Unbeknownist to most, if not all urbanites, when someone raises beef cattle, they’re more often than not raising them in the feedlot. For your information and for what it’s worth, cattle in the feedlot are really the endpoint of raising cattle, not the beginning, the end, and everything in between. Cattle in the feedlot are only being fattened up for slaughter.
So there is far more to raising beef cattle than a “normal” person can fathom, but enough that any cattleperson can tell you, off the top of their heads, what each type of operation involves. It is here that I wish to take the time to explain the differences and point out the different types of beef operations.
There are five different areas of cattle production on the beef side alone:
Purebred or Seedstock cow-calf
Commercial cow-calf
Stocker/Backgrounding
Feedlot
Slaughter
Purebreeding or Seedstock operations are farms or ranches that breed registered, purebred cattle of one breed to the same breed to produce offspring that are sold to commercial producers or other seestock producers. The selection of cows and bulls in this operation is to produce calves that meet the standards of other producers in terms of producing other calves for beef or for the next generation of heifers and bulls for yet other seedstock or commercial producers.
Being a seedstock producer is much harder than it looks. Besides paying a registration fee for each purebred calf born, you must market yourself and your cattle/operation through advertisement in magazines, ag newspapers, and showrings, including having to have cattle to be trained for showing. You also have to have the confidence, trustworthiness, loyalty, and dedication towards your customers to make them happy and have them come back again and again. Experience under your belt helps a lot in this way, and much skills in marketing, financing, as well as running your cattle farm/ranch is also a ticket to success in this business. Remember, you are selling cattle that other producers are using and expect results from that you claim in your advertisements and sales. In order to have satisfied customers, you have to live up to those claims and keep it that way.
A purebred breeder has many breeds to choose from, and can choose based on past experience, fads, recommendations, or simply because they like the breed. Choice of breed is also determined by the topography, climate and vegetation you are in as well as your management practices you wish to or are implementing. For instance, if you have a management practice that insists on raising top-quality cattle on only grass with no supplements (except mineral) in a topographical area where pampering them isn’t possible (for instance, in the rough prairie rangeland east of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada), you might want consider the following breeds: Hereford, Angus, Red Angus, Shorthorn, Murray Grey, North Devon, South Devon, Highland, Galloway, Belted Galloway, Red Poll, Texas Longhorn, English Longhorn, and Dexter. Other things that determine what breeds you should pursue is demand from other cow-calf producers. Thus, the first five breeds should be considered first and foremost before the last nine. Other breeds that require more maintenance and more pampering include those 14 listed, as well as Charolais, Simmental, Limousin, Saler, Maine Anjou, Blonde d’Aquataine, Chianina, Belgian Blue, Piedmontese, and many others. For the hotter climates, such as down in the South of the US, the following are most commonly raised: Brahman, Beefmaster, Droughtmaster, Santa Gertrudis, Charbray, Brangus, Red Brangus, Santa Cruz, Braford, Barzona, American, Ranger, and many other breeds derived from the crossing of Brahman with other European breeds.
Commercial cow-calf production is the easiest part of the cattle business to get into and the most recommended for those starting up. There is much more flexibility in this operation with choice of breeds because one can choose to start with one breed as a commercial animal, and stick with that breed without the necessary hassle of paying regristration fees nor advertising. With that one breed, one of many things can be done: 1) stick with that breed 2) crossbreed with another breed and sell all offspring 3) retain crossbred females and slowly “wean” the straightbred foundation females out, 4) eventually go the seedstock route with more experience gained as the months and years go by, and other things you wish to pursue.
Most commercial producers have crossbred females to produce calves that are only used for beef production, taking advantage of heterosis to produce high quality, beefy calves that the slaughter plants are looking for. Thus, in most cases uniformity doesn’t matter as far as colour goes. Commercial producers are more sensitive to the fluctuations of the markets than seedstock producers, since their weaned calves go directly to the salebarn. However, as mentioned above with seedstock producers, topography, climate and vegetation in the area that the ranch/farm is located in determines what cattle and what breeds of cattle will do best, as well as the management practices involved. Thus the definition of commercial production is producing a calf crop that is to be sold for meat production, with a small percentage of highest-quality females kept for herd replacements. No males are kept for breeding, because of the disadvantages of having a crossbred male breed crossbred females, as well as fears of inbreeding.
