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Bud Wentz has often been called the "Godfather of Simbrah Cattle"

published: March 1st 2010
source: Simbrah World

Regardless of your status--old or new breeder, or somewhere in between, the probability that you have heard and even met Bud Wentz is very high. Wentz has often been called the “Godfather of Simbrah” and his life long devotion to the breed is unquestionable.
    As he recalls, he wasn’t out to develop a new breed, he was just looking for a better cow.
    “I had a lot of Brahman cattle then (circa early 1970’s) and was producing Hereford X Brahman, Tiger Stripes. They were good cattle, but it just took too long for them to mature and there were udder and teat problems,” recalls the sage cattleman.
    He became acquainted with the Simmental breed, through a friend in the dairy business.
    “I’m the luckiest person in the world. I had never heard of Simmental cattle, but my buddy had purchased quite a bit of semen at the time and was telling me about these cattle. Well, we came up with a wild scheme. We would synchronize 60 head of my Brahman females and breed them AI using the Simmental semen” says Wentz. “Back then”, he explains further,” synchronization was done by a feed supplement,” adding that only one of the 60 took.
    But that one calf was enough. “I was really impressed,” says Wentz.  The calf impressed him enough to find some halfblood Simmental bulls to purchase.
    A fellow Brahman breeder, Homer Knost in Louisiana, told me he had some halfblood Simmental/Angus and Simmental/Hereford bulls for sale in Louisiana.
    “I ended up buying 20 of those bulls. They were the ugliest bulls I had ever seen, but the calves were the best I had ever seen. That sold me on this genetic combination,” he remarks.
    From there, Wentz purchased two imported bulls and put them on his Brahman cows, in addition to the halfbloods.
    Not only did he like the phenotype of these calves, he loved the fertility, as the heifer calves were starting to cycle at 8-9 months of age. He also saw great improvement in the quality of udders on his females.
    He began calling the cattle Brahmental. He first went to the American Brahman Breeders Association (ABBA) to initiate a registry for the cattle.
    “ABBA was not interested, but I heard that the American Simmental Association (ASA), which was still very young at the time, was having a meeting in Denver, Colorado. Lou Chestnut was the president and Colvin Jackson from Mississippi, Albert West and R.A. Brown from Texas were all on the ASA board. These last three gentlemen would ultimately become very involved in the Simbrah breed,” he explains.
    Wentz went to the meeting and told them about his Simmental x Brahman cattle.
    “I credit Chestnut with getting the ASA to open the doors to us. He told the  board , “if they can make money for these cattlemen, then we need to set up a registry,”.
    ASA voted to begin registering the cattle in 1977 and according to the ASA website, 700 were registered in the first year. At this time they set-up the registry for purebred and percentage Simbrahs.
    Wentz returned from the meeting to his motel room. His wife Jenny, (now deceased) had been out shopping during the meeting. She had purchased a silver figure of a little ostrich sitting on a big egg. When he told her what had happened, she said, “I don’t know who laid the biggest egg today, you or the ostrich.” He still has the ostrich in his office today.
    Wentz had applied for a patent for the name Brahmental, but another guy claimed he had rights to that name.
    Wentz and the ASA leadership decided they didn’t need to spend money in a lawsuit over a name, and they agreed to change it to Simbrah.
    Another pivotal point in the history of the Simbrah breed was the meeting of Wentz and Edmond Tom. They formed a partnership the day they met and set about breeding Simbrah cattle with a passion for promoting this new breed.
    “I went to a sale over in the Houston area, as they had some Simmental X Brahman heifers for sale, along with other crosses. Well, I noticed that it was only me and one other guy bidding on these Simmental crosses. I went over and introduced myself to Edmond and we started taking turns buying the groups. We formed our partnership on our word and in all our years together never had a written contract. We didn’t need one,” he explains.   
    Tom and Wentz Cattle Co., began providing bulls to neighbors with registered cows and then they would buy all the calves back at weaning for a $1.00 a pound. This allowed them to build their female numbers and build the registry, as they began having their sales, which as best anyone can remember were the first Simbrah sales.
    The cattle were easily marketed.
    “I call it the ‘Golden Age of Marketing’, as everyone was wanting Simbrah, because of the economic traits they were providing. Of course that led to lots of people getting in and using inferior genetics. This resulted in a lot of crap being sold as no one was culling. Every breed experiences this at one time or another it seems, but quality wins out over time,” he describes.
    Wentz describes himself as, “hard-headed, extremely lucky and terribly opinionated” and thinks that all helped get the breed started, but he is quick to credit others who joined him in the early days.
    “People like Dr. Woodrow Sharp who promoted the cattle, Lou Chestnut who had the vision to register the cattle, Sally Buxkemper, who recognized the value of their genetics and Edmond, who believed in the cattle as strongly as I did. I also want to give credit to Carlos Guerra, we had become friends in the ABBA and he came to my last Simbrah sale as we lost a lot of lease ground suddenly and had to greatly reduce our herd in the early ‘90s. He’s probably done more for the breed than any 10 people, as he has worked tirelessly to promote Simbrah for the past 25 plus years. And there’s been others in more recent times, but I’m talking about when the breed was in its infancy and trying to gain market share,” he says.
    Wentz at one time ran close to 3,600 head of cattle and then reduced that to 600 head as their lease land was sold. He says he has tried to retire, even tried raising Boer goats, but in 2006 he went back to raising cattle and now maintains about 80 head, predominately Simbrah with some registered Brahmans on 150 acres.
    “I like having the cattle, my wife now, Lupita likes bidding on them,” he says.
    Plus Wentz, who is now 78-years-old, is just as impressed today as he was with that very first halfblood calf.
    “The breed is so superior to what we started with back then. I thought we had some good ones, but every year it amazes me to go to the shows and sales and see just how good Simbrah are and how much improvement breeders make in such a short time now,” he says adding, “there’s no comparison. I take my hat off to today’s breeders.”
    Wentz has remained an active ASA member all these years and attended many summer conferences participating in committee meetings. He also was very active in the Texas Simmental/Simbrah Association.
    “I never served in a leadership position with either. I could get more done, just by being there and talking to people, and I would tell people to be involved and participate,” he says.
    Wentz is known not just for starting the breed, but also his generosity, as he has helped many youth over the years get started with a Simbrah show heifer. He’s also known for his ability to entertain, as you can be assured that when he’s in the crowd there’s a lot of fun.
    He also is partial to new breeders and has counseled many over the years.
    “I always told new folks at my sales, go and look at the cattle, study the catalog and find the cattle that are a little older, but can yet give you a lot for your dollar. These usually sell for less, but will get you in the business and be contributing to your bottom line pretty quick. These cows have stayed in the seller’s herd, because they are productive, so take advantage of that.”
    Another point Wentz tells folks is, to stand behind their cattle. “I have always guaranteed my cattle and to this day, I’ve only taken back two bulls.”
    While Wentz may have just been looking for a better cow, he has made the cattle business better, by starting the Simbrah breed. His belief in the breed has never wavered since that lone calf out of 60 breedings and his influence on the breed remains strong.