Does anybody make a living with cattle?

[TexasBred]

There are plenty of people who make a living on cattle, but you won't find many with the time or the inclination to post here. It seems like most of the people with the time to post on this site don't live in cattle country so I am not surprised that they don't personally know full time producers.

It is still possible to make a living with cattle, but it does depend on where you live. In the Umpqua Valley of Oregon you can still find reasonable land to lease, but you will need to have lived her much of your life to have the connections to find it. Off the top of my head, I can think of 8 full time cow/calf operations and one stocker grower who are personal friends and have no income outside of the ranch. You won't find any of them posting here. They don't have that much spare time and most cattle questions they have can be better answered by a fellow rancher. My husband and I are retired from other occupations and run about 50 registered Angus cows on 1000 acres. We make a profit, but not enough to support our lifestyle. I would need up to 10 times as many cows for that, thousands more acres and it would mean working long hours. We do it because we enjoy it and it brings in a little extra income but we don't depend on it as our primary income.

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

 

[M-5]

There are plenty of people who make a living on cattle, but you won't find many with the time or the inclination to post here. It seems like most of the people with the time to post on this site don't live in cattle country so I am not surprised that they don't personally know full time producers.

It is still possible to make a living with cattle, but it does depend on where you live. In the Umpqua Valley of Oregon you can still find reasonable land to lease, but you will need to have lived her much of your life to have the connections to find it. Off the top of my head, I can think of 8 full time cow/calf operations and one stocker grower who are personal friends and have no income outside of the ranch. You won't find any of them posting here. They don't have that much spare time and most cattle questions they have can be better answered by a fellow rancher. My husband and I are retired from other occupations and run about 50 registered Angus cows on 1000 acres. We make a profit, but not enough to support our lifestyle. I would need up to 10 times as many cows for that, thousands more acres and it would mean working long hours. We do it because we enjoy it and it brings in a little extra income but we don't depend on it as our primary income.

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

a heII of a lot more not doing it full time than those that are.

U.S. Beef Community
•Average age of a principle beef cattle rancher is 58.32
•913,246 total cattle & calf operations2. Of these: ◦727,906 are beef farms and ranches. Of these: 91% are family-owned or individually-operated
11% are operated by women

◦26,586 are engaged in cattle feedlot production. Of these: 80% are family owned or individually operated
5% are operated by women

◦64,098 are milk cow operations

•Cattle inventory: 93.5 million, up 1.8% from January 20163 ◦31.2 million beef cows 6.4 million beef replacement heifers in 2017, a 1.3% increase from 2016

◦9.35 million milk cows
◦35 million head calf crop (2016)

•The average beef cow herd size is 40 head of cattle2
•Of the 30,219 feedlots those with less than 1,000 head of capacity compose the vast majority of U.S. feedlots (93%)5
•As of Jan. 1, 2016 of the 13.1 million head on feed, feedlots with greater than 1,000 head capacity account for 81% of all cattle on feed5
•U.S. beef production in 2016 (commercial carcass weight) was 25.2 billion pounds4
•U.S. commercial slaughter in 2016 was 30.5 million head3
•The amount of beef consumed in the U.S. (i.e. purchased by consumers in foodservice and retail) in 2016 was 25.668 billion pounds1
•The amount of beef consumed in the U.S. Per Capita 55.7 lbs
•Average price of USDA Choice beef sold in retail in 2016 was $5.96/lb down from $6.29/lb in 20151
•Value of U.S. beef exports (including variety meat) in 2016: $6.343 billion, up from $6.302 billion in 20156
•Volume of beef export: 1,187,050 (metric tons) in 2016 up from 1,067,614 (metric tons) in 20156

 

[Allenw]

Some it is just a matter that they were in the right place at the right time. I know a guy who sold his fairly nice house and 20 acres here. Bought 2,000 acres of sage brush and rock for $175 a acre. He also picked up a BLM lease to summer the cows on. That may seem cheap to many here but that was all it was worth then and still today. He was running a few cows on BLM lease and wintering on that rock and sage. Them they built a destination resort next door. Suddenly his land was worth $1,500 an acre. That set him up on real nice ranch where he runs 750 pairs. No inheritance, no big money from outside work, just a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

There's a guy that worked in this area whose brother in law inherited a ranch and didn't want it. I don't know what he paid his brother in law for it but he bought it including the mineral rights just before they started leasing and drilling.

