Parthenais
A Cut Above the Rest
Parthenais is a beef breed from the Deux-Sèvres department of western France.
The name comes from Parthenay, a town which was an important cattle market during Middle Ages.
The name comes from Parthenay, a town which was an important cattle market during Middle Ages.
Docile, reddish buckskin cattle with black pigmentation. Calving ease consistent with traditional North American values.
The hair colour is golden brown, with lighter eyes, muzzle and legs while the nose, hooves, and tail are black. Horns are crescent shaped. Bulls weigh up to 1150 kg (2,600 pounds) and stand about 145 cm tall. Mature cows weigh around 700 kg (1,600 pounds) and stand about 135 cm tall.
The hair colour is golden brown, with lighter eyes, muzzle and legs while the nose, hooves, and tail are black. Horns are crescent shaped. Bulls weigh up to 1150 kg (2,600 pounds) and stand about 145 cm tall. Mature cows weigh around 700 kg (1,600 pounds) and stand about 135 cm tall.
- Attractive double muscled cattle
- Generally easier calving
- Fertile, hard working bulls
- Suits most systems
- Hard black feet
- Excellent terminal sire in commercial suckler and dairy herds
- Parthenais sired females sought for suckler replacements
- High killing out % and meat to bone ratio
- Superb eating quality beef
- Lower cholesterol than chicken
- Steaks cut from forequarters
- Top carcass value
The breed is large and heavy with a long body and muscular rump. Heavy farm work has shaped a strong animal. The coat is a beautiful wheat to light brownish colour bordered by grey. The muzzle, eyelids, eyelashes, ears and tuft at the end of the tail are black.
Parthenaise cattle may now no longer be primarily used for milk production but their strong maternal qualities and ancestral background of rich milk ensure that the calves grow well. Renowned for their high fertility, they calve regularly and easily, with little or none of thedouble muscle shown at birth, the calves being born small (females 43kg-males 46kg) and very lively at birth, with the result that productivity is high.
The Parthenaise thrives on all types of terrain and coming from western France where climatic conditions are not too dissimilar to Irish conditions they are shown to cope very well and have very good disease resistance.
The Parthenaise thrives on all types of terrain and coming from western France where climatic conditions are not too dissimilar to Irish conditions they are shown to cope very well and have very good disease resistance.