Our Brand. A Legacy.
Our family brand was established in 1911 when my Great Grandfather, Anton Bakos, and his family began raising cattle and horses on their William’s Fork homestead. Anton followed his brother-in-law from the coal mines of Pennsylvania, out West to the Colorado Mountains...
Our History
Our family brand was established in 1911 when my Great Grandfather, Anton Bakos, and his family began raising cattle and horses on their William’s Fork homestead. Anton followed his brother-in-law from the coal mines of Pennsylvania, out West to the Colorado Mountains. At the age of five, Johnny Bakos (my grandfather), took over the livestock and ranching operations when Anton, his father, passed away from Spanish Influenza. With a head full of knowledge but not a lot of wisdom at this young age, Johnny asked for the help of his uncle who had a homestead next to theirs. Through trials, drought, and success, Johnny continued the ranching business until he volunteered to fight in WWII as part of the Air Force. After the war, Johnny came back to the homestead, where he passed on his love of horses, cattle and agriculture to his daughter Catherine Bakos; my mother.
Our brand has represented the resilient strength of family, hard work, and the love of raising children and animals in the Rocky Mountains. Our family has years of practice producing quality, hardy cattle that not only only thrive at high elevations, but have strong mothering traits. Self sustaining cattle that place low burdens on owners and perform well at market are a family tradition. We have generations worth of practice ensuring we provide the highest quality cattle to our producers and customers.
V7 Today
Evan and Katryna Sundberg
Today, at V7, we still value the quality, hardy, high-performing cattle that our brand was built on. With the advantage of modern genetics, we can breed these exceptional animals at high elevations that are designed to be assets to an operation’s future growth and profitability in the market. We raise seedstock animals that we would want in our own herd. We put an emphasis on maternal traits that help your calves grow faster in a cow-calf operation, which, in turn, decreases some of the stress and labor from the producer. All our animals are genetically tested with the numbers speaking for themselves. Our bulls are PAP tested at 6,700ft and consistently have some of the lowest scores in the Yampa Valley.
Partnership with Circle 8 Ranch
V7 Elevated Cattle Company operates at/ with the Circle 8 Ranch, which is owned and operated by Holly and Sam Barns.