Our Actual Jersey Steer Numbers

[ourflockof4]

Since this touches on breeds/feeding/care/ect I decided to put this in everything else.

It seems like a lot of times people are on here asking about what breeds to get, how much it cost to but meat in the freezer, ect, so I thought that I would share our actual numbers. I will try to put a value to the item so anyone can modify per local prices.

Background info - My wife decided that she wanted to raise a steer for the freezer last winter, and being a good husband (and smart) I said whatever you want dear. We decided that since it was our first time a young steer would be nice so we could get used to handling cattle. In January we found a fairly inexpensive steer from a local dairy. It was 2-3 months old and looked to be a jersey brown swiss cross (call him steer "A"). About 2 months later we picked up a 1 month old full blood jersey from the same farm (steer "B"). Both were healthy bright eyed bull calves that were already on hay and grain.

They were both raised with free choice grain in front of them 24/7, with limited hay, and limited pasture. Our spring was crazy with lots of wild temperature swings so it wasn't the best growing conditions. We also fought pink eye in the summer, steer "B" was always a lot more high maintnence then steer "A". We banded in May/June time frame.

Our feed was a ration of ground ear corn and a steak maker concentrate designed especially for dairy steers. The nutritionalist I was working with recomended a max of 2-3 lbs of hay/head/day, but we didn't hold to that. They always had more hay & graze than that.

We decided to take them to the butcher early since we were out of ear corn, our freezer was almost empty, and we needed space in the barn for the beef cows & calves. It also seemed like it make the most sense when I projected our cost out until finish. So here is a quick run down. All these prices are current market value, not what I actually have into it. You can't buy ear corn from a grain elevator so I plugged in cost to buy shelled corn (ear corn weights 70lbs/bu, shelled corn is 56lbs/bu). I did not figure in water, fuel to grind & haul feed, ect. It's too hard for me to quantify these cost currently.

Steer "A"
Price - $150
Weight - 125 lbs
Rate of gain - 1.5 lbs/day +/-
Grain Used - 2 tons (50 bu ear corn, 10 bags of concentrate)
grain cost - $570 (corn $8/bu, concentrate $17/bg)
Hay cost - $50 ($200/tn)
Hanging weight - 375 lbs
Live weight - 575 lbs
Proccessing cost - $205
Total cost - $975
Price/lbs - $3.44/lb

Projected Finish weight - 1,000 lbs (Aug '13)
Projected hanging weight - 650 lbs
Projected additional feed - $1500 (@ 4% feed intake/day)
Projected total cost - $2750 (added some for hay, bedding, increased process cost)
Projected price/lb - $4.23/lb

Steer "B"
Price - $100
Weight - 85 lbs
Rate of gain - 1 lb/day +/-
Grain Used - 1 tons (25 bu ear corn, 5 bags of concentrate)
grain cost - $285 (corn $8/bu, concentrate $17/bg)
Hay cost - $30 ($200/tn)
Hanging weight - 210 lbs
Live weight - 325 lbs
Proccessing cost - $105
Total cost - $520
Price/lbs - $2.50/lb

Projected Finish weight - 900lbs (Jan '14)
Projected hanging weight - 585 lbs
Projected additional feed - $2200 (@ 4% feed intake/day)
Projected total cost - $2650 (added some for hay, bedding, increased process cost)
Projected price/lb - $4.52/lb

Yes, you can raise them for less, especially with cutting back on the grain. But, right now with hay at $300-400/ton the cost of gain is less with grain. Yes a lot of times people can find a day old bottle calf for $25-50, my numbers reflect the healthy started calves we bought. Make sure you figure in replacer and death loss with day olds.

If our projected cost would have been lower we may have found a way to finish them out. But with the higher cost to finish & needing the barn space & beef it made sense. I would rather but the corn we have through a steer that can utilize it better and give us a lower cost of gain (like our angus x beef steers)

Yes, you can also raise them on pasture with little grain. We tried it. After 2-3 weeks they were back in the barn. The beef crosses were on the same pasture and eaisly maintaning condition while the jersey's dropped condition fast.

 

[Mike Fronczak]

That's some great info.
And confirms what my experience/thoughts have been. Our first two steers were a Jersey & a Jersey/Holestien cross. We went through a lot of grain. We got into raising Highlands after that, I almost never give grain now, only keep around for necessary times, otherwise Hay & Pasture only.

 

[WildRoseBeef]

The last sentence is a particular one that confirms my suspicions. Yes, they can be raised on pasture with limited grain, but not for very long otherwise they loose too much condition--at least that's the gist I got from it, and certainly not like beef cattle can be raised on pasture. If you're going to raise dairy cattle on pasture, they need grain in addition with what they're getting from grass.

