“A bad foot will get you sent to town almost faster than anything. Those cattle have to travel to go to water,” York says. “A bad attitude will also get you sent to town. We want them so they take care of their babies, but they don’t need to try and kill us.”

York breeds for moderate-framed cattle that don’t require a great deal of feed to stay in good condition and breed back. She buys bulls, mainly from Wyoming and Montana, that thrive in the High Plains.

“If you take care of the cow, the bulls take care of themselves,” York says. “If I put pressure on my cows, that goes into the bulls that they build, and then that flows onto the cow-calf man that buys my bulls. The maternal genetics are in there, and then those can go on to the feeders. There’s enough go juice and there’s enough carcass that they’re not going to take discounts, and that is what we are striving for.”