he stress of this experience. Then we separate the mothers from the calves, which triggers a couple of days of mooing. But the mothers soon realize that having a 600-pound calf nursing maybe wasn’t that ideal, and they are happy to go back to the pasture and eventually to the stalk fields during the fall. By this time, calves are used to eating from the feed bunks with their mothers, and they are happy to eat their own food without any competition.
More Growing. After weaning, calves eat a diet that is almost entirely roughage – corn silage and hay, plus soybean meal as a protein supplement. We also feed vitamins A, D, & E to make up for the fact that it is now fall and foods are no longer fresh, but must be stored in our part of the country. Corn is gradually added as the calf matures. We believe in using a high roughage diet throughout the calf’s time in the feedlot – even when a calf is weighing 1200 pounds, he is eating about 40 percent of his diet by weight in the form of roughage. We believe this reduces stress and permits the cattle to use their normal digestive processes to their advantage – and ours.
Harvesting. When the calves approach 1200 pounds, we take them to a local locker for processing. The carcass generally hangs in a cooler for a period from 2-3 weeks, after which it is cut, wrapped, and frozen – ready to be taken home by our customers.
This entire process – from birth to harvest — takes about 15 months or more. We typically begin harvesting the calves in May or early June, and the last ones are ready in the early Fall. Of course, the investment time frame is much longer than this. If we start with a heifer calf born on our farm, it will take one year until she becomes old enough to breed, another year to have that first calf, and then another 15 months until that calf is big enough to become a steak.
We must operate on long time horizons. When other farms were profiting from high corn prices, we decided to look to the future and to invest in new pastures and more cattle, continuing to chop and feed that high-priced corn, marketing it on the hoof rather than sending it to town. It is a steady commitment, as these animals require our care in freezing cold, blazing sun, and everything in between. Fortunately, there are days when it all works, when there can be nothing better. Looking out at a peaceful grazing herd, watching a newborn calf get up and nurse, and seeing growing calves come to the bunk and eat somehow makes up for the days of snow, ice, mud, and hardship.
Our methods are more costly than those used by commercial feedlots. But we think the difference is worth it, both in terms of the quality of life we are able to deliver to our animals, and in terms of the quality of the meat that these animals provide for us. We take care of our cattle; they take care of us. It is that simple.