We have around 1000 head right now. Thank god we locked in a floor price.

Anyone complaining about high beef prices at the grocer is welcome to come out and enjoy the fun. There's not profit being made at these levels, it's just more financial risk cause the purchase price of feeder cows is equally higher - margins are gone, downside risk is up.

CowPieAndFries said:

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Hopefully it's a deal with Brazil. I need
My John Deee stock to go up.

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Nothing is going to help your JD position too much used Eqpt on the market from both voluntary and involuntary retirements

Quote:

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Replacement bred heifers are selling for $3000 at the sale barns

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YIKES

HEB has choice tri-tip at $5.99/lb this week in the Houston market.

Charpie said:

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Fitch said:

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We have around 1000 head right now. Thank god we locked in a floor price.

Anyone complaining about high beef prices at the grocer is welcome to come out and enjoy the fun. There's not profit being made at these levels, it's just more financial risk cause the purchase price of feeder cows is equally higher - margins are gone, downside risk is up.

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And ranches all across west Texas are selling their herds and turning over their land to become solar farms.

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I believe this is a long-term bad idea, but the short-term incentive has been too much for them to ignore.

Sq 17 said:

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Link please would be shocked if there is more than 2,000 acres slated for solar farm development
There are 10's of thousand of acres out there I doubt more than 5% is becoming solar farms

People in West Texas are getting out because they ain't making any money

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Solar Nova

This project was 5000 acres by itself.

Sq 17 said:

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Link please would be shocked if there is more than 2,000 acres slated for solar farm development
There are 10's of thousand of acres out there I doubt more than 5% is becoming solar farms

People in West Texas are getting out because they ain't making any money

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I drive from West Texas (NW of Abilene) to Bryan every other week. Scurry, Fisher, Nolan and Jones counties are converting to solar farms. All up and down US83, Texas 92 and Texas 70 are changing. Not to mention the windmills that are already out there.

Go make that drive yourself. Lots of the cattle ranchers are my husband's clients. Times are not GREAT for them.

Thanks I deleted there is about 30,000 acres of projects under development not all are in west Texas

Of course the 5 largest counties total 11,000,000 acres so to get to 3% of this land would be a little 300,000 acres of solar farms

CDUB98 said:

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Charpie said:

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Fitch said:

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We have around 1000 head right now. Thank god we locked in a floor price.

Anyone complaining about high beef prices at the grocer is welcome to come out and enjoy the fun. There's not profit being made at these levels, it's just more financial risk cause the purchase price of feeder cows is equally higher - margins are gone, downside risk is up.

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And ranches all across west Texas are selling their herds and turning over their land to become solar farms.

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I believe this is a long-term bad idea, but the short-term incentive has been too much for them to ignore.

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Not to mention the ups and downs of the weather/drought conditions

I paid $20 for a Choice rib-eye yesterday at HEB and as I put it in the cart I told the wife their were 3 meals in that piece of meat.

Hagen95 said:

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It seems the market should be handling these prices and not the government.

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That ship sailed long ago. The government decided they want stable but affordable food prices. They use subsidies and market meddling to achieve that goal. A free market would have much larger price swings with periods of rapid food inflation followed by price crashes.

Google is your friend.

8000 acre solar project in Callahan County

Here is a 5000 acre solar farm in Kent County

This is in a part of the state where you calculate grazing capacity based on animal units per section, not per acre.

I meant they weren't making any money on the cattle compared to the amount of work needed

CDUB98 said:

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Quote:

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Replacement bred heifers are selling for $3000 at the sale barns

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YIKES

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Closer to $4,000 than $3,000 in Central Texas.

It's been deleted and corrected learn something new everyday

Still not anywhere near 5% of the available land

In the last 2 years, I've gone from paying ~$16 per lb of grass fed/finished NY strip to $24. I've switched from strips to tri-tips, due to the cost.

I believe the industry has to self-correct. I'm sure there are many, like me, who have plenty of money to pay those prices but will refuse to because it's simply outrageous. If I can save myself $6-$8 per day by choosing different cuts or just going with pork/chicken instead of beef, that equates to over $2,000 a year in meat costs.

texagbeliever said:

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1 lb of ground beef is nearly $8. A few years ago that was $4. Food cost inflation is ridiculous.

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I was at costco yesterday and a husband/wife were looking at steaks along side me. The prime ribeyes were something like $27/lb. The wife made a comment along the lines of, 'that's rich folk food, let's see what the poor folk choice steaks look like.' I said, 'pretty tough times when poor folk food is $18.99/lb.' I laughed. They laughed. We all cried.

Lathspell said:

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In the last 2 years, I've gone from paying ~$16 per lb of grass fed/finished NY strip to $24. I've switched from strips to tri-tips, due to the cost.

I believe the industry has to self-correct. I'm sure there are many, like me, who have plenty of money to pay those prices but will refuse to because it's simply outrageous. If I can save myself $6-$8 per day by choosing different cuts or just going with pork/chicken instead of beef, that equates to over $2,000 a year in meat costs.

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I'm curious why you say the price is outrageous. Is it simply based on what you used to pay?

As a producer and a consumer, I see both sides and will still argue that the real pinch point is at the processor level.

I also do not want beef to be competing for "value". The industry has worked too hard over the last 30-40 years improving the product. Mass produces poultry and pork simply isn't at the same quality level as US produced beef. That is why I'm not opposed to importing lower quality cattle for grind. US beef is mainly too good of a product to sell as ground.

Hagen95 said:

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It seems the market should be handling these prices and not the government.

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The government probably ****ed it up

texagbeliever said:

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1 lb of ground beef is nearly $8. A few years ago that was $4. Food cost inflation is ridiculous.

