The Lowline Angus Story...

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TJ

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farmboy said:
SHOW UP TO THE FAIR AND ALL MY BUDDYS WATCH ME STRUT MY 46 INCH CALF AROUND AND WONDER WHAT IT IS (lol) IM DEFINENTLY GONNA TRY IT

Actually, I'd be totally shocked if your 1/2 blood steer calf would quite be that short, that is unless the dam was pretty short too.  My best guess is that you would be looking at a 49-50 inch steer @ 17 months, give or take an inch or so. 

Edited to note... I just found out that the NDSU steer's averaged around 51 inches at their finished weight over the 3 year period, so maybe I am guessing a little short myself.  Anyway, you will get shorter calves, but the 1/2 bloods will be most likely only be about 3-5 inches shorter (again give or take) than what you are producing right now. 
 

TJ

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farmboy said:
IN THAT CASE IT MAYBE 48 INCHES

48 inches is certainly possible... you might even get one just a hair shorter than that, every now & then.  It's all going to depend upon the female & what Lowline bull that you use & how the genes match up.  Regardless, your friends probably wont quite know what to think about your "smaller" calf & it will certainly attract some serious attention!!   ;)   (lol)
 

shortyjock89

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TJ said:
farmboy said:
IN THAT CASE IT MAYBE 48 INCHES

48 inches is certainly possible... you might even get one just a hair shorter than that, every now & then.  It's all going to depend upon the female & what Lowline bull that you use & how the genes match up.  Regardless, your friends probably wont quite know what to think about your "smaller" calf & it will certainly attract some serious attention!!   ;)   (lol)

especially if it's one of those flashy Lowline x Shorthorn's  ;D
 

TJ

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shortyjock89 said:
TJ said:
farmboy said:
IN THAT CASE IT MAYBE 48 INCHES

48 inches is certainly possible... you might even get one just a hair shorter than that, every now & then.  It's all going to depend upon the female & what Lowline bull that you use & how the genes match up.  Regardless, your friends probably wont quite know what to think about your "smaller" calf & it will certainly attract some serious attention!!   ;)   (lol)

especially if it's one of those flashy Lowline x Shorthorn's  ;D

Not to mention that you could call that cross "SHORTLINES"!!  ;) (lol) (clapping)
 

TJ

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TJ said:
shortyjock89 said:
TJ said:
farmboy said:
IN THAT CASE IT MAYBE 48 INCHES

48 inches is certainly possible... you might even get one just a hair shorter than that, every now & then.  It's all going to depend upon the female & what Lowline bull that you use & how the genes match up.  Regardless, your friends probably wont quite know what to think about your "smaller" calf & it will certainly attract some serious attention!!   ;)   (lol)

especially if it's one of those flashy Lowline x Shorthorn's  ;D

Not to mention that you could call that cross "SHORTLINES"!!   ;) (lol) (clapping)

In all seriousness, I can't wait to get 1 or 2 of those!
 

JbarL

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ditto for me too...........great info and knowledge of the breed and the  pics and proof of success explains your enthusiasm good enough for me....i think it was ty cobb who said..."it aint braggin' if you can do it"..good job.......looking forward to sharing further info with you ......jbarl
 

justme

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Some of our friends just moved to KC they raise lowlines and took them to the Royal.  What an awesome sale they had!  I must admit I was envious of what they were bringing.  Like I said in another post...I believe all purebred cattle have a place somewhere in the market.  I believe these would be a great specialty market for resturants and "city folks"  Not everyone wants a huge steak.

Now my question...do you get nailed at the auction barn for the smaller steers? or do you just market your beef yourself?
 

sjcattleco

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All people see is the black hide.. they have no clue how old they are or what the are.... They just buy them!!!  i am sure they  feed out decent so I doubt if the buyer is ever that unhappy with them.. They will grade and make money the feeder won't care if they finish at 1050..... Lowline breeders will be setting in the driver seat in 10 yrs or less esp if this ethanol thing drives up the price of corn.
 

TJ

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sjcattleco said:
All people see is the black hide.. they have no clue how old they are or what the are.... They just buy them!!!  i am sure they  feed out decent so I doubt if the buyer is ever that unhappy with them.. They will grade and make money the feeder won't care if they finish at 1050..... Lowline breeders will be setting in the driver seat in 10 yrs or less esp if this ethanol thing drives up the price of corn.

Thank you for your positive comments, sjcattleco & JbarL!!  BTW, sjcattleco... I think that you are 100% correct about higher corn prices benefitting Lowline cattle & other smaller to moderate framed breeds, that have natural fleshing ability, but I'll chime in more on that in a little bit when I try to answer justme's question...

