Livestock Production Systems: Beef
We all like steak. Just thinking about it gets my mouth watering. There's nothing more satisfying than visiting my local grocery store's meat market and picking out a nice juicy steak, criss-crossed with seams of succulent marbling, just begging me to grill it until the outside is done, but the center is pink and juicy. Nothing beats a tender, rare steak (I like mine with minimal seasoning, cooked just enough to be safe to eat. The rarer the better). People like their steaks all sorts of ways, but what exactly does it take to put that steak on your plate? Do you prefer grass-fed or grain-fed? Organic or conventional? What exactly did it take to get that steer or heifer from the pasture to the store? Is implanted beef safe to eat? This post aims to answer these questions and more. So without further ado, I'll begin my explanation of beef production systems with the cow-calf operation.
Birth to 7 months: The Cow-Calf Operation
Birth to 7 months: The Cow-Calf Operation
The life cycle of beef cattle starts as all mammal life cycles start: with an egg and sperm. Gametes determine what type of genetics the calf will inherit. Genetics are the single most important factor in helping a calf reach its full genetic potential, and what type of nutrition it will need later on in life. It also helps breeders select for certain desirable traits and determines breed. For instance, purebred Angus cattle are renowned for their ability to produce very well-marbled beef that tends to be more likely to grade choice or prime (What does that mean? I'll explain later). Similarly, purebred Brahma cattle are highly prized by southern ranchers for their ability to tolerate disease, insects, and heat. Breed an Angus with a Brahma, however, and you'll get what's called a "Brangus" calf which combines the meat quality of the Angus with the hardiness of the Brahma. In fact, Brahma crosses are arguably the most popular type of cattle in the south, especially in states like Florida and Texas, which are warm and teeming with mosquitoes. This superiority of cross-breeds is called "hybrid vigor" and is very heavily used in agriculture of all types, including crop farming. Different hybrids allow ranchers to customize their cattle to fit their markets and the climate, land, etc. of their particular region. This in turn maximizes profits and increases efficiency.
But how to unite the egg and the sperm? There has been increasing concern from the public that Artificial Insemination (AI) is unnatural, and some in the animal rights community have resorted to calling it a form of rape, which is insulting to actual rape victims and is morally reprehensible. In truth, AI can be better for the cow because it puts less stress on her skeleton, allowing her to live longer and be healthier, and it also helps prevent the spread of STD's such as vibriosis, which causes abortions and infertility. However, only a small percentage of beef cow-calf operations use AI. the vast majority of beef calves are conceived via natural service because of its convenience and efficiency. When a rancher has thousands of cows to breed, for example, it makes more sense to own bulls than to buy several thousand straws of semen each year and have the facilities and labor required to AI so many cows. AI is more commonly seen in the dairy industry, although many of dairy's male calves will eventually be sold to be grown and finished just like beef cattle. We call this "dairy beef" and it is prized for being a lean meat. No matter how the calf is conceived, however, it is born after a gestation period of nine months. Upon birth, males are castrated and possibly branded. Approximately ten days after birth, some calves will have a small hormone capsule injected to the back, middle third of the ear (the ear is used because it is not consumed by humans). This capsule slowly releases a hormone into the calf's system. Steer calves usually get an estrogen implant, and heifer calves which will be fed out as beef calves are implanted with progesterone. Heifers intended to be kept back as future brood cows are not implanted, because progesterone implants have been shown to cause infertility (1).
Implants have proven to be another cause of consumer concern, widely stemming from reports in 1977 of early onset puberty in Italian schoolchildren, which was blamed on illegal hormone use in beef that was being used for school lunches. At this point, there was public outcry because consumers did not understand how lawful hormone use is implemented in beef production systems, and people grabbed hold of that narrative and ran with it, even though hormones were never proven to be the cause of the early onset puberty, even though the ones in question were being used illegally. As a result, consumers hired lobbyists. Beef producers had their own lobbyists, but the consumer lobby won. As a result, even legal, vet-approved hormones were nearly all banned in the EU in 1981. Keep in mind that this ban was because of the consumer lobby, not because scientific evidence had proved that legal hormone use was dangerous to humans. When Europe banned most hormones, America proceeded to freak out. If Europe thought hormones were bad, then obviously America should ban them too, right? Fortunately, the anti-hormone lobby was never as strong in the U.S. As a result, lawful hormone use is still a regular practice in beef production. Hormone capsules do not flood the meat with estrogen. In fact, cabbage and soy have far more estrogen in them than even implanted beef, and implanted beef only has two nanograms more estrogen per pound than non-implanted beef. How much is a nanogram? A nanogram is 1.0x10-9 grams. This means implanted beef contains only TWO BILLIONTHS OF A GRAM or estrogen per pound than non-implanted beef. I have provided a graph for your viewing pleasure. I also found the numbers for a birth control pill, which many women take willingly. It's 35,000 ng/pill (2).
