Ranch History

The Judy and Line Ranch was founded in 1887 when Dan & Sofia Judy purchased land from the railroad and began raising Shorthorn cattle. Roy and Blanche Judy continued to raise shorthorns until their daughter Irma and her husband Azale Line took up the family business and starting using Hereford cattle. When their son, Doug, and his wife, Dixie, took the reins, they brought in Angus cattle to produce a black, white face F1 cross. The tradition continues with me, Darby, and my wife, Annette doing business as Triangle J Ranch.

We introduced Simmental to the ranch, with the initial group being made up of the old red and white spotted cows. We have 4 Generations of the Line Family now transitioned to black-hided cattle to fulfill the needs of our customers. We run about 1300 head of registered cattle. The bulls range from 1/2 blood Simm/Angus to purebred Simmental and Angus.  Approximately 275 yearling bulls sell on our January Sale, with another 175 yearling bulls sold on our Colorado Sale in March. Another 150 bulls are sold by private treaty. Around 300 females are sold in November.

The Triangle J Ranch Sale is located on the family farm, 30 miles northwest of Kearney, NE. The sale is annually the last Sunday in January. We do all the preparations for the sale from getting the cattle ready, to preparing the sale catalog, to cooking the meal for sale day.

Commercial cattlemen are the main focus of our breeding program. Many of our customers are local, but we do have a number of  out-of-state buyers who come back year after year.

We have also been fortunate enough to place a number of bulls in several of the popular bull studs.                

We attribute our family’s success to our intensive artificial insemination (AI) and embryo transfer (ET) program.   

Our goal is to produce females with fleshing and milking ability that raise calves that weigh heavier at weaning. We also look for moderately framed, thick, high-performing cattle.  Most of the cattle for sale are both Homozygous Polled and Homozygous Black. We enjoy following up with our customers after the sale and use their input to plan for the next breeding season.