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When the Coverdale family started raising cattle, they did a fair amount of experimentation. It was in 1962 that they bought their first Angus bulls.

"Dad had Herefords, I had Shorthorns originally,” explained Bob Coverdale, now the “senior partner” at Coverdale Angus. “We bought Angus bulls and crossbred them. We crossed with Chianina, we crossed with Simmental.”

“He had a commercial herd of crossbred cows that he turned those Angus bulls on, and he started building a registered herd,” said Bob’s grandson Clint Coverdale. “When they'd weigh those calves at weaning, the purebred calves actually weighed up heavier than the crossbred calves, which goes against hybrid vigor and everything everybody ever had said. So they just made the transition so that everything ended up being purebred.”

Coverdale Angus still raises nothing but purebred Angus. In 2016, the farm was recognized by both the American Angus Association and the Indiana Angus Association with the Historic Angus Herd Award, which recognizes Angus breeders who have been in continuous production of registered Angus cattle for 50 years or more. (A full list of award winners, which includes several from Indiana, can be found at www.angus.org/Pub/HistoricHerds.)

The farm is owned and operated by Bob, his son Ron, and Ron’s sons, Clint and Garrett.

The Coverdales raise and sell breeding stock – including bred heifers, cows and cow-calf pairs, along with a handful of registered bulls every year – as well as show cattle to other breeders. They also sell show heifers and steers to 4-H and junior Angus exhibitors.

They now own around 230 acres but rent some of their pasture, hay and row-crop ground. The family raises its own feed, both grain and hay, and they use a rotational grazing system.

“We pretty much make hay off everything that first cutting when everything's growing tall, and then we rotate the cows around the rest of the year,” Clint said.

They currently have 85 cows with calves. Nearly all their cows are bred through artificial insemination or embryo transfers, “to get those higher quality genetics,” Clint explained.

Most of their steers are used for their own freezer beef enterprise.

“We've been doing it for a long time, but we recently expanded the freezer beef operation,” Clint said. They sell quarter, half and whole sides of beef, but they also sell some individual cuts through Gatewood Vegetable Farm & Greenhouses in Noblesville.

While many of their sales are direct to individuals, they participate each year in the Indiana Fall Classic Angus Sale, which this year will be held Aug. 31 in Greenfield, Indiana.

“That's all breeding stock – bred heifers, cows, show heifers – and show steers,” Bob explained.

The original farm was outside of Noblesville in Hamilton County, but in 2006, the family moved to its current location, which is near Frankton in Madison County, because it was getting a little too congested in the original location.

“We got an opportunity to buy this and moved back up to the country,” Clint said.

For more about Coverdale Angus, including their breeding stock and freezer beef, visit www.coverdaleangus.com.

For more about the Indiana Fall Classic Angus Sale, visit www.facebook.com/TheFallAngusClassic.