In addition to the CSU Main Campus Facilities, the Animal Science Department has several satellite facilities where research is conducted.

Eastern Colorado Research Center (ECRC)

In 1952, a ranch consisting of 3,760 acres and now known as the Eastern Colorado Research Center (ECRC) was purchased by Colorado State University. The Eastern Colorado Research Center is located midway between Akron and Sterling just east of State Highway 63. A sign located along the highway directs visitors to the headquarters. At the time of purchase, some 2,960 acres were rangeland in poor to fair condition while 800 acres were abandoned cropland. This offered an ideal opportunity for CSU scientists to investigate problems in management and improvement of range and beef cattle production. The present facilities consist of more than 35 fenced pastures of native and seeded rangeland, 22 feedlot pens with 640 feet of bunk space, and enclosed working facilities with chute and scales for working and weighing the livestock.

The ECRC research effort presently is focused on beef cattle reproduction and nutrition. Extensive research has been conducted at ECRC in beef cattle estrous synchronization. Early work evaluated the use of estradiol valerate and progesterone to induce estrus in non-cycling heifers. Recently, a low cost system using melengestrol acetate (MGA) and prostaglandin F2a for synchronizing estrus has been developed. Beef cattle nutrition research is being done in both range and feedlot. Work has been completed on the effect of time (A.M. vs. P.M.) or supplementation on range. The effect of protein type upon finishing steer performance when fed whole shelled corn has been studied and research has shown positive effect on the economics of feeding whole shelled corn in a finishing ration. Reporting of research findings at the Eastern Colorado Research Center is handled through field days, tours, publications and news stories. A field day is held at the ECRC every year. The public is invited to tour the facilities and scientists are present to explain research work. In addition, numerous farm, ranch and range groups schedule special tours at the research center.

 Southeastern Colorado Research Center (SECRC)

This facility was gifted to the University in 2005 by Five Rivers Cattle Feeding, LLC (ConfiBeef), and is located on approximately 15 acres at the junction of US 287 and Colorado highway 50 in Lamar, Colorado.  The main facilities include 6,364 square feet of buildings, and 168 nine-to-ten head cattle pens.  The pens are easily manipulated and designed specifically for research purposes.  The cattle sorting and handling facility consists of 50 herring-bone pens.  Other features include: a 20,000 gallon treated water storage tank, fully integrated data capture system, indoor mixing equipment, shading structures, two feed trucks and skid steer loaders, access to reverse osmosis treated water system, and fresh steam-flaked corn or milo.  The center offers the opportunity to create regional and multi-state research in the following areas:

• Integrated livestock management
• Nutrition
• Environmental/waste management
• Pre- and post-harvest food safety and product enhancement
• Infectious disease management
• Animal behavior and well-being

John Rouse - Beef Improvement Center (BIC)

In May 1986, John Rouse donated the One Bar Eleven ranch to CSU along with 150 mature cows (7 yr +) and their calves and 125 yearling replacement heifers. A.D. Davis, owner of Bighorn Ranch, Walden, then donated 100 One Bar Eleven cows and their heifer calves (45) to CSU. These cows were a portion of the cows purchased by Mr. Davis from Mr. Rouse before the ranch was donated to CSU. Mr. Rouse began a career in the cattle business (after retiring from an executive position with Standard Oil of Indiana) with the purchase of 376 Angus females from Mr. Andrew Anderson, Wyoming, in 1953. Mr. Rouse ran the cows on a neighboring ranch until purchasing the One Bar Eleven in 1955. He was a strong believer in performance cattle, kept accurate records and used records in selecting replacement bulls and females. He also used top performance sires through the use of AI. The herd has a long-standing reputation for superior reproduction, maternal abilities and early growth. Ranch-raised bulls at several test sites in the region have been among the top-gaining individuals over all breeds for many years. This property (also known as the One Bar Eleven Ranch) is located nine miles east of Riverside and twenty-six miles southeast of Saratoga, Wyoming, along the North Platte River. The ranch consists of approximately 7,500 acres with about 800 aces of irrigated meadow, of which 200 acres is in alfalfa under a center pivot, 1,000 acres of improved crested wheat grass and 5,700 acres of native sagebrush range. Average elevation is about 7,200 feet and annual precipitation ranges from 9 to 13 inches. The ranch capacity is about 400 cows plus bulls and replacement heifers. Purebred but non-registered Angus cattle are owned by the Animal Sciences Department and ranch management is supervised by departmental employees. The first people employed by CSU were Jack Moon, Manager, and his wife Kate and son Mike. Jack and Kate have retired and Mike is manager. In addition, CSU student interns work at the Center during the spring and summer months.

The top performing bulls are retained for ranch use and semen is collected for use in the herd. The remainders of the bulls are sold at auction after culling. Data on the bulls includes birth, weaning and yearling weights, and average daily gain on test and scrotal circumference. In addition, all bulls undergo a pulmonary arterial pressure (PAP) for brisket disease and all bulls are given a complete breeding soundness examination. Also, Expected Progeny Difference (EPD) values are calculated for all animals. Currently the Rouse herd (called Beef Improvement Center) is a valuable source of replacement heifers. These heifers have won championships at the National Western’s commercial heifer show.

