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customers locate, select, purchase, and ship the sheep from the US breeder to their home destination. We rely heavily on the USDA, FAS for country and region information. We participate in Agriculture trade shows worldwide. One of the photos is from the Mexico Livestock Association Trade Show in Acapulco Mexico. Sharon and Nebraska Suffolk breeder, Mary Ann Nipp are working our booth. The two men in the photo with the sheep numbered 8 and 6 are Ronald Bertangnolli, owner of Cabanha Butia on left and DuWayne Swenson, USSA president on right. I took DuWayne to Ronald’s production sale. We were treated like royalty. Are there any memorable export experiences involving Suffolks? Ronald called me up after this and said he wanted to import 6 really good Suffolk ram lambs and asked the price. I told him the first cost at the farm would be $2000 each. He said okay. I kept him informed of the rams I had selected. A couple of weeks later he called again and said one of his competitors, Jorgie Lopes had bought a ram for a US breeder for $4000. I told Ronald I knew about that sale but wasn’t involved with it. Ronald then told be he wanted one of the rams he was importing to be good enough to beat Jorgie Lopes at the following year’s National Show. I told Ronald I could find one for him, but it would cost more than $2000. Ronald’s response was, “I don’t care how much it costs if it is good enough to win the national show”. I bought and exported a George Brothers ram that had been in the first pair of ram lambs at Louisville. Steve had named the ram “Tractor”. “Tractor” was the Brazil National Champion Suffolk ram the following year. A NOTE FROM THE SELECTION COMMITTEE: Stan and Sharon Heitz were Suffolk breeders from 1951 to 1999 and were selected for their involvement in livestock export business, including the exporting of Suffolk sheep.
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