(Hoff man and Eversol, 1986, Hartman et al, 1998, Shore and Shemesh, 2003, USDA-ARS, 2002) Units are nanograms (ng) of estrone plus estradiol for animal products and isoflavones for plant products per 500 grams of food
I tried to put it in a bar graph, but the only two bars that even showed up were the ones for soy flour and tofu. So we just have this table instead. But if this table were true, why don't we die of estrogen overdose every time we eat a bowl of beans n' sausage? (It's a thing in Texas. I don't know about other places.) The answer is that oral estrogens are subject to digestion, meaning they are subject to denaturing acids and enzymes until they are largely broken down and neutralized. In this manner, they don't act as hormones at all anymore if they are absorbed by the body (2). The conclusion? Implanting cattle is safe. Unfortunately, I digress.
Now back to calves. From birth until they are 7-8 months old (3), calves are raised in a pasture with their mother, eating grass. Some farmers supplement feed prior to weaning, and the calves may get hay, molasses, or silage in the winter, but for the most part, their diet consists of grass. Oftentimes cow-calf operations are located on range land not suited for crop production, and as a result make agricultural use of land that would otherwise be useless. In addition, cow-calf operations are often small, family-owned herds. The average beef cow herd is only 40 head, and herds larger than 100 only make up 9% of all beef operations, and only 51% of the beef cow inventory (4). Once calves reach a certain age, they are weaned and moved on to the second stage of beef production.
Weaning to Feeding: The Stocker Cattle Operation
Stocker operations can be thought of as both a continuation of cow-calf operations and as an entirely separate stage of production. In this stage, weaned calves are placed on pasture and are kept on a grass-majority diet. The purpose of the stocker stage is to allow the steer or heifer's skeleton to grow. It's similar to how humans experience growth spurts as they mature. Stocker cattle reach their frame size at stocker operations, and they remain in this stage of production for approximately seven months, or from spring to fall (5). It's a risky business, however, because the smallest profit margins come from stocker operations. Therefore, many stocker operations are owned by people who also have cow-calf operations. Those that raise strictly stocker cattle often buy and sell by contract with feedlots and cow-calf growers. Stocker operations may also purchase their cattle from local auction barns and sell by contract to feedlots. In addition, some feedlots buy stocker cattle and raise them on pasture and bring them into the main feedlot when they are old enough. Stocker operations allow for specialization by breed, as different breeds finish differently due to frame size or genetics. For instance, remember the "dairy beef" I mentioned earlier? Holstein steers finish differently than beef steers, tending to be larger in frame size and leaner overall than breeds such as the Angus, which are smaller in frame size and tend to grade higher on the quality grade scale. Stocker operations customize by breed and feed each breed the correct diet to ensure they receive adequate nutrition and reach their highest potential on the quality grade scale and yield equation. As a result, supplemental feeding is more common in stocker operations than cow-calf production(5). Once the animal's skeleton is done growing, however, it moves to the third stage of production: the feedlot.