Maxwell Ranch

The Last Will and Testament of Fred Maxwell provided that all of his property be placed in trust for support of his wife, made provision for certain annuities and provided that upon death of these beneficiaries, the remainder of the estate was to be distributed and transferred to Colorado State University Research Foundation (CSURF) to be held by CSURF in accordance with the terms of the will. Mrs. Maxwell passed away on November 17, 1968. At such date, Mrs. Eva Marietti was the only surviving beneficiary. An agreement was entered into between CSURF and Mrs. Marietti substituting a funded annuity for the annuity provided by the will. Based upon this agreement, the Court entered an order terminating the trust in December 1969.
CSURF assumed the responsibility of operating the ranch in January of 1970. Shortly thereafter, Thomas Bryant, a nephew of Mrs. Maxwell, commenced a legal action against the trustee, the executor and CSURF relative to the Maxwell Ranch and in connection with the suit obtained an order of the Court vacating the order terminating the trust. Effective March 21, 1972, the parties entered into an agreement of compromise and settlement.
The Maxwell Ranch and its assets were officially transferred to CSURF on June 30, 1972. The Maxwell Ranch is located approximately thirty miles north of Fort Collins, Colorado, with the majority of the property being located on the east side of U. S. Highway 287. The ranch headquarters is located on the northwest side of Red Mountain and is accessible from the Red Mountain Granite Canyon Road. A total of 11,600 acres comprise the ranch with 9,700 acres located in Colorado and 1,900 acres located near the Colorado-Wyoming line, southwest of Tie Siding, Wyoming. The property maintains a herd of Angus X Hereford-based cows and resources are used for a variety of teaching and research needs.

Y-Cross Ranch

In 1997, the Courtenay C. Davis Foundation gave the Y Cross Ranch, headquartered in Horse Creek, WY, jointly to Colorado State University (College of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Animal Sciences) and the University of Wyoming. The 56,000-acre working Hereford cattle ranch is located approximately 35 miles northwest of Cheyenne, Wyoming. The Davis Foundation Executor, Miss Amy Davis, visited the 1996 World Hereford Congress sponsored by the CSU Department of Animal Sciences and was so impressed that she initiated discussions with departmental and college officials about transferring the ranch to the university for practical training of students in the skills of western high-desert ranching. Because the ranch was located in Wyoming, Miss Davis thought it should be accessible to University of Wyoming students too. Thus, the basis of the unique experiment of transferring the ranch to the two institutions was formed. Not only were the ranch property and fixed assets transferred, so were all of the seed-stock cattle, horses, equipment and working capital to operate the ranch for the first year. The ranch is managed for the universities, colleges and departments by a five-member Y Cross Ranch Management Committee (one person appointed by the Davis Foundation, the dean of the CSU College of Agricultural Sciences, one person representing the CSU Foundation, the dean of the UW College of Agriculture, and a representative from the UW Foundation) with consulting specialists as needed. An on-site ranch manager and staff are responsible for day-to-day operations. The foundations must jointly hold and operate the ranch for at least 14 years. Thereafter, joint CSU-UW ownership may continue, or it may be dissolved. If dissolved, the ranch may be sold to the other partner or to a third party with the proceeds being split equally between the two. The ranch is dedicated to educating students and developing skills required to efficiently and profitably manage Western ranches; research efficient methods of resource use and allocation, and develop management strategies for integrated resource use, as well as to develop holistic approaches to management of domestic and wild animal enterprises, plant and other resources.

San Juan Basin Research Center (SJBRC)

The Colorado State University San Juan Basin Research Center is located four miles south of Hesperus, on the original site of Fort Lewis occupied by the U.S. Army in the 1880s. In 1911, the property was transferred to the State of Colorado for use as a school of agriculture, mechanical and household arts. The school later became Fort Lewis College, which in 1956 was relocated in Durango. Since that time, the old Fort has been a research center under the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station. Research dates back to the early days of the school, when several types of trees were planted from 1918 to 1921 for high altitude adaptability studies. Field crop research began in 1922 and was discontinued in 1975. Beef cattle breeding research was conducted in the early 1940s, in cooperation with Fort Lewis College, and in 1946 many of the foundation lines of the present cowherd were established. Range research became a part of the research program in 1962. The 6300-acre research center has an elevation of 7600 feet and receives 18.5 inches of precipitation annually. Crop varieties adapted to the 100-day frost-free growing season are limited to small grains, forage and hay crops.

Early research centered on the development of inbred lines of Hereford cattle and subsequent line crossing among the lines. The effects of inbreeding on reproduction and growth traits, along with the effects of hybrid vigor were studied. The Center has pioneered work in the genetics of reproduction. Scrotal circumference in yearling bulls, as a measure of testicle size, was shown to be a highly heritable trait that is easily and accurately measured. It is an excellent predictor of age at puberty in bulls and in female offspring. It is favorably related to both semen quantity and quality, but is independent of bull libido or serving capacity. Individual feed consumption for bull calves has been obtained for many years during the post-weaning performance test. Several different measures of feed efficiency have been evaluated and have been shown to be moderately heritable. Colorado State University was one of the first universities to establish a bull test for evaluating the performance of young bulls at SJBRC. Ranchers from the Four Corners area have been testing bulls at the Hesperus station since early 1950 and built a facility consisting of 40 pens to performance test 200 bulls annually. This facility, built in 1975, is at an altitude of 7600 feet. Estimates of Expected Progeny Difference values (EPD), indicating the genetic worth of individual animals, were used to identify animals that are superior for various measures of reproduction, milk, growth and mature size. Cancer eye in Hereford cattle, which usually occurs later in life, has been shown to be moderately heritable and can be nearly eliminated through selection. Eye, eyelid and pigmentation around the eye studies show these traits to be highly heritable. Classic work with pulmonary arterial pressure (PAP) measure as an indicator of susceptibility to brisket disease was done at SJBRC. Research at the Center has provided opportunities for graduate student research projects with research for over 40 advanced degrees completed at the Center and over 200 scientific papers and popular articles published.