Lactating Steers? Beef Herdshares. Fresh Chicken & Ground Sale

This feedlot picture is of course NOT our grass-fed/pasture-raised cows which I frequently highlight in the farm newsletter.  This is how the other 99% of beef cows are raised in the US…finished on grain and silage in a crowded poopy feedlot with thousands of other cattle in what's called a CAFO (Confined Animal Feeding Operation). 

 

I have been thinking about feedlots since reading an article a few days ago about the surprisingly high number of “lactating” steers that are turning up beef slaughterhouses nowdays. Just to clarify, a beef steer is a castrated male animal and normally would not produce milk. However, this article mentioned that up to 20% of the feedlot steers arriving in some slaughterhouses are now producing milk, or lactating. Very weird and unsettling since most Americans are eating this hormonally-confused beef. Might be leading to hormonally-confused kids?

 

This article, featured on the ACRES USA website, explores some of the possible explanations for this phenomenon, including the hormone implants that all feedlot cattle receive to speed up their growth rates, or the heavy fat load they carry to increase “marbling” of the meat which increases the value of the carcass. 

 

Whatever the reason for these lactating steers, it is clear that our industrial food system's ongoing infatuation with “faster, cheaper, more efficient” food production is leading us into all kinds of unintended consequences that are negatively impacting the health of Americans.  

 

As writer and farm philosopher Wendell Berry wrote "People are fed by the food industry, which pays no attention to health, and are treated by the health industry, which pays no attention to food."  Mr. Berry passed away this week and we will miss his many contributions to improving our food system.

 

On the topic of beef, we launched our beef herdshare program last week and still have a few shares available. As a reminder this program will help us fund the purchase of up to 100 six-to-eight month-old weaned calves in the coming months to replace our finishing herd and add some additional heifers to the cow-calf operation next fall.  

 

We are expecting to pay $2,500-$2,700 per head at current prices, meaning we have to come up with at least $250,000 over the next several months to continue growing our beef herd. 

 

We have almost fifty (50) head of 100% grass-fed/pasture-raised beef that are ready for processing this fall (September through December). We can only allocate 20 sides of beef this fall for custom half beef orders, and will make those available to the first 20 customers that sign onto the beef herdshare program. 

 

It's pretty simple, herdshare owners will pay a $6,000 deposit at signup and receive a custom half-beef this fall, and another half-beef next year no earlier than July.  We will hold our custom beef prices for herdshare owners at the current $8.95/lb.(hanging weight) for both years even if we raise them for non-owners. For each half beef order we will apply $3,000 of the deposit toward the cost of the meat and processing fees.

 

If interested in purchasing a beef herdshare please reply to this email and I will send you the simple one-page agreement to review and answer any questions. Scheduling preferences for half-beef orders this fall will be based on timing of signing on to the program.