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| Any pointers? How long does it take to fatten them out for butcher? What is the going rate?
Thanks so much!
Edited by Kgirl 2016-02-03 7:24 AM
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  Witty Enough
Posts: 2954
 
Location: CTX | Following, the hubby has been talking about doing this, when we get a bit more land. (Bad thing is that he wants to name them T-Bone and Sirloin....... ) |
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 Extreme Veteran
Posts: 520
Location: Lone Star State | It depends on how you want to finish one out. Some prefer grass fed beef while others grain feed. I have never grass finished one of my own but it takes about 2 years to do so and improved pastures are a big deal. We have a small Brangus herd and keep one to two calves every year to butcher. When the calf is about 10-12 months, we separate and grain feed for 90-120 days. So we butcher around 16 months old. I'm going to start this year's calves on feed sooner.
Feeding grain less than 60 days, you're just throwing your money away.
You do have to gradually work them up to full feed and always leave good quality hay for them. Also recommended to keep them in a smaller lot so they don't get to exercise their gain off and work their muscles.
Once you do get to raising your own freezer beef, it's hard to go back to store bought, that's for sure.
Going rate? For beef? For a weaned beef calf? For finished steer ready to butcher? Are you going to raise for family or sell to public?
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 John Deere Green
Posts: 12272
Location: ~Kansas~ | We get Holstein calves to fatten up, they are out on grass but we also hay and grain them as well.
Usually takes about 1 year and half I think not sure.
The meat is excellent and reason for Holsteins is they are usually cheaper :) |
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| My husbands family used to raise some angus crosses and we used to get meat from them and it was great! But now they sold out and I'm desperate for some good quality meat again! They were on a high grain diet and the meat was a tad fatty for me but still way better than store bought!
im not sure what size of calf to start off with! What do you recommend? And what do they cost? We'd rather raise them ourself so we know what they've been eating!
eta we r just wanting to raise a couple for our own quality meat
Edited by Kgirl 2016-02-03 9:23 AM
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 Go Your Own Way
Posts: 4947
Location: SE KS | depends on what weight you want to buy your calves at:
700 wight cattle are costing around 1.58 # = $1106 based on todays feeder market board
as one other poster stated, you have to work them into the feeder where they will ration themselves. So every day you give them feed, see if they clean it up, if they leave feed, you don't increase until they clean it up; it is a gradual increase of feed - when they are cleaning that up good, we turn them into what we call the feed lot with a self feeder (additional $$$ based on feed cost) and stick a round bale in there - the hay will help with any bloat (additional roughage) as they acclimate to the feeder. after the round bale is gone - they do no get any additional hay - we are trying to fatten them. then about 90-150 days we take them to the locker.
then you have to cost of the processing at the meat locker - around 500-800.
this is kansas prices:
Feeder Steers Medium and Large 1-2
Head Wt Range Avg Wt Price Range Avg Price
10 406-411 408 175.00-219.00 205.69
46 468-496 489 210.00-215.00 212.48
26 532-548 542 191.00-194.50 192.33
61 580-597 593 180.50-189.00 187.72
81 600-648 631 175.00-180.50 177.95
314 659-696 683 159.00-169.00 163.35
156 713-749 727 152.00-157.00 154.24
670 758-799 788 141.50-153.00 149.87
431 803-847 822 145.75-152.00 148.26
15 826 826 143.50 143.50 Fleshy
398 853-898 881 140.50-146.00 142.83
426 908-949 924 138.00-143.25 140.46
7 998 998 136.50 136.50
Edited by Dinero10 2016-02-03 9:37 AM
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 Experienced Mouse Trapper
Posts: 3106
Location: North Dakota | We handle our own meat from beginning to end-processing occurs at our garage. That being said we used to always have one of dads "left over" calves, either had a short ear or a funny color that the salesring would pick apart-usually born in March when they are a year old they are kicked out on grass with the cows and then the following fall they are brought in and fed grain (dad usually uses oats and barley, maybe a little wheat) we like oats barley and corn. They are on grain a minimum of 120 days. So ultimately they are almost 20 months old. We've butchered some younger but the flavor is better on older animals-also be sure that they hang in a cooler at least a week before having them processed-we prefer 10 days to 2 weeks.
With that said we have a couple roping steers we buy every year and it seems like every other year we have a couple that are too big so we will fatten them-the same way as above. The roping cattle tend to have more age on them-at least 5 years old-but the flavor of an older animal in my opinion is great! The first year we had roping cattle we sold 3 of them-for $139 total-someone had some ridiculously cheap hamburger that year! Kick myself every time I think about it. Point of my story? Don't be afraid of someones old roping cattle or a short tail/ear or funny color. The salesring will occassionally have cheaper animals if you have the time to sit and watch. We've eaten ones with a bad leg-where they're lame-missing an ear or part of a tail and they are great if you handle them well. This year it's a "blue roan" and a holstein. Next year it will be 2 corriente/longhorn crosses. Always have 2 to eat together-they like friends :) |
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Go Your Own Way
Posts: 4947
Location: SE KS | LMS - 2016-02-03 9:35 AM We handle our own meat from beginning to end-processing occurs at our garage. That being said we used to always have one of dads "left over" calves, either had a short ear or a funny color that the salesring would pick apart-usually born in March when they are a year old they are kicked out on grass with the cows and then the following fall they are brought in and fed grain (dad usually uses oats and barley, maybe a little wheat) we like oats barley and corn. They are on grain a minimum of 120 days. So ultimately they are almost 20 months old. We've butchered some younger but the flavor is better on older animals-also be sure that they hang in a cooler at least a week before having them processed-we prefer 10 days to 2 weeks.
With that said we have a couple roping steers we buy every year and it seems like every other year we have a couple that are too big so we will fatten them-the same way as above. The roping cattle tend to have more age on them-at least 5 years old-but the flavor of an older animal in my opinion is great! The first year we had roping cattle we sold 3 of them-for $139 total-someone had some ridiculously cheap hamburger that year! Kick myself every time I think about it. Point of my story? Don't be afraid of someones old roping cattle or a short tail/ear or funny color. The salesring will occassionally have cheaper animals if you have the time to sit and watch. We've eaten ones with a bad leg-where they're lame-missing an ear or part of a tail and they are great if you handle them well. This year it's a "blue roan" and a holstein. Next year it will be 2 corriente/longhorn crosses. Always have 2 to eat together-they like friends :)
kinda how we do it - something we bought at the sale barn - and just won't fit - or he got crippled.
the one we are fattening up now last year fell thru the pond 4 weight and pulled him out of the pond - broke his shoulder but
we saved him - heat lamp, blow dryer lots of towels , anyway - he travels good for a broke shoulder steer and getting fat and then eating with him we have a jersey. red (broken shoulder steer) would have been classed as a #1 steer thru the sale barn. |
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 Expert
Posts: 1857
| sold some 600-700lb calves this weekend at 140cwt, its low, if you're going to buy i'd buy now while the price is low. We have Angus so we butcher around a 1 1/2yrs and we butcher our heifers sooner than our steers. They usually weigh in at about 900-1100. We feed them out the last 90days. Avoid summer time to feed out if you're going to grain. |
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Veteran
Posts: 165
| Make sure you have good facilities for them. Good pasture fences, if wire make sure there are lots of stays in it so they can't crawl through, and a smaller corral where you can get them in incase you need to treat them or anything as well as a loading area or at least panels or something you can set up in case you ever have to load them on a trailer. |
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