Traditions and evolution in the ganadería of Celestino Cuadri
Madrid empresa Plaza 1 has an interesting interview with the ganadero Luis Cuadri in the latest edition of the magazine T(ORO), an extract from which is printed below.
The ganadería was founded in 1954 by Celestino Cuadri Vides, continued by his son, Fernando, and is today run by Fernando’s nephews. With its name of Hijos de D. Celestino Cuadri Vides, the ganadería’s animals continue the mix of bloodlines that Celestino purchased - predominantly Parladé, based upon Gamero Cívico and Conde de la Corte, although there are also touches of Urcola and Santa Coloma. This unique blend is now considered an encaste in its own right. Cuadri animals tend to be thick-bodied, dark in colour, moderately horned, short-legged, low-backed, with a defined dewlap and give an appearance of strength and arrogance. The ranch opened this year’s Madrid temporada, Antonio Ferrera cutting an ear from the fourth bull.
The third bull of the corrida looked unusual for a cuadri. Some onlookers thought it may have been the result of some crossbreeding.
Our reference is that of my grandfather Celestino, who made a purchase involving three encastes – Urcola, Parladé and the ibarreña branch of Santa Coloma. We don’t have any worries about crossbreeding, for my grandfather was the first to do it, but we haven’t done any, nor do we have any plans to do this as it goes against our philosophy. For better or worse, we have confidence in what we have and know, and we don’t wish to depart from that. It’s true that there are problems with consanguinity, that’s logical, but we prefer to resolve things with the means we have, opening up bloodlines, before looking elsewhere. So we haven’t crossbred, nor are we going to, and, if we did crossbreed, we’d have no problem in saying so.
For one of the particularities of the Cuadri legend is the faithfulness to its origins, which produced a unique bull in the campo bravo.
Hombre, claro. Our animal has a very distinct personality. It’s true that, as there is a mix of bloodlines, one has a prototype of the idealised bull. We don’t wish to crossbreed because the bull would lose the personality it has, but also we prefer to work with what we know. We really like our encaste and the idea of crossbreeding or refreshing the herd doesn’t cross our minds. There are methods ganaderías now use to obtain results in a short timescale and to alleviate the problems of consanguinity and scarcity. But we prefer to tackle this internally.
And you don’t value the practice of selling the bloodline to other ganaderos…
No. They say this is a good thing, from the point of view of your being considered an encaste, because it’s something interesting to talk about. Look, they tell us our herd is an encaste, speaking genetically, because it is very different from the others, but, at the beginning, there was a ministerial order that said one of the requirements you had to comply with to be regarded as an encaste was to be selling animals to other ganaderos. As far as we’re concerned, it is neither here not there whether a ministerial order recognises us. What we have is what our grandfather had, had exclusively, and you don’t then want to sell that on to someone else. Animals that fail the tienta don’t enter into our concept with regard to our understanding of being ganaderos. What we don’t want for ourselves, we wouldn’t wish on anyone else, and the good stuff that we want is solely for ourselves. So selling is something we’ve never considered, nor would we plan on selling. This is something we do for afición, because it’s become a part of our lives, so we couldn’t permit sales, although the economic side of things is something that concerns us a lot.
Nor would you alter the philosophy of the ganadería in terms of maintaining similar numbers of animals and enlarge the herd?
No. We have 150 vacas. Although it is true that the genetic nucleus is closed, and, in order to make an advance, I think we would need to have a much large number of cows. We’re not going to go beyond 150-180 mothers. What we’re going to do is be a little bit stricter, as we have two types of selection – one in the plaza and then what the animals produce. You test a vaca in a tentadero, but after that comes the second part, that the vaca produces descendants. We’ve already defined the family and before we get rid of an element of this family, something better has to come along, but we don’t think it’s opportune to add to the numbers of cows. For us, it would be a nuisance; we would place more bulls into the market, but it isn’t part of our philosophy.
Does the third generation of ganaderos have different criteria from your uncle Fernando and your grandfather Celestino, or do the same criteria continue as before ?
Our work is to continue things as before. We govern by the philosophy my grandfather Celestino had – this is what motivates us and is what we identify with. It’s true that, for example, there are specific topics - times change, as do matters of health… My grandfather didn’t inoculate animals against parasites, but now we do this, and, in terms of nutrition, there have been advances in feed, and management of the animals is always more and more demanding. My grandfather didn’t move the animals around much and I have begun to do this, we’ve done this more. In terms of management, our animals are very temperamental and putting them together, in order to control them in the field, works well. The bulls tend to get furious when they’re in the ring, but not in the corrales. We are trying to move forward, but always with the criteria and ideal bull of my grandfather (who began all this) in mind.
And I imagine you continue the same practice of putting the sementales in with the cows without testing them beforehand?
Yes, absolutely. What’s more, each time we do it with more conviction. I’ll tell you a story that demonstrates that what my grandfather did and has occurred over time has reaffirmed our beliefs. There was a bull called ‘Podador’ which, because of consanguinity in the time of my uncle Fernando and his mayoral, José Escobar, was selected as a calf so that, as a semental, it would cover a number of vacas. Then the bull was lidiado in the 2011 Feria de San Isidro and Fandiño was tremendous with it; it was one of his most memorable afternoons in Madrid and the bull was awarded prizes by the empresa, Taurodelta, and by the Madrid abonados. But the offspring ’Podador’ produced, out of 12 cows, we kept two, which we’ve already had to get rid of because their animals weren’t any good either, and, of the machos, there were none worth mentioning. So you can imagine that the practice of putting animals together without testing the males beforehand was reaffirmed even more in our beliefs. Here, we have tientas with hembras and from these we select in terms of type, the family and their behaviours. We see how the sementales evolve from these females, but the machos who go on to father animals we don’t try out at all.
And you choose them by reata or their appearance, I suppose…
Well, we select them primarily to reduce consanguinity and, after that, we look at what the ganadería needs. For example, currently we are focused on improving mobility and how to have more depth of casta. So, perhaps we are sacrificing a little of the animals’ trapío for other characteristics in order to achieve a little more casta. It’s a little of whatever the ganadería requires, and always looking for a balance between casta, strength - which is important - and the power of this ganadería.