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I thought Trump said inflation had been defeated…. No more Biden inflation.

Sq 17 said:

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Hate to disagree with you but if young people can't afford a house not sure how the hell they are going to get In The cattle business

Land Eqpt and a herd start off in the 6 figures the ROI is crap.
Everybody who is remotely making it it in the cattle business has a wife who is a govt employee ( teacher, healthcare, or county bureaucrat ) bringing in the regular paycheck and Health insurance and also has 100's of acres under lease for almost nothing to graze cows on because the actual owner just wants the ag exemption.

Nobody is making money if they on had to borrow money to buy the land on to run cattle on

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You don't have to own land. Great strides in the lean renting business model. Check out Greg Judy on YouTube. That aside, the bottleneck is processing, always has been and it's intentional.

There's a lot of land for small herds, and part time cattle operations. I know a lot of homesteading type families making a little side income from poultry that would greatly benefit from removing the processing restrictions and let them sell beef.

The number of small producers would explode. And like I mentioned before more kids growing up on farms and more people knowing where their food comes from.

96ags said:

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Lathspell said:

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In the last 2 years, I've gone from paying ~$16 per lb of grass fed/finished NY strip to $24. I've switched from strips to tri-tips, due to the cost.

I believe the industry has to self-correct. I'm sure there are many, like me, who have plenty of money to pay those prices but will refuse to because it's simply outrageous. If I can save myself $6-$8 per day by choosing different cuts or just going with pork/chicken instead of beef, that equates to over $2,000 a year in meat costs.

---

I'm curious why you say the price is outrageous. Is it simply based on what you used to pay?

As a producer and a consumer, I see both sides and will still argue that the real pinch point is at the processor level.

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I don't care about the producer. I want to save as much money as possible while balancing the need to keep beef available as well.

Why should I not be committed to my interest?

Beef prices are dumb right now.

Like previous poster I can afford it but I just kind of choose not to sometimes. I cook burgers for other people instead of steak more often.

Is this kind of like when Newsom and other Dems come out and say things like "every MAGA that I spoke to regrets voting for Trump"? I wonder who actually falls for this type of manipulation...

It's the meteoric increase in pricing which seems to outpace inflation and costs of other products, at the store. My income didn't increase 50% over the last 2 years. The cost of everything else I use every day or everything else in my house did not increase 50% over the last 2 years.

It's outrageous because I do not believe a homecooked grass-fed steak should cost me $24. Hell, I could pay double that and eat all the prime beef I want at Fogo de Chao. Why am I having to pay that much at the grocery store?

But I've also been eating on the carnivore diet over the last 3 years, so I'm very aware of the fluctuations in prices and make decision on which cuts to buy based on the price or deals when I'm at the store. I used to exclusively eat NY strips. Now, I may get one every couple of weeks as a special thing. I can buy nearly 3 lbs of tri-tip for the same price as 1lb of NY strip.

The Collective said:

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Anyone remember when brisket was cheap meat? Thanks hipsters.

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$0.99/lb on sale at HEB. Those were the days...

96ags said:

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Lathspell said:

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In the last 2 years, I've gone from paying ~$16 per lb of grass fed/finished NY strip to $24. I've switched from strips to tri-tips, due to the cost.

I believe the industry has to self-correct. I'm sure there are many, like me, who have plenty of money to pay those prices but will refuse to because it's simply outrageous. If I can save myself $6-$8 per day by choosing different cuts or just going with pork/chicken instead of beef, that equates to over $2,000 a year in meat costs.

---

I'm curious why you say the price is outrageous. Is it simply based on what you used to pay?

As a producer and a consumer, I see both sides and will still argue that the real pinch point is at the processor level.

I also do not want beef to be competing for "value". The industry has worked too hard over the last 30-40 years improving the product. Mass produces poultry and pork simply isn't at the same quality level as US produced beef. That is why I'm not opposed to importing lower quality cattle for grind. US beef is mainly too good of a product to sell as ground.

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Same concept with everyone wanting $2.00/gal gas. Why would you expect the cost of gas to go down, when the cost of everything (materials, labor, transportation, etc) to drill has gone UP? Why is gas not also subject to inflationary price increases? If food costs have increased 100-200%, why do we think gas prices should stay flat?

Do these homesteaders have at least one paycheck from a regular job teacher nurse firefighter etc

If they do it's a hobby not a business and a way use the place you live as way to have a small side hustle

Yes there is cheap land to lease but most counties have a small handful of guys that have that market locked up. It's not that easy to break in unless for example your uncle is one of the guys that has most of the acreage under lease
A good momma cow will set you back a few thousand if you have 50 momma cows that's real money to buy that size of a herd


if you have 10 momma cows or less it's a side hustle

jteAg said:

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texagbeliever said:

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1 lb of ground beef is nearly $8. A few years ago that was $4. Food cost inflation is ridiculous.

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I thought Trump said inflation had been defeated…. No more Biden inflation.

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Weren't you crying about egg prices a few months back?

96ags said:

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CDUB98 said:

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Quote:

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Replacement bred heifers are selling for $3000 at the sale barns

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YIKES

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Closer to $4,000 than $3,000 in Central Texas.

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Yup Just gave a ballpark figure. Its insane.

Lathspell said:

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In the last 2 years, I've gone from paying ~$16 per lb of grass fed/finished NY strip to $24. I've switched from strips to tri-tips, due to the cost.

I believe the industry has to self-correct. I'm sure there are many, like me, who have plenty of money to pay those prices but will refuse to because it's simply outrageous. If I can save myself $6-$8 per day by choosing different cuts or just going with pork/chicken instead of beef, that equates to over $2,000 a year in meat costs.

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Bill gates has won, when do the cricket steaks roll out. Stupid methane.