Good info, thanks for sharing.

 

[ourflockof4]

The last sentence is a particular one that confirms my suspicions. Yes, they can be raised on pasture with limited grain, but not for very long otherwise they loose too much condition--at least that's the gist I got from it, and certainly not like beef cattle can be raised on pasture. If you're going to raise dairy cattle on pasture, they need grain in addition with what they're getting from grass.

Good info, thanks for sharing.

Yes, that is exactually it, at least in our experience. There are a couple people in my area that raise jerseys on just pasture and they look extrememly thin. I'm sure I probably could have ration feed ours and maintaned condition then pushed at the end to get a good finish, but when we first stated we had some cheap corn.

I will clarify though, when they were on pasture they still had access to full feed all day. They would fill up on graze though and eat very little grain = lost condition. I would guess limited grase and 3% body weight/day in grain (600 lb steer = 20lbs/day) I was also feeding ground ear corn which is higher roughage then shelled corn would be. I would think you could reduce by 20% with shelled corn.

 

[Royd Wood]

wow - no disrespect to those that do but why bother with dairy steers and their med bills ?????????? - I kill bigger pigs
Great info and good on you for logging info down - more of us should do that

 

[WildRoseBeef]

The last sentence is a particular one that confirms my suspicions. Yes, they can be raised on pasture with limited grain, but not for very long otherwise they loose too much condition--at least that's the gist I got from it, and certainly not like beef cattle can be raised on pasture. If you're going to raise dairy cattle on pasture, they need grain in addition with what they're getting from grass.

Good info, thanks for sharing.

Yes, that is exactually it, at least in our experience. There are a couple people in my area that raise jerseys on just pasture and they look extrememly thin. I'm sure I probably could have ration feed ours and maintaned condition then pushed at the end to get a good finish, but when we first stated we had some cheap corn.

I will clarify though, when they were on pasture they still had access to full feed all day. They would fill up on graze though and eat very little grain = lost condition. I would guess limited grase and 3% body weight/day in grain (600 lb steer = 20lbs/day) I was also feeding ground ear corn which is higher roughage then shelled corn would be. I would think you could reduce by 20% with shelled corn.

Thanks for the clarification, especially for those who probably wouldn't've gotten what you were trying to put out in your first post--last few sentences. Definitely shows how well beefers do on grass compared to dairiers...

And yeah, what Royd said about more of us should log down such info as that.

 

[ourflockof4]

Royd - That is why we processed our dairy steers before they were finished. I could see the writing on the wall and knew it wasn't going ot end well. Yes, everyone should try to keep accurate records. I spent 2 hours last night logging info into spread sheats and am about half way done. I came to the conclusion my record keeping sucks. I need to get & write reciepts for everything next year.

WildRoseBeef - Yes, night and day beef/dairy cattle. As a comparison, our hay production was worrible this year so I'm trying to streatch everyting. Right now I'm feeding a very low quality hay (been outside uncovered since last spring) and he beef cows & calves still look great. There is now way I could do that with the dairy steers.

My intention isn't to tell anyone that this or that doesn't work, or get this animal instead of that animal, or whatever. I see a lot of people asking questions about what to get, or what it cost to do whatever, so this was just my perspective. I do know a couple local farmers that finish out several hundred head of dairy steers a year. They claim they are making money at it (I wonder if they really are when they figure the opprotunity cost of what they could sell their corn for instead of feeding it though)

I also must clarify though that when I say finish I do mean a nice finished steer, meaty with good marbling but not overly fat. If I am goiung to spend 12-18 months to raise an animals I am going to get the best finished product I can.

 

[sawfish99]

Thanks for sharing.

Do you know how the conversion worked out from hanging weight to packaged meat?

 

[ourflockof4]

Thanks for sharing.

Do you know how the conversion worked out from hanging weight to packaged meat?

No we never checked that conversion, I wish I would have though.

I must say though that the quality of meat was better then I expected. The flavor is excellent and the larger one had very good marbling with no real excess fat, with is how I like it.

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

Thank you for breaking down the numbers.

We are selling the two little Jersey steer that are in my avatar tomorrow morning, at a loss. They are almost 2 years old now, and have eaten the same food as each other and as of our Hereford. The Hereford clearly outweighs the Jerseys by a long shot and keeps condition well. I must say however, that alot of what your end result is in a Jersey seems to have much to do with breeding stock as well. They both came from the same dairy, and as stated have both been raised the exact same way. However, one actually has a little meat on him. The other one, all bones and stomache! Clearly different parents.


I am actually glad that we did not record numbers as we could have. At this point, I would be really dissapointed. Instead, I am just taking it as "lesson learned".