MFL's Bison
MFL Bison Ranch Ltd runs three separate herds. The herd sires in each herd are related bulls from a specific genetic line from a specific ranch or park origin. The dams in each herd are selected for genetics that are diverse from the sires, either from one of the other MFL herds or bought from other sources.
Click on each herd name to view a few photos of the herds in the pasture.
The North Herd
Our North Herd, which lives in the northern half of our home section, is sired by 'New Teddy Roosevelt' bulls. These bulls are descended from animals that came out of Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. The original animals in this bloodline went to the Crow Reservation on the Montana/Wyoming border. Some of them were procured by KenMar Ranch in the late 1990s and became the 'New Teddy Roosevelt' line.
The East Herd
Our East Herd, which roam the hills on a piece of range land a couple miles east of our home section, is sired by mixed line of KenMar 'Old Theodore Roosevelt' and Kenmar 'M-line'. These bulls genetics are derived from Theodore Roosevelt National Park animals released in the 1970s, and a private herd in Maddock, North Dakota. This Maddock herd was initially obtained by the Heim Ranch, and subsequently purchased by KenMar and became KenMar's 'M-line' genetics.
The South Herd
Our South Herd, which lives on the southern half of our home section, is now sired by our 'Yellowstone Bulls'; 'Hayden' and 'Lamar', named after two valleys in Yellowstone National Park.
Prior to these bulls, this herd was sired by 'Holmberg/Heim' bulls. This sires of this genetic line were obtained by KenMar from the Holmberg family in North Dakota in the early 1990's. The dams of our current bulls come from Heim Ranch background.
Our Cows
This is about all the girls!
Their genetics vary but until recently the North Herd had sires from the Hanson Ranch in the Peace River region of Alberta. So many cows in our herds come from that background and the Hanson Ranch are well known for high quality plains bison. A number of years ago MFL ran herd sires from Heim 'Great Northern' background, a line developed by Chad Heim's Dad on the Heim Ranch in the early 1990s.
We also have cows with backgrounds from the Durham Ranch, Black Buckle Ranch, Elk Island National Park, Grasslands National Park, Sturgeon Lake and a number of other mixed backgrounds.
With our DNA testing, although we didn't specifically test for origin, we discovered indications that showed genetics from Fort Niobrara National Wildlife Refuge in Nebraska, Maxwell Wildlife Refuge in Kansas and there are probably others.