In the meantime I want to add this...
Some may not believe this, but I actually laughed & cracked a few jokes when my sister & I walked past the Lowline display in Denver, back in 1997.  I even showed some other people the display, so that they would be sure to see the “dwarfs”!!  However, I finally decided to actually read some Lowline literature in 1999.  It talked about positive results crossbreeding Lowline with 1st calf heifers & the light bulb went on.  But, I was still pretty skeptical & I kept a close eye on them for several more years.  Finally, in 2004, I decided to take the plunge & I bought my 1st Lowline bull.  When my first 1/2 blood were born in 2005, I knew that I had made the right choice & the Lowlines have continued to amaze me ever since.  They aren’t for everybody, but the 1/2 bloods appear to be very efficient commercial cattle... so far, I am totally satisfied!!
 

Show Heifer

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SJCattle: Off the subject but I love your "Cowboy Logic" note!!!!! (clapping)
 

TJ

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justme said:
Some of our friends just moved to KC they raise lowlines and took them to the Royal.  What an awesome sale they had!  I must admit I was envious of what they were bringing.  Like I said in another post...I believe all purebred cattle have a place somewhere in the market.  I believe these would be a great specialty market for resturants and "city folks"  Not everyone wants a huge steak.

Now my question...do you get nailed at the auction barn for the smaller steers? or do you just market your beef yourself?

justme... Thank you for your comments!!  Yeah, the Lowline sales at Kansas City & especially the National Sale at Denver have been real eye openers!!   :eek:    

I think you nailed it... Lowlines are a really good match for a specialty niche market... restaurants, freezer beef, grass-fed beef, etc.  


RE Lowlines & the sale barn... thank you for asking that question, because it is topic that I failed to cover.  

Most of the percentage Lowlines that I raised have either been sold as bulls or were finished on our farm & sold locally for freezer beef or were sold to an individual wanting to finish there own beef.  If you can market your calves in that manner, that is the way to go, IMHO.    

However, I did sell a steer that was a 1/2 blood Lowline & 1/2 Tarentaise in a special feeder calf sale...  (KY CPH Sale).  In that sale they group the cattle by type & weight & then sort them into pens & they are sold as a “pen lot“.  The state grader selected my 1/2 Lowline calf as a large frame #1 & put it in with the “black” pen.  It weighed 696 lbs. (shrunk weight @ the sale barn) & it sold for $1.0775 for a grand total of $749.94.  Of course that was the gross price & sale barn fees & other charges had to be deducted.  So, the 1/2 bloods can do OK at the sale barn.  I also think that sjcattleco is 100% correct... as long as they are black, look good & have 1/2 way decent size to them, they will sell.

Now with that said, keep in mind that I am talking about 1/2 bloods.  If a person sold purebreds or fullblood Lowlines, the story will most likely be different, because those higher percentage Lowlines will be significantly shorter than most 1/2 bloods.  3/4 blood Lowlines probably don’t need to see a sale barn for the same reason.   Those higher percentage calves will probably make you a lot more $$ if you can have them custom fed at a feedlot & then sold on the rail.  Those higher percentage calves should also be very well suited for a niche market (restaurants, freezer beef, grass-fed beef, etc.), and those niche markets can be VERY profitable!!  

FWIW, I know people who are selling all-natural grass fed beef in this area for $5 per lb. (on the rail)!!  “Whole cow hamburger” (grass fed) is selling for $2.50 per lb!!  Those calves never eat a bite of grain, only forage, so feed costs are kept down to a minimum.  It does take about 6 months longer to grass finish a calf verses a grain fed calf, so the downside is that you have to keep them around longer, but you can make some real good money selling them.  If you don’t want to keep them, more & more large scale grass finishing operations are willing to buy those steers with grass finishing genetics to help meet the large demand.  20 years ago, grass-fed beef was hardly talked about, but now it is starting to pick up a lot of steam & right or wrong, lots & lots of “city folk“ are really buying into the “grass finished is better for you” concept.    

Hope that helps!

