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Post by jerryr on Oct 11, 2012 8:31:45 GMT -5
Thanks Gene. He's had plenty of good pasture all summer. We're not exactly sure, but he should be 25 months old now. I've been trying to hurry him up so he would be ready for slaughter beore winter, so I had been giving him 3 - 6 pounds of cattle feed (pretty good stuff from Southern States) daily for the past couple of months. Now I'm mixing some cracked corn in it and trying to increase the amount. As far as feeling around his tail head, I'm not sure exactly where to feel, but above and on the two sides, it doesn't feel very coushy, a little hard. If I do the test where you lay your hand flat on the rib cage and push back, it does ripple some but I can still make out the ribs as I go across them, but they are soft. I was really hoping to slaughter on Nov 2, becase the grass won't be so good after that, I would think, and then of couse the grass would be used up and we'd have to keep buying feed. I wonder if he will have enought fat by Nov 2? The reason Nov 2 is so important is because the only meat packer close by won't take beef between Nov 3 and Dec 15 because it's deer hunting season. :0
Thanks a lot for your opinions and advise!
Jerry
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Post by jerryr on Oct 11, 2012 8:35:28 GMT -5
Here's another pic. Thanks all! Attachments:
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Post by Olga on Oct 11, 2012 9:32:21 GMT -5
All in all, I'd go for the Nov 2 date. When you are feeding hay in the winter and the weather is colder, you are loosing a lot of the calories from what you feed him in grain. Plus, there is a decrease in Omega oil in forage once it has been cut and dried, so it's not as good as fresh grass. It would be more economical to butcher him this fall rather than have to wait till next spring, nearly.
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Post by jerryr on Oct 11, 2012 10:33:13 GMT -5
Thanks Olga. And thanks everyone for your input.
I decided to go back and feel around this tail head again. It's not really hard. It's not very cushy, but a little. I compaired with our very good cow in excellent condition, and the steer is a little more soft around the tail head than she is.
What I may do then is move him back and forth between our two pastures to encourage him to eat a lot, and try to pack the feed to him, and do the best we can till Nov 2.
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Post by dexterfarm on Oct 11, 2012 11:15:05 GMT -5
you should not need to pack feed to him. We dont feed any grain accept for an occasional treat. butcher when they are on good grass and gaining weight. I would keep feeding as you have been you dont want him to loose weight. Some fat good to much fat and it just gets cut off in trim and thrown out waste of money. Fall is a good time if the grass is good because they are naturally putting on weight for the winter as the weather starts to cool.
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Post by copperhead on Oct 13, 2012 21:35:32 GMT -5
the old timers always told me to slaughter them while they were on the gain. that steer looks good and fat, I wouldn't put another winter in him.
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Post by jerryr on Nov 19, 2012 15:13:40 GMT -5
Thanks to everyone for your advice. In case any of you are checking in I wanted to give you an udate on our results with our steer in the picture above. I continued to feed him cattle feed and some corn until he was slaughtered on Nov 2. I don't know the live weight. The hanging weight was 478 pounds. We got 327 pounds in the freezer. There was a lot of fat trimmed off so that there was a box full (about 70 pounds) of fat that the slaughter house kept to show me (so we would know what we got) that we threw away - not included in the 327 pounds. So I probably didn't need to feed him as good as I did (you nailed that dexterfarm) the last three weeks, but we got beautiful meat anyway.
About the method above where you lay your hand flat on the rib cage and push back and you aren't supposed to be able to feel the individual ribs... I could always feel the individual ribs go by as I pushed back so that never happened, but they felt soft and you couldn't see any ribs showing. So I think on Dexters, that doesn't always work where you can't feel them as you push back. He was getting more cushy around the tail head and more so than my really good cow, so now I know how that works.
Anyway, real good first experience and I sure appreciate those of you who gave advice. Thawing out some T-bone steaks for tonight.
Jerry
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