All About the Grade: Feedlots
The feedlot is the most well-known stage of production, and also the one subject to the most scrutiny. However, it's also the shortest stage, and arguably the most critical. The feeding, or finishing, stage is when cattle build muscle and lay down fat. American feedlots feed grain and other concentrates like cottonseed meal, dried distillers grains, and algae meal along with high-energy roughages like silage and alfalfa so that they gain an average of 2.5-4 pounds per day, and must eat approximately 6 pounds of dry-weight feed per pound of gain (4). This is another cause of concern from consumers, who feel that the grain fed to these cattle could be used to feed the hungry. This is misleading, however, as I addressed in my second blog post, "Protein in Context," not only because of the DIAAS scores of corn and wheat, but because feedlot cattle eat an incredible amount of non-human-edible protein, but because proposing that people in third-world countries live off our scraps and leftovers is morally and ethically wrong for so many reasons (read The Hunger Games. What are the people in the districts eating? The leftovers of the capitol, that's what. See? Now you're disgusted that people actually think just giving away our leftovers is the best solution. I propose instead that we teach them better ways to grow crops, and invent GMO seeds that grow in harsh climates. Mention GMOs, though, and suddenly people think you're trying to poison everyone). But seriously. Read my second blog post for more info on that.
In these feedlots, the object is to get cattle to to rail the highest choice grade and lowest numerical yield grade possible. Yield grade is an equation that has to do with how much muscle a steer or heifer has. The more muscle, the lower the grade. 1 is the best yield grade you can get, and 5 is the worst (6). Yield grade 1 carcasses have the highest percentage of boneless, closely trimmed retail cuts, and 5 has the lowest. Therefore, it is imperative that steers and heifers be heavily muscled. On the other side, quality grade is based on the degree of marbling (internal fat) in the meat, color and texture of the meat, and on the degree of ossification of cartilage in the animal (6). I have included a picture of several quality grades of meat (there are four: prime, choice, select, and standard. Prime is the best and most expensive, and standard really isn't good for much besides hamburger meat).
As you can see, standard marbling is so bad the graphic didn't even put in a picture for it. Incidentally, it's also the cheapest. By that, I mean it's dirt cheap, so the feedlot probably won't even make any money off standard cattle. They make the bulk of their money by producing cattle with choice or above grades, so cattle must be well-conditioned. The ideal feedlot steer looks like this one. He's black, so there's the possibility he could be marketed as certified Angus beef even if he isn't an Angus (that's right. Not all Angus beef comes from purebred Angus cattle. It's based on coat color and carcass indicators), he's got plenty of muscle. I'd call him a yield grade 2, and he's got plenty of fat (I'd say he'll grade choice in a few weeks).
What You Should Take Away
Cattle are fed grass for most of their lives. This is contrary to the claims from the animal rights community. I will not lie and say there aren't environmental and ethical concerns with raising cattle for food, but I believe the assets outweigh the liabilities, and that beef cattle are a good source of quality nutrition. Hormone use in beef cattle isn't near as bad as the media makes it out to be, and I firmly believe in the future of this industry as a safe, affordable food source that can help feed the world.
But how to unite the egg and the sperm? There has been increasing concern from the public that Artificial Insemination (AI) is unnatural, and some in the animal rights community have resorted to calling it a form of rape, which is insulting to actual rape victims and is morally reprehensible. In truth, AI can be better for the cow because it puts less stress on her skeleton, allowing her to live longer and be healthier, and it also helps prevent the spread of STD's such as vibriosis, which causes abortions and infertility. However, only a small percentage of beef cow-calf operations use AI. the vast majority of beef calves are conceived via natural service because of its convenience and efficiency. When a rancher has thousands of cows to breed, for example, it makes more sense to own bulls than to buy several thousand straws of semen each year and have the facilities and labor required to AI so many cows. AI is more commonly seen in the dairy industry, although many of dairy's male calves will eventually be sold to be grown and finished just like beef cattle. We call this "dairy beef" and it is prized for being a lean meat. No matter how the calf is conceived, however, it is born after a gestation period of nine months. Upon birth, males are castrated and possibly branded. Approximately ten days after birth, some calves will have a small hormone capsule injected to the back, middle third of the ear (the ear is used because it is not consumed by humans). This capsule slowly releases a hormone into the calf's system. Steer calves usually get an estrogen implant, and heifer calves which will be fed out as beef calves are implanted with progesterone. Heifers intended to be kept back as future brood cows are not implanted, because progesterone implants have been shown to cause infertility (1).
Implants have proven to be another cause of consumer concern, widely stemming from reports in 1977 of early onset puberty in Italian schoolchildren, which was blamed on illegal hormone use in beef that was being used for school lunches. At this point, there was public outcry because consumers did not understand how lawful hormone use is implemented in beef production systems, and people grabbed hold of that narrative and ran with it, even though hormones were never proven to be the cause of the early onset puberty, even though the ones in question were being used illegally. As a result, consumers hired lobbyists. Beef producers had their own lobbyists, but the consumer lobby won. As a result, even legal, vet-approved hormones were nearly all banned in the EU in 1981. Keep in mind that this ban was because of the consumer lobby, not because scientific evidence had proved that legal hormone use was dangerous to humans. When Europe banned most hormones, America proceeded to freak out. If Europe thought hormones were bad, then obviously America should ban them too, right? Fortunately, the anti-hormone lobby was never as strong in the U.S. As a result, lawful hormone use is still a regular practice in beef production. Hormone capsules do not flood the meat with estrogen. In fact, cabbage and soy have far more estrogen in them than even implanted beef, and implanted beef only has two nanograms more estrogen per pound than non-implanted beef. How much is a nanogram? A nanogram is 1.0x10-9 grams. This means implanted beef contains only TWO BILLIONTHS OF A GRAM or estrogen per pound than non-implanted beef. I have provided a graph for your viewing pleasure. I also found the numbers for a birth control pill, which many women take willingly. It's 35,000 ng/pill (2).
(Hoff man and Eversol, 1986, Hartman et al, 1998, Shore and Shemesh, 2003, USDA-ARS, 2002) Units are nanograms (ng) of estrone plus estradiol for animal products and isoflavones for plant products per 500 grams of food
I tried to put it in a bar graph, but the only two bars that even showed up were the ones for soy flour and tofu. So we just have this table instead. But if this table were true, why don't we die of estrogen overdose every time we eat a bowl of beans n' sausage? (It's a thing in Texas. I don't know about other places.) The answer is that oral estrogens are subject to digestion, meaning they are subject to denaturing acids and enzymes until they are largely broken down and neutralized. In this manner, they don't act as hormones at all anymore if they are absorbed by the body (2). The conclusion? Implanting cattle is safe. Unfortunately, I digress.
Now back to calves. From birth until they are 7-8 months old (3), calves are raised in a pasture with their mother, eating grass. Some farmers supplement feed prior to weaning, and the calves may get hay, molasses, or silage in the winter, but for the most part, their diet consists of grass. Oftentimes cow-calf operations are located on range land not suited for crop production, and as a result make agricultural use of land that would otherwise be useless. In addition, cow-calf operations are often small, family-owned herds. The average beef cow herd is only 40 head, and herds larger than 100 only make up 9% of all beef operations, and only 51% of the beef cow inventory (4). Once calves reach a certain age, they are weaned and moved on to the second stage of beef production.
Weaning to Feeding: The Stocker Cattle Operation
Stocker operations can be thought of as both a continuation of cow-calf operations and as an entirely separate stage of production. In this stage, weaned calves are placed on pasture and are kept on a grass-majority diet. The purpose of the stocker stage is to allow the steer or heifer's skeleton to grow. It's similar to how humans experience growth spurts as they mature. Stocker cattle reach their frame size at stocker operations, and they remain in this stage of production for approximately seven months, or from spring to fall (5). It's a risky business, however, because the smallest profit margins come from stocker operations. Therefore, many stocker operations are owned by people who also have cow-calf operations. Those that raise strictly stocker cattle often buy and sell by contract with feedlots and cow-calf growers. Stocker operations may also purchase their cattle from local auction barns and sell by contract to feedlots. In addition, some feedlots buy stocker cattle and raise them on pasture and bring them into the main feedlot when they are old enough. Stocker operations allow for specialization by breed, as different breeds finish differently due to frame size or genetics. For instance, remember the "dairy beef" I mentioned earlier? Holstein steers finish differently than beef steers, tending to be larger in frame size and leaner overall than breeds such as the Angus, which are smaller in frame size and tend to grade higher on the quality grade scale. Stocker operations customize by breed and feed each breed the correct diet to ensure they receive adequate nutrition and reach their highest potential on the quality grade scale and yield equation. As a result, supplemental feeding is more common in stocker operations than cow-calf production(5). Once the animal's skeleton is done growing, however, it moves to the third stage of production: the feedlot.
All About the Grade: Feedlots
The feedlot is the most well-known stage of production, and also the one subject to the most scrutiny. However, it's also the shortest stage, and arguably the most critical. The feeding, or finishing, stage is when cattle build muscle and lay down fat. American feedlots feed grain and other concentrates like cottonseed meal, dried distillers grains, and algae meal along with high-energy roughages like silage and alfalfa so that they gain an average of 2.5-4 pounds per day, and must eat approximately 6 pounds of dry-weight feed per pound of gain (4). This is another cause of concern from consumers, who feel that the grain fed to these cattle could be used to feed the hungry. This is misleading, however, as I addressed in my second blog post, "Protein in Context," not only because of the DIAAS scores of corn and wheat, but because feedlot cattle eat an incredible amount of non-human-edible protein, but because proposing that people in third-world countries live off our scraps and leftovers is morally and ethically wrong for so many reasons (read The Hunger Games. What are the people in the districts eating? The leftovers of the capitol, that's what. See? Now you're disgusted that people actually think just giving away our leftovers is the best solution. I propose instead that we teach them better ways to grow crops, and invent GMO seeds that grow in harsh climates. Mention GMOs, though, and suddenly people think you're trying to poison everyone). But seriously. Read my second blog post for more info on that.
In these feedlots, the object is to get cattle to to rail the highest choice grade and lowest numerical yield grade possible. Yield grade is an equation that has to do with how much muscle a steer or heifer has. The more muscle, the lower the grade. 1 is the best yield grade you can get, and 5 is the worst (6). Yield grade 1 carcasses have the highest percentage of boneless, closely trimmed retail cuts, and 5 has the lowest. Therefore, it is imperative that steers and heifers be heavily muscled. On the other side, quality grade is based on the degree of marbling (internal fat) in the meat, color and texture of the meat, and on the degree of ossification of cartilage in the animal (6). I have included a picture of several quality grades of meat (there are four: prime, choice, select, and standard. Prime is the best and most expensive, and standard really isn't good for much besides hamburger meat).
As you can see, standard marbling is so bad the graphic didn't even put in a picture for it. Incidentally, it's also the cheapest. By that, I mean it's dirt cheap, so the feedlot probably won't even make any money off standard cattle. They make the bulk of their money by producing cattle with choice or above grades, so cattle must be well-conditioned. The ideal feedlot steer looks like this one. He's black, so there's the possibility he could be marketed as certified Angus beef even if he isn't an Angus (that's right. Not all Angus beef comes from purebred Angus cattle. It's based on coat color and carcass indicators), he's got plenty of muscle. I'd call him a yield grade 2, and he's got plenty of fat (I'd say he'll grade choice in a few weeks).
What You Should Take Away
Cattle are fed grass for most of their lives. This is contrary to the claims from the animal rights community. I will not lie and say there aren't environmental and ethical concerns with raising cattle for food, but I believe the assets outweigh the liabilities, and that beef cattle are a good source of quality nutrition. Hormone use in beef cattle isn't near as bad as the media makes it out to be, and I firmly believe in the future of this industry as a safe, affordable food source that can help feed the world.
Sources:
(1) http://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.cfm?number=B1302
(2) http://newsroom.unl.edu/announce/beef/2846/15997
(3) http://www.nda.agric.za/docs/weaning/weaning.htm
(4) https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/animal-products/cattle-beef/background/
(5) http://www.cias.wisc.edu/stocker-cattle-convert-pasture-to-profits/
(6) http://meat.tamu.edu/beefgrading/
I'm a full-time college student at Texas A&M University, where I'm in the process of getting my Animal Science degree, with eventual aspirations to go to law school and work as a consulting lawyer for agriculture corporations. I grew up around animals, and currently manage an operation that breeds show-quality boer goats for 4H and FFA exhibitors. My family also raises commercial cattle in south Texas.
I'm a full-time college student at Texas A&M University, where I'm in the process of getting my Animal Science degree, with eventual aspirations to go to law school and work as a consulting lawyer for agriculture corporations. I grew up around animals, and currently manage an operation that breeds show-quality boer goats for 4H and FFA exhibitors. My family also raises commercial cattle in south Texas.
Good stuff!! :)
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