Raising a beef cow/steer - looking for advice and tips

[General Lee]

If your main goal is the satisfaction of raising your own beef then there's really no economic advise to give.......I've been a butcher for a long time and have lived on acreage my whole adult life and have never seen a situation where it's cheaper to raise your own beef than to buy it at a grocery store.
I charge 50 cents a pound to cut, wrap and freeze a beef cow. Dressed weight will vary but the ideal weight is around 600 lbs. ( 150 lbs per quqrter ) and I've done some that were in the 200-225 lb range per quarter.So on a 600 lb animal it cost the producer $300 for me to cut, wrap and freeze.
For that money you can buy 150 lbs of boneless outside round roasts ( no waste ) at the grocery store when it's on special or 100 lbs of top sirloin roasts or steaks.
What ever you decide.....Good Luck

Well, the economic advice I was looking for was pricing all the way around. Materials, heifer, feed costs, butcher pricing. Raising your own beef tastes a whole lot better than antibiotic, hormone, steroid injected grocery store beef.

I appreciate you giving your prices. I talked to a friend today who buys and raises cattle and the butcher he uses charges $100 bucks to kill and skin. Then .67 cents a pound to cut up and package.

 

[General Lee]

General Lee, if you have enough woodland, you can get quite a bit of grazing off of it. Larro

Can you explain? Is dried leaves a decent grazing diet? What would the cow be eating? I've never heard of this.

 

[motownbrowne]

Two things cows like: to be in herds, and to eat grass. I vote against penning one up by itself for a number of months and feeding it hay or worse yet, just grain. Buy a cow from a small producer with a healthy herd who is doing it well. My .02

 

[paulharvey]

Can you explain? Is dried leaves a decent grazing diet? What would the cow be eating? I've never heard of this.

I new a fairly well off man that raised cattle. He brought an expensive breeding bull, and turned him out in the woods with the rest. He dropped weight, and people kept telling him you can't turn a high dollar bull out like that. He responded "he'll learn to eat or he'll starve". With in a couple weeks he was eating fine in the woods. There's more forage in the woods then you realize, and it would allow for more room too. As you graze them in the woods over time it actually helps improve it by killing off the small saplings, and "lolipopping" the trees.

 

[Axe Man]

I've worked in the grocery industry since the mid 1970s when I was learning to cut meat, and meat on sale at the store has always been cheaper than beef I could raise myself. In the last year, the place I work has had outside round roasts on for $1.99 a pound.....extra lean ground beef for $2.49 a pound, boneless blade roasts for $2.49 and sirloin steak and roasts for $2.49 ( a few examples ) As for pork, this week pork chops were 99 cents a pound and pork picnic roasts were 99 cents a pound ( for comparison ). Like I said a small producer can't compete with those prices.

You have me confused......how on earth is it cheaper to buy beef at the grocery store. Here are the current average beef prices:
Average retail food and energy prices, U.S. city average and Midwest region

Round roast is $4.70 a lb...150 lbs = $705

Even if you go with the minimum price for ground beef at $3 a pound, then 450 lbs would cost you $1,350. My cow(450 lbs) processed and in my freezer right now cost me $530 in processing fee, add 2 years of worming($30), and 2 years of mineral blocks($30) brings it to $590. And it's not just all ground beef, it's top, strip, ribs, stew meat, round, roast, etc.

My cows are all grass fed and I barter with a neighbor who cuts my hay & I get what I need for the year for free. Even if I had to buy hay, add 20 4x4 rolls for the winter at $15 a roll and I am still way under retail prices. My point is that if you have the acreage, then raising your own is the only way to go.

 

[lockhaven]

where do you live axe man? no beef under $4 on sale except 80% ground pork $2 and up on sale here

 

[Western]

Where you live will impact more than the advice we can give, ( as far as the financial part ) cost are all over the place depending where you are. (promise we all wont show up on your porch,,,,depends on whats for dinner though) I have raised or been round cattle all my life and I only have a few "pointers" .

1st, don't count on your "woods" for graze, with all do respect, as far as that goes, cows will get little benefit other than some summer shelter, winter protection. (Some cows like to calve in the thickest crap they can find) . Also the cow breed has allot to do with what they find palatable. For instance, a Brahma bred cow, will graze more types of "browse" , than say a Hereford, even a mixed cow that has some "Brahma" in it will eat a more diverse diet. Neat thing is, you can probably make improvements to the woods to accommodate some grasses, like thinning and clearing.

2. This would be fencing, sure a "lot" will do fine". just BOLO for Foot rot, subsolar absess'es,(sp) tendinitis and a few other problems that can arise from a "lot" set up. (Standing around in muddy cr%p all day). Having a fenced in area of some size, will aid you for years and give you many more options for "hobby animals" IMO. Personally, I would spend the $$ and fence in the place, or a large portion, but eventually the whole place.. (your neighbors fence will cut cost, if they have one). IMO also, you would be better off in the long run (with hobby farming in mind) to use a field fence, say 38" and a couple strands of barbed wire on top, this gives you additional options, like raising goats for instance (some here, are making more raising goats than cattle)

3. Additional cost to consider are loading facilities and working pens. There will be times you need to treat the cow and having the right facility/pen/chute can possibly save you and the animal a severe injury. The tamer the cow, the easier it is to deal with. All my cows, where easy to worm and look over in the field, but having a chute made loading much safer and easier. Spend allot of time with them and they, for the most part, will be good with you. Feed is the key, get them used to the sound of a bucket shaken with feed. (could pay huge dividends if they get out) AND don't just "turn" out a cow in a new pasture, you may end up posting a "lost reward" poster. Pen them up for a week and let them adapt. This also gives you time to make sure they aren't sick or have something that could infect your other animals. During this time, condition them to the " feed bucket" routine and/or truck horn.

I have a "theory". A cow that spends all its time standing in a feed lot, will t grow muscle (meat), but not to the degree if they are allowed to roam. If they use muscle, it should help build tone and better marbling. Just a "theory" though based on how muscle grows.


Feed cost are in no way "constant" either, a dry year and you're paying out the rear, even if the drought is in "grain country" 200 miles away. Motor seven pays $15 dollars for a bale, here you cant even fertilize for that cheap, $15 is just what the baling would cost here. Round bales here are going from $50-$100 per roll, up to $140 last summer in South Texas.

I know I probably look at it different than most here, but I think I would get in a fence 1st, (330' rolls of field fence go along way) and give you so many more options and last for years, not counting helping protect your investment (s) from now on.

Obviously I'm not familiar with "feedlot" type set up, mainly raised them for "profit' (right:confused3 so I may just be rambling as far as your needs:laughing:

 

[Egon]

There are places where digging post holes gets interesting.

 

[Western]

There are places where digging post holes gets interesting.

Got that right, but "we/he can overcome"

 

[paulharvey]

If you want to try a less risky approach, have you considered a pair of meat sheep. You would have less invested and still have several hundred lbs of meat.