EXPANDED TEST STATION HANDLES BEST OF BULLS

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, April 11, 1993                   TAG: 9304090251
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-3   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY  
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: FORT CHISWELL                                LENGTH: Medium
EXPANDED TEST STATION HANDLES BEST OF BULLS
Top bulls from farms in Virginia and surrounding states spend six months on a Wythe County farm each year for testing before they are sold.
Virginia Tech oversees the bull-testing station on the Danny Umberger farm in eastern Wythe County near the Wythe-Pulaski line. The Umberger family operates it and Jack Poole is its manager.
The facility dates to 1980, when Brent Moore and his family owned the farm. When the Umbergers bought Moore's farm about seven years ago, they inherited the testing station as well.
They constructed a new sales building, used for the first time March 27 for the 14th annual prize-bull sale at the facility. They also have added a new feed barn, electronic scales to speed up the periodic weighing of the bulls and larger pens to accommodate greater numbers.
"We've established something here that we think will go for many years and will be of great service," Ike Eller, professor emeritus of Tech's department of animal science, said of the new sales building.
The 154 prize bulls sold at last month's auction made up the largest sale of its kind on the East Coast, and the largest to date for the Wythe station.
Only the top two-thirds of bulls tested make the sale. The station had 225 bulls for testing during the past years, a record number.
The bulls, out of registered cattle, are brought in during early October. They are fed strict rations of silage and grain, no grass or hay, and tested by Tech until the February weigh-off and March sale.
Tech also is looking into the possibility of some educational programs at the test station.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB