Our next sale date will be Saturday, March 9, 2024
At 11:00 a.m.
At the Ichthys Headquarters.
For more information:
Phone: 402-984-6375
Email: [email protected]
Sale Instructions
Eligibility to Bid: In order to bid you will need to register with DVAuction or with Ichthys Cattle Enterprise prior to the sale. You may bid via DVA through click to bid or with a phone representative, or you can bid in person at the sale. Other options include giving a maximum bid to an ICE Cattle representative prior to the bid, in which case we will NOT bid any higher than necessary for you to win the bid. Or, we can accommodate a limited number of individuals placing bids live over the phone with an ICE Cattle rep. during the sale. We will clerk the sale on site.
Directions: [NOTE: We highly recommend NOT using GPS as several customers have gotten stuck when it took them on minimum maintenance roads.] From Guide Rock, NE: One mile north of G.R. is the intersection of Hwys 136 and 78. From that intersection drive 3 miles west on Hwy 136 to Road 1900. Turn north and drive 5 miles to Road M; you will see a large white building to the east, that is where the auction will be. From Red Cloud, NE: Drive 7 miles east on Hwy 136 to Road 1900. Turn north and drive 5 miles to Road M. You will see a large white building (auction site) to the east. If you are coming south on Hwy 78 you can turn west on Road N (8 miles south of Hwy 4), drive 3 miles on gravel to 1900, then turn south and drive 1 mile to Road M. The auction will be held in a relatively new multi-purpose building on our place.
Viewing: The bulls and bred heifers are available for viewing anytime at or near our homeplace from now until sale day. They will be penned and sorted early on the morning of sale day to be more easily viewed. Each animal will have an ID number and a blue lot number. The animals will sell in lot number order. The animals will not leave the pens during the sale. We will show a video of each animal during the sale.
Auction Format: We will have a cowboy style auction. Though this format still moves very quickly you will not hear a bunch of chatter that you can’t understand or have ring men yelling at you when there is a bid. There will be no rafter bids.
Every lot has a base price listed in the sale catalog. The auctioneer will offer the animal at the base price. If you are registered to bid on site, you will receive a bidding card. If you are interested in the animal, raise your card while the animal is for sale. If the auctioneer exceeds your bid price, put your card down. If you are the last person with your card in the air, you have won the bid. In the case that multiple bidders on site drop out at the same time, we go to smaller increments to settle, but if multiple bidders still drop out at the same time, the lowest bidder number wins that lot.
Online bidding is a bit of a challenge to our auction format. When someone can click to bid at home, instead of raising a card in the air, it can essentially cause a tie with the person holding a card at the sale. In that case, the onsite bidder wins the lot unless the online bidder is willing to increase to the next bid amount and the onsite bidder is not. Sometimes the online bidding makes the sale a little choppy, which is awkward, but we have learned that if we are willing to wait a few seconds, it’s not as uncomfortable as it first seemed.
New policy last year: All of the no sale bulls will be offered for $3,000 on our website for one week after the sale and then put into our beef program.
Motel Accommodations: The closest towns with motel accommodations are Red Cloud (Green Acres 402-746-2201), Blue Hill (Blue Hill Motel 402-756-3901) and Superior (Victorian Inn 402-879-3245). For a wider range of options in lodging and dining you are welcome to investigate accommodations in Hastings, Grand Island and Kearney.
Delivery: Though we don’t offer delivery, we would be happy to help buyers get together to combine loads. There is a bulletin board at the sale to ease communication between buyers willing to haul and buyers looking for someone to haul. Kristin also helps to connect online buyers.
Vet Papers: Much of the time and expense to get all animals ready to ship to all places on sale day has proven unnecessary. Any animal that needs health papers will be worked as soon as possible the week after the sale. Our goal is that any animal that needs health papers is ready to go in one week from the sale. If you want to wait on health papers, we will board the animals at our expense until the papers are ready.
AI Certificates: If you want to register any black angus or Hereford calves, you must acquire the correct certificate from the appropriate source.
Reference Sires: Following is a list of some of our sires, their breeds, and their registration numbers. These sires are, for the most part, either the sires of the animals themselves, what the heifers were A.I.ed to and/or cleaned up with, or are the sires of cows in our herd. Links to their progeny for sale as well as breed association pedigrees and additional information are (or soon will be) available on our sire directory page.