TJ

 

knabe

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i can chime in here for fun.  when i was hunting around for the paramount son my heifer is out of, he's a small bull.  the guy who bought him is also a lowliner, and has been using  maine's since 1974.  i have eaten a few grassfed steaks and other cuts including hamburger, will have my first home raised one's shortly.  My comments about them are that it sounds good, you are helping the whole sustainable ag movement thing and it feels good.  but actually, the steaks fall kinda bland.  i have experimented cooking them in a variety of ways.  i've tried roasts, ribeye's, new york, santa maria tritips etc.  the roasts are  the most disappointing, and then the steaks.  they mostly lack enough fat to taste, like well fat.  i also like lamb, goat, elk, deer, and in general, those products are more consistent in the taste and "tenderness" qualities.  the reason i am interested in that paramount son, yes, he's probably a carrier, but he's a small bull, thick, and someone who is actually using the lowlines purchased him.  they are going to send me some pics, so i'll post them at that time.  the other reason i became interested in maine's in the first place, was that they supposedly have the genetics to marble on grass, rather than moving the fat from the outside to the inside of the carcass like happened to holsteins.  at least 20 years ago when i was tracking carcasses, it was pretty easy to tell the carcasses apart from where the fat was alone.  the one thing that scares me about the PB maines, is that they may be losing that marbling on grass genetics, which may have something to do with size, but maybe not.  i have been reading some information about backgrounding and there is some interesting comments about that on other sites regarding that the cattle may have the genetics to marble more, but our imposed environmental practices are not allowing this.  that's why i really like chambero's milky mouth heifer.  would really like to see a pool of those, but steers, stay right on irrigated pasture all the way to finish and get some good fat, moist grass fed beef and get the "gaminess", but also a little more of the fat beef taste.  my game plan is to keep wean late, and keep them rolling, without the need to "go off feed" to background later, and basically delay? an earlier finish point.  get some of that in people's mouth and go from there.  could be pointless, but no one out here is really doing it to push for early finishing on grass.  they are mostly doing the 24-30 month window.  over time, the novelty may wear off revealing the quality more clearly and then the customer base might be a little weary.  but these feel good city environmentalists treat food like music, part of the fun for them is seeking it out.
 

CC

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knabe said:
i can chime in here for fun.  when i was hunting around for the paramount son my heifer is out of, he's a small bull.  the guy who bought him is also a lowliner, and has been using  maine's since 1974.  i have eaten a few grassfed steaks and other cuts including hamburger, will have my first home raised one's shortly.  My comments about them are that it sounds good, you are helping the whole sustainable ag movement thing and it feels good.  but actually, the steaks fall kinda bland.  i have experimented cooking them in a variety of ways.  i've tried roasts, ribeye's, new york, santa maria tritips etc.  the roasts are  the most disappointing, and then the steaks.  they mostly lack enough fat to taste, like well fat.  i also like lamb, goat, elk, deer, and in general, those products are more consistent in the taste and "tenderness" qualities.  the reason i am interested in that paramount son, yes, he's probably a carrier, but he's a small bull, thick, and someone who is actually using the lowlines purchased him.  they are going to send me some pics, so i'll post them at that time.  the other reason i became interested in maine's in the first place, was that they supposedly have the genetics to marble on grass, rather than moving the fat from the outside to the inside of the carcass like happened to holsteins.  at least 20 years ago when i was tracking carcasses, it was pretty easy to tell the carcasses apart from where the fat was alone.  the one thing that scares me about the PB maines, is that they may be losing that marbling on grass genetics, which may have something to do with size, but maybe not.  i have been reading some information about backgrounding and there is some interesting comments about that on other sites regarding that the cattle may have the genetics to marble more, but our imposed environmental practices are not allowing this.  that's why i really like chambero's milky mouth heifer.  would really like to see a pool of those, but steers, stay right on irrigated pasture all the way to finish and get some good fat, moist grass fed beef and get the "gaminess", but also a little more of the fat beef taste.  my game plan is to keep wean late, and keep them rolling, without the need to "go off feed" to background later, and basically delay? an earlier finish point.  get some of that in people's mouth and go from there.  could be pointless, but no one out here is really doing it to push for early finishing on grass.  they are mostly doing the 24-30 month window.  over time, the novelty may wear off revealing the quality more clearly and then the customer base might be a little weary.  but these feel good city environmentalists treat food like music, part of the fun for them is seeking it out.



I have been monitoring this discussion, and it's a good one.

