas Brahman Breeders Association in addition to the Morrison Farm web page. Internet users should be sure to check out Myra’s farm at www.morrisonfarm.com. Myra can also be contacted by e-mail at myram@morrisonfarm.com.
This unique farmwoman somehow manages to get everything done. She says the only thing on her farm that she does not do is the artificial insemination. She is a trained technician but she says to be truly good at it, you should be consistently breeding cows. Myra truly enjoys what she does and you can tell when she talks about her cattle. She out feeds her last group of cattle at 11:00 PM and uses that time to check cows for calving. She has a list of people to call for help at night and they hate to hear the phone. She is rewarded every time a calf makes it through a difficult time.
When Myra isn’t doing fieldwork or tending the cattle, she enjoys spending time with her grandchildren or on her computer. She has three daughters, Trish, Sandy and Shirley and five grandchildren. She is a director for the NC Simmental Association and is the current President of the Carolinas Brahman Breeders Association. But she also has 400 orchids and is a member of the American Orchid Association and is a fish enthusiast with both a salt water and fresh water tank. Myra has hosted many field days in the past and enjoys showing visitors her farm and cattle. If you can’t visit Myra in person, which is a treat, at least visit her on the web at the above listed web address. Give her a call at (704) 279-3128 to arrange a visit to her farm on the Rowan-Cabarrus County line. You’ll be glad you did.
Written by Jennie Rucker
Copyright 2000, Carolina Cattle Connection
Written permission was granted by Bundy Plyler of NC Cattle Association
(Publisher of the Carolina Cattle Connection) on 8/4/00