Welcome to Medicine Rock Ranch!

About Us

Medicine Rock Ranch is owned and operated by Trevor Wattier and Larissa Wattier near Aberdeen, SD. We both grew up with animals large and small, in 2019 we found ourselves with a growing cattle heard. We started out with three steers, wanting to produce a high quality beef for ourselves. We soon realized we both were passionate about raising better beef. Next came two Dexter cow calf pairs. Our goal was to raise beef, eggs and produce for ourselves and our families. We have been working as a team to improve the health of what we produce, the land we produce it on and the animals that we work with.

We loved our Dexter cows but were on a quest to improve our animals and our bottom line. Winters here are harsh and we didn’t want to rely on feeding grain and other products to supplement out cattle through the winter. Another trial is that the Dexter breed of cattle are small and do not yield as well as we hoped. We have always believed that just because ‘that’s what everyone does’ or ‘that is how it has always been done’ doesn’t make it right. In an effort to have cattle that would be hardy to our winters and continue towards our goal of 100% grass fed and finished beef we introduced the Highland cattle breed.

We started our herd with two unregistered cows, and an unregistered bull. After a couple of generations of seeing difference between the highland, highland cross cows we fell in love. Highland cows wintered incredibly well, faired just as well in the summer heat and were overall a kind and calm breed to work with. We made many mistakes, and had a lot of commitment issues but in 2024 we found our footing. We sold our beloved bull Buffy and replaced him with our first registered highland, PC’s Moorcroft. It was a huge honor to be able to purchase him and he was our first step into registered cattle. Soon after we purchased two registered cows. We continue to grow out herd with a mix of highlands both registered and non-registered, pure and crossed.