Improving the quality of our beef
For the past 150 years, beef cattle have been a major part of American agriculture. There are approximately 620,000 farms and ranches in the United States specializing in beef production with more than 30 million beef cattle across the country at any one time. (30,000 in Muskingum County). The top states in beef production are Texas, Nebraska, Kansas, California, and Oklahoma.
The United States produces enough beef to feed ourselves and also export to Japan, Mexico, Canada, South Korea, the Middle East and several other countries.
The beef industry in the West seemed to expand greatly about 150 years ago, just prior to the Civil War, with the Spanish descended Longhorn cattle which had been roaming wild in the Southwest for several centuries. They had developed the ability to survive the droughts, hot weather, sparse food supplies and predators, becoming a very hardy breed.
However, the domestic English breeds, including Angus, Herefords and Shorthorns, raised east of the Mississippi, provided more meat per animal and higher quality in taste and tenderness. This caused ranchers in the West to start experimenting with English breeds to increase the quality and value of the beef they raised and marketed.
In the 1800s, Shorthorns were the most popular breed in the East, partially as a result of their ability to be ready for market quickly. But ranchers in the West found the breed did not do well in their rugged conditions. Shorthorn mothers are known as superior milkers as long as there are sufficient food and water supplies. Without these supplies in the West, mothers used their own nutrients producing milk and would die when under severe stress conditions (lack of feed, extreme heat, etc.), resulting in a double loss for the rancher (cow and calf). The Angus breed is another that was popular in the East, but not readily accepted in the early West. This could be attributed to the fact that they were polled (lacking horns) and considered unable to protect themselves even though they had a superior carcass. The Herefords (white-faced cattle) became the English breed of choice on the range due to their ability to survive in very tough food and weather conditions.
You may have heard the old saying, “Herefords on the range, Shorthorns in the feedlot, Angus on the rail.” This identified these three breeds in terms of their best location for growth and outstanding characteristics as seen by the farmers and ranchers of the time.
Beef production has changed significantly since the early West. Producers have studied the various breeds and taken the best traits from each to produce quality beef for their appropriate locations and markets. They have instituted serious cross-breeding programs to incorporate the superior characteristics of each breed as well as introducing breeds from other countries. This is just one example of work being done in the agricultural community to improve the quality of our food. And it is a project that seriously affects our state with its approximately 17,000 cattle farms and 1.8 million cows and calves.
Chuck Bell is a former Muskingum County 4-H youth development educator and district specialist and a member of the Muskingum County Farm Bureau.