Stocker/Backgrounding involves calves that are purchased from commercial cow-calf (and seedstock) producers through the auction mart/salebarn that are fed up to weight for the feedlot. Calves in this stage are growing, so they need feed that is not too high in energy for them to gain too much fat, but feed that helps them grow muscle and bone before they put on weight in the feedlot. A diet of 90% forage high in protein and macrominerals like calcium and phosphorus is a must, with a touch of grain to give them a bit of energy.
However, despite the best intentions possible to feed these weaned calves the best quality forage, genetic qualities come into play into how well a calf will grow in this type of operation, as well as the subsequent feedlot/finishing phase. This is where heterosis becomes a factor: it is, by definition, the result of breeding one breed to a different breed to produce offspring that displays genetic or physical traits that are superior to either of its parents. For example, the offspring from mating a Hereford bull to an Angus cow produces what is known as a black-white face or black-baldy calf, and this calf tends to display better carcass quality characteristics, rate of gain and growthiness than either parents. Thus in a stocker operation, these calves will excel in performance over the purebred calves, making them the most sought-after type of cattle for beef production than anything else.
A stocker operation typically is one where calves are purchased in the spring, pastured over the summer and early fall, and sold in the fall. A backgrounding may be long-term, or over a period of a year: a producer buys weaned calves in the fall (where they weigh at around 500-600 lbs), winters them with hay and silage, pastures them from late spring, through summer into early fall, then sells them in mid-fall where they weigh approximately 900-1000 lbs. It’s not uncommon either to background calves over a much shorter period of time, such as during the winter months, or even graze them (as stockers) from spring to fall. Backgrounding operations can also be found in feedlots, where hay is brought to the weaners (called feeder calves) all the time until they are at the weight good enough to start them on a finisher ration.
Breeds differ here: Continentals, like Charolais, Simmental and Limousin who mature later and grow faster, can be put in the feedlot right away. The British breeds (Angus, Hereford, Shorthorn, etc.) need to be put through a stocker/backgrounding operation because of their ability to put on fat too soon, and mature early.
The feedlot is the final phase of feeding beefers, thus the “finishing” phase. This is where many people are debating about the health and welfare of the cattle in these operations, and the point where beef may be deemed “unhealthy” due of the grain these cattle consume. The 80 to 85% grain-ration is not natural for cattle because it is high in starch not fibre, thus most cattle become sick with acidosis and bloat. Antibiotics, feed additives like Rumensin and other things that prevent these illnesses are mixed in the feed. Cattle are in the feedlot for several months–typically around 150 to 160 days–until they reach a target weight of around 1400 lbs.
The slaughter plant is where cattle are killed, hung, dressed, quartered and boxed or packaged up to be fed to the human population through the supermarket, on-farm sales (also called direct sales), farmer markets and many restaurants. Other inedible parts are used for everything we use, live in, wear, and enjoy.
Cattle are slaughtered by a stunning method called a cap-bolt gun, where cattle, who are restrained in a chute (often with solid sides as highly recommended by animal behaviourist expert Temple Grandin), and shot in the head a couple times, then strung up by their hind legs. They are quickly bled out by a quick slash to the jugular vein located in the neck, and moved down the assembly line to have the hide, legs, head, tail and entrails removed. Excess fat may have to be removed depending on the type of animal that was slaughtered and the breed. The carcass is weighed to determine the “hot carcass weight” of the animal, then sent to a cold storage facility where it cures for a couple weeks before being quartered and diced.
Once the carcass has gone through the curing process, different parts of the carcass are cut for different cuts of beef, such as roasts, steaks, and tenderloin. The beef cuts that are not suitable to be eaten whole are ground up and used for hamburger patties or as ground beef, as well as for sausages. Other parts of the carcass that fall short of being used for human consumption are ground up and used as livestock feed, primarily for pigs and chickens, but not for ruminants like cows, sheep, deer and goats.
All five of these areas of producing beef cattle (or beef) have their own complexities, but each of these areas of production all have one thing in common: to work toward the outcome of providing food in the form of meat to the general population.