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The History of Rawburn by John Elliot

The Rawburn Aberdeen Angus herd evolved around 50 years ago from cattle bred in the Cape Wrath herd on the farthest North Westerly tip of the British mainland.
The Cape Wrath herd was started in 1913 by John Elliot, my Great Grandfather and his sons Tom, John, my Grandfather, Andrew and Walter. My Father, also John, used their best bulls in his herd of registered Aberdeen Angus and crossbred cows at Rawburn near Duns in the Scottish Borders. These produced calves for sale at the local auction. The family objective almost a century ago of providing high performance, sale topping cattle remains unchanged today at Roxburgh Mains, Kelso in the hands of the fourth and fifth John Elliot.

Several of the cross bred steer calves sold for huge prices and were subsequently successful in the leading primestock shows in the county. On three occasions during the 1970s the highest priced steer calf in the United Kingdom was bred in the Rawburn Herd. Extensive use of Charolais bulls, along with Angus and Shorthorn, which was the only profitable way at the time, led to a deterioration in the quality of the crossbred cows. To remedy matters, a number of registered Aberdeen Angus females were bought for crossing with the Shorthorn. Sometimes a better female would be bred pure. At this time two significant heifers entered the herd. Magnet Princess of Tangier, a daughter of a cow from the first importation of cattle from Canada into the UK, and Southolm Duchess 66N, top priced heifer at the Southolm sale in 1982, proved exceptional breeders. Many descendants of both remain in the herd today. Two sons of Duchess were Reserve Supreme Champions at Perth Bull Sales. Another was top priced bull and a fourth Junior Champion.

That Was Then, This Is Now...

Around fifteen years ago Angus bulls did not enjoy the excellent prices they do today so the decision was taken to market all the bulls privately as soon as they finished our on farm performance test. Most years, despite the herd being only of medium size, more bulls from it have been included in the Signet list of the Top 100 bulls in the UK than from any other herd. This is hardly surprising as we have not only weight recorded for twenty five years and backfat and muscle scanned since the technology became available, but have sought out and used the highest performing sires in the breed , wherever in the world they were, through purchase, AI and ET. The present senior herd sire, Rawburn Transformer, broke every existing record as a youngster and recorded a previously unheard of Beef Value of 55. His offspring, both in our own and other herds, have outperformed those of any other bull year after year. In 2001 one third of the top hundred yearling bulls in the UK, including the entire top ten, ranked on performance were sired by him.

Herd management remains as commercially realistic as it always has been. Heifers calve at two years old, bulls are reared in a contemporary group and wherever possible only feeds grown on the farm are fed. Nothing receives individual treatment during performance recording and nothing thereafter except the few heifers intended for select sales. One of these heifers, Rawburn Lady Rush A113, sold for a breed record price of 16,000 guinees at the “Best of Blacks in the Borders” sale in October 2003. Another, Rawburn Estelle B163, was Champion and top priced heifer at Perth in February 2004.

Into 2004...

In 2004 the entire Huxton herd, bred entirely from Rawburn cows by the Late Frederick Tait, joined our own. The Rawburn herd now numbers around 150 breeding females. Their calves, sired by Transformer, Wedderlie Netmark A281 the 25,000 guineas top priced Aberdeen Angus sold in 2003, and two young home bred sires, Lord Hi Spade B148 by Ankonian Elixir 100, and Eldorado B175 by Hoff Head of the Class, is absolutely the best so far. In addition there are fifteen Embryo Transfer calves sired by Hoff Limited Edition and Millcreek Diversity out of four quite exceptional cows bred at Hoffs Scotch Cap Ranch, South Dakota and Cudlobe Angus, Alberta. The cows are running with Transformer, Netmark, Eldorado and Lord Ross C216 “Leroy”. Leroy has received more favourable comment than any bull bred in the herd since Transformer. His 9cm eye muscle depth at half a centimetre of backfat, muscle score of 13 and 400 day weight of 710 kilograms (1562lbs) promise well. 30 embryos have recently been implanted. They are sired by Hoff Limited Edition, Millcreek Diversity, TC Freedom 104, Roth Regulator and GAR Gridmaker, and are out of various cows including the two ranked first and second for growth in the whole of Canada.

Thank you for visiting our website. Even better, visit us at Roxburgh Mains, Kelso in the beautiful and historic Scottish Borders. Please contact us at 01573 450223 or info@rawburn.com. We would be delighted to see you.