rachels.haven's Journal

[Bruce]

200 pounds of meat from an 1100 pound steer? It would have had to be a bag of bones to have such poor yield. Yep, don't look back though if you know of others that use that processor it would be interesting to compare notes.

 

[Bruce]

Yay for the thrills of semi domesticated waterfowl.

So PETA wouldn't be QUITE as mad at you since they aren't willing to be kept "at home"?

 

[rachels.haven]

This lamancha's pinnae are broken. Maybe some sort of trauma early in life.
She needs a registered name. Her mother's name is lady as in lady luck. I may have one, not sure. Still working on it.

 

[Nubiansrock]

I’m with you! I tend to lurk and read other peoples stuff but I’m just getting going in a goat venture and really need some guiding. So I’m trying to be more active and social. Here’s two of my girls...

and of course my best girl and 3yr son!

 

[rachels.haven]

Lovely! And pictures are the best. I think that's why we're encouraged to share journals.

Love what I can see of your farm setup!

 

[Nubiansrock]

200 pounds of meat from an 1100 pound steer? It would have had to be a bag of bones to have such poor yield. Yep, don't look back though if you know of others that use that processor it would be interesting to compare notes.

We recently took a 1085lb black angus steer to be butchered and came home with 425lbs of meat! Which now our boy was a big boned steer that we fed out for three months instead of the normal two. Because he turned into an escape artist! And we couldn’t find were he kept getting out of the five strand bar wire fence. So into the feed lot he went.

 

[Senile_Texas_Aggie]

Miss @Nubiansrock,

Welcome to Back Yard Herds! We are glad you are here. Since you said in your intro that you are new to goats, you have found a good thread to follow, namely Miss @rachels.haven's journal. There are a lot of other folks on here that also know a lot about goats, such as Miss @chickens really, who resides in Alberta, Canada, and Miss @B&B Happy goats, who resides in Florida. You may also be interested in getting to know Miss @thistlebloom, Miss @Mini Horses, and Miss @Hudson and me, as well as others, who are big horse enthusiasts.

Your residing in middle Tennessee puts you near Mr. @Mike CHS, who raises sheep. His journal is named "Teresa & Mike CHS - Our journal". Several others worth mentioning are Miss @Baymule, who resides in east Texas, who raises sheep, and is one of the wittiest people on here. Another person of keen wit is Mr. @Bruce of NW Vermont, who raises chickens and alpacas. Another quite witty person is Miss @Ridgetop, who currently resides in southern California, and who raises sheep, among other things.

Another really smart person on this forum is Miss @farmerjan, who resides in southwestern Virginia and who raises cattle, chickens, and hay.

I could go on and on but you get the idea. In fact, I have yet to meet anyone on this forum who is not interesting in some way. (For those of you on the forum whom I did not mention by name, please don't feel slighted. I just didn't want for this post to get too long.)

I hope you will consider starting your own journal. There is a suggested outline in the thread titled "For those who don't know where to begin." And pictures. We love pictures!

Senile Texas Aggie

 

[Bruce]

This lamancha's

The one on the left or the right because the goat in the foreground don't look like a Lamancha - it has ears!

 

[rachels.haven]

Lol, somebody just grabbed those ears on both sides and stretched them right out till they flopped off to the side right and left.
Regardless, she's a good girl. Biosecurity testing goes out on Thursday (her herd was supposedly clean and probably are, but you know-checking and all) and when that comes back she can join the herd.

 

[Ridgetop]

Absolutely nothing I can prove but we weren't happy with the end product two times in a row. Two 115 pound wethers yielded 40 pounds of meat and a half of an 1100 pound steer yielded a little less than 200 pounds of off tasting meat with cuts of T-bone that were not much bigger than our lamb chops.

Since MikeCHS knows how to finish out his butcher lambs, the butcher might have been changing out his prime carcasses for lesser grade carcasses and selling off the prime meat. Removing a few cuts from each animal he processes would stock his sale cases for nothing. Also, who raised the steer? The taste of the meat can change depending on the type of feed it was fed. However, again the lower yield, small steak sizes, and off flavor would suggest that the butcher is substituting lesser grade carcasses for your prime meat. Again holding back a few cuts here and there in a busy operations would make up a lot of individual meat sales. It has been known to happen. Rates of yield on different livestock vary but not that much! Definitely change butchers.

Beef, lamb, veal usually yield approximately 50% meat depending o the grade of the carcass. I always ask what my carcasses graded. I have had a couple of Dorset lambs yield significantly less than expected but that was years ago when I wasn't weighing and their access to feed was limited. They were not in a creep situation and the ewes were crowding them out.

Well fed lambs (and 115 lb. lambs are well fed) should yield around 50 lbs. of meat at least. It the lambs are over fed there can be too much fat which is trimmed off lowering the yield percentage. However fat weighs less than muscle so the drop in yield shouldn't be that significant. Particularly in your Katahdins or the black faced breeds that are larger framed sheep. I can't feed my smaller framed White Dorpers much above 110 lbs. or it all turns into excess fat. However, a 100-110 young Dorper carcass will still yield 50 lbs. of prime meat.

Hog yield is the best. They can yield from 65 to 75% since lot of the scrap meat is ground into sausage.

I weigh my lambs before they go to the butcher, and give a list to the butcher with the ear tag numbers. I also ask for the ear tags to be included in the boxes of meat to make sure I get my own stuff back, although that is not a guarantee. I have known my guy for years and he is completely trustworthy, but I also like to make sure that certain long time customers get the larger lambs. I also ask my butcher how my carcasses graded out. It pays to know what cuts come from where on the carcass, and what the normal carcass yield would be on your animal. A large boned poorly fleshed animal can have a low yield but a properly finished out animal will have a normal yield.