JoeBnTN
Well-known member
- Joined
- Mar 10, 2008
- Messages
- 258
As many of you know several years ago I coached a successful college judging team and a meat animal elevation team. For those who aren’t familiar with meat animal evaluation, it’s the prediction, based on live evaluation, of an animal’s carcass and economic merit - or as I used to tell my teams – livestock judging was an evaluation of the “outside” of an animal, while meat animal evaluation looked at the “inside”.
Anyway I was cleaning out old files and found an exercise we used to do in class that I thought some of you might want to try. The question is simple – define an ideal steer from the livestock judge’s point of view and define an ideal steer from the meat animal evaluator’s point of view, then compare and contrast them. Keep in mind a couple of things – most of the steers in judging contests are “show” steers and meat animal evaluators are always comparing to an industry optimum – not necessarily a maximum.
To give you an idea of what I’m talking about – when I first gave this lecture 25 years ago in 1983 (yes Malinda I really am that old but thanks for the compliment), it included things like this (this list isn’t inclusive but should give you an idea):
Ideal Judging Steer:
53-55 inches tall
1150-1300 lbs.
Wide based
Clean in lower 1/3 of the body, especially in the flank and brisket
Firm handling
Ideal Evaluation Steer
1200-1350 lbs.
YG 2
.35 inches fat thickness
Low Choice carcass
12.5-14.0 REA
Likely a British – Continental cross
What about today? Anyone want to play?
Anyway I was cleaning out old files and found an exercise we used to do in class that I thought some of you might want to try. The question is simple – define an ideal steer from the livestock judge’s point of view and define an ideal steer from the meat animal evaluator’s point of view, then compare and contrast them. Keep in mind a couple of things – most of the steers in judging contests are “show” steers and meat animal evaluators are always comparing to an industry optimum – not necessarily a maximum.
To give you an idea of what I’m talking about – when I first gave this lecture 25 years ago in 1983 (yes Malinda I really am that old but thanks for the compliment), it included things like this (this list isn’t inclusive but should give you an idea):
Ideal Judging Steer:
53-55 inches tall
1150-1300 lbs.
Wide based
Clean in lower 1/3 of the body, especially in the flank and brisket
Firm handling
Ideal Evaluation Steer
1200-1350 lbs.
YG 2
.35 inches fat thickness
Low Choice carcass
12.5-14.0 REA
Likely a British – Continental cross
What about today? Anyone want to play?