By Marcia Barnes
Feature Writer
Randall Townley is a business man, a farmer, a breeder and a mentor to younger farmers who are members of Future Farmers of America and 4H. The Georgia native wears several other hats known to those who are close to him.
He is at home in Cleveland, Ga., when he’s not on one of the four TNT Simmental farms in Baldwin, Cleveland and Lula; checking on cows; taking a bull or heifer to an agricultural expo or returning from a meeting in Dallas.
The Simmental Farm owned by Randall and Jackie Townley is the main thing.
All the other pieces thread their way into a life that continues to keep touch with the land and people around him.
Townley said his life with cattle and agriculture began while he was in high school in Dawsonville and a member of Future Farmers of America.
“I started raising black cattle. Then in 1978, I bought four Full Blood Simmental heifers from Emory Hills Farm because I was looking for better structure beef cattle. Last year when I sold one of the bulls, a truck from Fulton County pulled up. It was from Emory Hills where I purchased the first heifers.”
Perhaps Townley’s knowledge of the breed or desire to understand more caused him to make the purchase. Simmentals are a Swiss breed and dual-purpose cattle. They are raised for milk and beef and named for the area where they were first bred, the Simme Valley in Switzerland. The breed has a history which dates to the Middle Ages. They first came to America in the early 1960s.
For about 30 years Townley went back and forth, raising pure breds crossed with Angus cattle, but in 2004, when he purchased a full blood bull and cow out of Kentucky his interest in the breed was renewed.
Townley said that later, in 2011, a good friend in Kentucky called to tell him about another bull which was advertised for sale, but there were no buyers.
“The bull’s name was Hayger and he was headed for the stockyard. I saved the bull and when he came to the farm, I realized from registration papers I’d already bought his mother, a Full Blood Simmental, and didn’t know it. This all happened in March.”
In November, Townley took Hayger back to Kentucky to show at the International Full Blood Simmental Exposition where Hayger took the Grand Champion ribbon. Townley has proof in the official photograph taken in Louisville and printed on the back of a shirt he wears.
This year other Simmental champions have been in the making in Clemson, S.C. and in Gwinnett and Jefferson counties in Ga. They have been shown by six juniors who participate in Future Farmers of America or 4H. One of them is 12-year-old Jayda Peppers who is raising Astrid, a Simmental heifer who made her debut at one month old when she showed at the Gwinnett County Fair in the Cow/Calf Class.
“Astrid’s mother is a Grand Champion,” Townley said, “and the next show was in Louisville at the North American International Livestock Show. The blue ribbon is hanging in the barn.
“This year in February, Astrid won Grand Champion in the Cow/Calf Class at the Dixie National Livestock Show in Jackson, Miss. and in March, at the S.C. Governor’s School for Agriculture.
“I’ve never seen this before,” Townley said. “In the heifer show, Astrid and her mother Aster were chosen Reserve Grand Champions of the show over 14 head of heifers. Usually, it’s just the heifer.”
Next, Townley traveled to Clemson, Astrid won first in her class, and again, at the Gwinnett Fair on Sept. 17.
There seems to be little doubt that Astrid is special. She was born on a farm off Thompson Road in Habersham County and hasn’t yet reached full growth. Though Townley knew from breeding about when her mother would calve, he says barometric pressure affects the actual date.
“The main thing when a calf is born is that you want to see that calf up and nursing. That’s when clostridium is in the mother’s milk and has antibodies.”
Townley’s great niece Jayda Peppers takes care of Astrid and Townley’s goal for her and the juniors he mentors is that they will become the breeders of the future. Together, they all bring more to the agricultural community.
Someone will be going to the Georgia National Fairgrounds in October. Townley’s not certain who it will be, but for sure, one of the Simmentals is headed for Perry, and that is Sweet Pea, a full grown cow whose disposition matches her name.