Regarding grassfed or grass finished beef, there lies a great range of qualities here as in all beef.  Certainly, the key is to feed for a high rate of growth, and know when they are finished.  I purchased my first Lowlines in 2002, and I have since been raising Lowline/Angus cross grassfinished beef.  We have actual recorded weight gains here as high as 4.5  to 6 pounds per day.  These are exceptional, and more frequently, we have very respectable gains of about 3 poiunds per day. Five framed steers  with finish weights around 1150 at 22 - 26 months.  I have been thrilled with the quality of our beef for both taste and tenderness--2 out 3 grade choice--the rest is high select.  I believe we can realisitically achieve 100% choice.  Our customers have been quite pleased as well.  One of the most common mistakes with grassfed beef, is not using the correct cooking process.  Being female, this is one other area of my expertise.  Because the chemical makeup of the fat is different, the beef must be cooked on medium or low heat, and must not be overcooked.  This allows the natural juices and flavor to remain in the meat, and retains the nutritional value, known to be greater than cornfed beef.

We have been on a fast learning curve coming from nearly 20 years of cornfed, high growth, big framed registerd Angus cattle.  I have loved my big cows, weighing from 1400# up to a ton, and we had a very respectable string on the Angus show circuit, made ROV, MT, IL, IN, and KY Grand and Reserve Champions.  I never really liked my feed bill!  We made the decision to change for family health reasons.  Old habits are hard to change, but I have no regrets.  We all know the biggest cost in raising cattle is feed, and reducing the frame size is the quickest way to reduce those costs.  Yes, it is true, as TJ says, that you can cross a 7 framed cow with a ZERO framed Lowline bull and get  4 to 5 framed progeny. This surprised me, too.  And those halfblood cows make as good a commercial cow as you will find anywhere.  Now, with high corn prices, the next thing to do to reduce costs is change to forage.  The American mindset it to get there in a big way as fast as you can.  That is well and good in many cases, but the smaller framed cow will give you a calf that is larger percentage of her weight, and that calf will compete with the best of them in the ring and on the rack.
 

knabe

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nice comments cc.  aware of your cooking comments.  my sis is a caterer and a great cook.  we do what you say, and sweat them afterward too.  most of what we get out here CA is the later maturing, low marbling grassfed stuff without quality grades, so there is an opportunity there.  one of the bigger grassfeeders just added quality grades to their meat.  along those lines of the smaller framed cattle, does anyone out there have any experience with slow burn or any of his sons?  i know slow burn is PHAC, so are there any sons' out there with a better BW epd that are similar to him.  interesting that he is a draft pick son, not because of the PHA, but because he is a smaller framed earlier maturing bull.  there is one son i found called burn out, don't know his PHA status.  thick looking guy. 
 

TJ

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knabe said:
nice comments cc.  aware of your cooking comments.  my sis is a caterer and a great cook.  we do what you say, and sweat them afterward too.  most of what we get out here CA is the later maturing, low marbling grassfed stuff without quality grades, so there is an opportunity there.  one of the bigger grassfeeders just added quality grades to their meat.  along those lines of the smaller framed cattle, does anyone out there have any experience with slow burn or any of his sons?  i know slow burn is PHAC, so are there any sons' out there with a better BW epd that are similar to him.  interesting that he is a draft pick son, not because of the PHA, but because he is a smaller framed earlier maturing bull.  there is one son i found called burn out, don't know his PHA status.  thick looking guy. 

knabe... My guess is that the grass finished beef tasted bland, disappointing, etc. probably due to genetics.  Later maturing & low marbling cattle are likely a train wreck waiting to happen in a grass fed beef program.   I guess that it also could possibly be due to the types of forage & the quality of the forage that they are feeding the animals too.  I know that corn fed beef tastes quite a bit different than Canadian fed beef that is finished using more barley in the ration.

I’ve only eaten grass fed beef a limited number of times, but it was very good each time.   However, the only grass finished beef that I have ever eaten was Lowline or Lowline cross beef.   The burger has been excellent & the steaks were very tasty, tender & juicy & I am very picky about meat!!  Also, a guy that I took with me on a 700+ mile (round trip) cattle hauling trip last summer was served 2 grass fed Lowline burgers at one of the places where we stopped & he has since repeatedly told me how good those burgers were!!  He kept telling me how much he wanted another one after we had been back on the road for a few hours & it got to the point where he was really getting on my nerves talking about it!!   ;) I have never tried a roast, so I can’t comment on that particular cut of beef.  Now with that said, I could see how grass fed beef would taste bland & would be very disappointing  if the meat was from a late maturing, low marbling animal, but the grass fed beef that I have eaten was vey good. 

Of course, depsite the health advantages to consuming grass fed beef, I still like & eat corn finished beef too!!   ;) ;D

CC... excellent post!   (welcome) You made some good points.  Also, thank you for sharing about the frame scores & finishing weights that you are seeing from your Lowline cross calves.  Good to have another Lowline breeder chime in!!   ;D Thank you!!  (clapping)

TJ
 
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