Franciska von Fedak

Franciska von Fedak is a Brown Swiss breeder with dairies in both Venezuela and Colombia.  El Vergel in Colombia has celebrated 60 years of breeding Brown Swiss and has garnered best breeder and exhibitor 8 times at major shows.  El Vergel is well known for its strong type and also very productive cattle with the ability to walk long distances to and from pasture.  Franciska freely offers her farm for seminars, classification work shops and visitors interested in Brown Swiss.  Franciska and her husband Daniel also own and operate Avia Service International, a aviation company.

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Franciska's father, Istvan von Fédak, born in Hungary, and her mother Gertrud von Stillfried, born in German, were married in Colombia and moved to Caracas Venezuela where she was born. Franciska went to school in Venezuela and studied veterinary medicine at the national state university.

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Franciska loved animals since she was very young, first rabbits, horses and cows. At 15, her father sent her to do trainee work with Bernard and Karen Monson of Meadow View Farm. Bernard inspired Franciska with his love and devotion to Brown Swiss. He taught her about Brown Swiss genetics, farming, and managing of a dairy.

 

She returned to Venezuela with a lot of energy to apply everything she learned. Franciska's father put her in charge to organize the presentation of the cattle at the Carora fair, and it was a complete success.

 

In 1993, she moved to Colombia, already married and with daughter Maria. Franciska's family put her in charge of  Hacienda El Vergel. At that time, the farm was in a bad shape, even to pay the salaries they had to sell 1or 2 cows monthly. So, they and their dedicated employees of the farm had to rebuild it, applying her training from Meadow View.

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Her family also started to start looking for new genetics. First they bought semen from Europe, and few years later, they used U.S. bulls from NGG. Franciska's family had tremendous success with Vigor, Jolt, TD, Brookings, Cadence and now Silver.

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Awards

2 Honor Medal - Brown Swiss Breed

1 Medal for the 60 years Breeding Brown Swiss

8 times Best Breeder a Best expositor in the Last 16 years