Hereford: ICE Triple Axel 7708E 43897362 (semen available for sale), ICE Tank 8708F 43952289 (semen available for sale), PPH Domino Plato Rupert 42965967, Edisto 136 Battle Rupert T352 42860368
Black Angus: ICE Hawk Eye 8521F 20114886 (semen available for sale), Beral of Wye UMF 9288 15600072, , ICE Billy Bob 7401E 19100970, OCC Picture Perfect 738P 14940739, OCC X-tra Easy 708X 17190960, OCC Paradise 681P 14940723, OCC Paxton 730P 14940735
Red Angus: PCC D-7 Amazon 1641202 (semen available for sale), ICE Assassin 8803F 3950243 (semen available for sale), ICE Amnon 5456 3624055, PCC Colorado Hobo 541060, PCC Johnny B. Good 1065904, PCC REI Super Pud 1354840, OCC Easy Red 1622476, OCC Red Grazer 610Z 1666776
Composite: ICE Roaring River 7429D (semen available for sale), ICE Bad Town (semen available for sale), ICE Joe, PCC Smitty, OCC Blaze Jetfleck 279Z, OCC Exceptional Blaze
Breeding Dates: The heifers were A.I. bred the first week of August and cleaned up until the end of September. They will calve in May-June.
All heifers were ultrasound preg-checked and their bred status is listed in the contents.
Calving Ease Guarantee: We guarantee the calving ease of every heifer we sell and many of our bulls are guaranteed for calving ease. So, what does that mean? We think every heifer we sell should be able to calve unassisted. However, in practice we know that doesn’t happen, absolutely, in every instance. In our operation if we have to assist a heifer at calving she is culled from the herd. We would recommend checking the heifers at least twice/day as we do. We calve on grass and aim to check them in the morning, at noon and in the evening. You could obviously check them more often if you want. For our guarantee, if you check your heifers at least twice/day and have an issue, we are willing to pay a vet call. If you take care of the issue yourself, we will pay you $100. Every heifer has bred-in calving ease and is bred to a calving ease bull. We don’t like problems in this area and don’t want you to deal with them either. I believe many think that calving ease is only an issue for heifers, and that’s generally true. But, we believe it’s most important for calves to grow on the outside of the cow and thus aim to bulletproof calving ease in all of our herd. Though our calving ease bulls are great for heifers, we believe they are great for cows too.
Breeding Soundness Evaluation: Experience has shown us that semen testing in December, when we evaluate the bulls, is of little value in August at turn out. Bulls that test well in December may not in August and vice versa. We will pay for a BSE at whatever time before turnout that you wish. If the bull fails, we will make arrangements to make it right for you, though we will likely not have a replacement bull. To receive reimbursement for the BSE, we will need a copy of the invoice.
Dam Age: The age of the dam listed is the age the cow was on that animal’s birth date, and every dam has had a calf every single year before that.
*Although we strive to be as accurate as possible at the time of printing the catalog, as we become aware of changes or errors, these will be made public through the email updates and onsite announcements the day of the sale. If you are not already signed up for the email updates, you can do so on our home page.
HOW DO WE SCORE?
Overall score
The overall score is simply a subjective number that we’ve assigned to the animal taking all its ratings as well as its conformation into account. A 10 doesn’t necessarily mean perfect but signifies an animal that excels in all the traits for which we are aiming. A 10 is “perfectly” suited to improve most operations. Almost all the animals we offer for sale are 8s, 9s, and 10s.
Disposition
Each animal is scored by how well it handles pressure in a situation where it is in a narrow lane blocked by a person each way. If it is easily agitated, its score goes down. If it stands calmly, it gets a perfect 10.
Fleshing Ability
Fleshing Ability is an animal’s ability to put on and maintain flesh in a low input environment in which only grazing forage sources are consumed. Our cattle do not receive tubs or other protein supplements, alfalfa, soybean pellets, or other expensive feedstuffs. An animal in better body condition score at the time of evaluation will receive a higher fleshing ability number. The body condition score on sale day will probably be lower than it was on evaluation day because these animals have had the most challenging grazing forage, corn stalks, for the last four months. Our cattle are always being tested. Those that fail don’t make the sale.
Calving Ease
Calving Ease score is a subjective number we assign based upon birth weight and calving ease direct EPDs as well as our experience with the size of the calves the sire bulls have thrown in the past. It is our prediction of the calving ease you will experience if using these genetics. If you have dystocia problems, you should select a bull with a score of 10 for calving ease; however, all our sires are better than breed average for calving ease in every breed. We don’t use non-calving ease sires in any of our AI or natural service bulls.
Butt & Gut
Butt & Gut is a subjective score based on what we see as depth and “sogginess” of the hind quarter as well as volume and hard girth of the mid-section. Bulls with Butt & Gut have the capacity to consume large volumes of forage and convert it into meat efficiently.
Frame Score (and Dam Frame Score)
We have measured the hip height of every bull and heifer and of most of their dams. We used a frame score chart which factors in age to determine the frame score of each sale animal and most of the momma cows to within ½ of a score.
Udder Score
We use a 10 star system to rate dam udders on the day they calve. A 10 star udder is well balanced, medium sized, has small teats, is level, and “looks” good. Any combination of those things not being in order results in a lower score. We want the calf to be able to easily nurse without assistance.
[Dam Age: The age of the dam listed is the age the cow was on that animal’s birth date, and every dam has had a calf every single year before that.]