 

[Hunter]

Just wanted to post this for reference.

http://www.cattlerange.com/cattle-graph ... mbers.html

 

[Dave]

The two areas I mentioned earlier were in Harney County Oregon and Mussleshell County Montana. My wife owned a ranch in Harney county. The county has 10,226 square miles which makes it bigger than six states. There are 7,200 people in the county. About 2,800 of those people live in the one bigger town. That leaves 4,400 people living out in the country. That works out to 2.3 square miles per person or about 1,470 acres per person. When you subtract the smaller land owner from the mix there are some huge ranches. The wife's neighbor to the north was Roaring Springs Ranch. They run over 6,000 cows on more than one million acres. Their remuda is about 150 head of horses.
Mussleshell county is where my daughter first worked when she moved to Montana. The first rancher she worked for is the one who told me they average 20 acres per cow. That county has 1,965 square miles. The total population is 4,582 people with 1,840 of them living in the one town. It works out to 0.71 square miles per person living in the rural areas. 458 acres for every man, woman, and child.
Both of these counties are almost nothing but cattle ranches.

 

[TexasBred]

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)


a heII of a lot more not doing it full time than those that are.

U.S. Beef Community
•Average age of a principle beef cattle rancher is 58.32
•913,246 total cattle & calf operations2. Of these: ◦727,906 are beef farms and ranches. Of these: 91% are family-owned or individually-operated
11% are operated by women

◦26,586 are engaged in cattle feedlot production. Of these: 80% are family owned or individually operated
5% are operated by women

◦64,098 are milk cow operations

•Cattle inventory: 93.5 million, up 1.8% from January 20163 ◦31.2 million beef cows 6.4 million beef replacement heifers in 2017, a 1.3% increase from 2016

◦9.35 million milk cows
◦35 million head calf crop (2016)

•The average beef cow herd size is 40 head of cattle2
•Of the 30,219 feedlots those with less than 1,000 head of capacity compose the vast majority of U.S. feedlots (93%)5
•As of Jan. 1, 2016 of the 13.1 million head on feed, feedlots with greater than 1,000 head capacity account for 81% of all cattle on feed5
•U.S. beef production in 2016 (commercial carcass weight) was 25.2 billion pounds4
•U.S. commercial slaughter in 2016 was 30.5 million head3
•The amount of beef consumed in the U.S. (i.e. purchased by consumers in foodservice and retail) in 2016 was 25.668 billion pounds1
•The amount of beef consumed in the U.S. Per Capita 55.7 lbs
•Average price of USDA Choice beef sold in retail in 2016 was $5.96/lb down from $6.29/lb in 20151
•Value of U.S. beef exports (including variety meat) in 2016: $6.343 billion, up from $6.302 billion in 20156
•Volume of beef export: 1,187,050 (metric tons) in 2016 up from 1,067,614 (metric tons) in 20156

:nod: :nod: :nod:

 

[Katpau]

There are plenty of people who make a living on cattle, but you won't find many with the time or the inclination to post here. It seems like most of the people with the time to post on this site don't live in cattle country so I am not surprised that they don't personally know full time producers.

It is still possible to make a living with cattle, but it does depend on where you live. In the Umpqua Valley of Oregon you can still find reasonable land to lease, but you will need to have lived her much of your life to have the connections to find it. Off the top of my head, I can think of 8 full time cow/calf operations and one stocker grower who are personal friends and have no income outside of the ranch. You won't find any of them posting here. They don't have that much spare time and most cattle questions they have can be better answered by a fellow rancher. My husband and I are retired from other occupations and run about 50 registered Angus cows on 1000 acres. We make a profit, but not enough to support our lifestyle. I would need up to 10 times as many cows for that, thousands more acres and it would mean working long hours. We do it because we enjoy it and it brings in a little extra income but we don't depend on it as our primary income.

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

I am not at all sure what it is we disagree on. Since the average cattle herd in this country is less then 50 cows, I would agree that most must supplement that income. The question was "Does anyone make a living with cattle?" My answer to that was, yes they do. I probably should not have use cattle country in my response since it apparently was taken as some sort of an insult to those who are not in a situation where making their living with cattle is very likely. I don't know if it is possible to make a living raising cattle where you live or where most CT posters live, but the fact that so few seemed to know someone who did, made it appear that it would be difficult. Land prices, whether you rent or own, are probably the biggest obstacle. There are places where it is possible, if you have the knowledge, skill-set and ability to work for it and people do make a living with cattle.

 

[dieselbeef]

and have paid for land....

 

[M-5]

There are plenty of people who make a living on cattle, but you won't find many with the time or the inclination to post here. It seems like most of the people with the time to post on this site don't live in cattle country so I am not surprised that they don't personally know full time producers.

It is still possible to make a living with cattle, but it does depend on where you live. In the Umpqua Valley of Oregon you can still find reasonable land to lease, but you will need to have lived her much of your life to have the connections to find it. Off the top of my head, I can think of 8 full time cow/calf operations and one stocker grower who are personal friends and have no income outside of the ranch. You won't find any of them posting here. They don't have that much spare time and most cattle questions they have can be better answered by a fellow rancher. My husband and I are retired from other occupations and run about 50 registered Angus cows on 1000 acres. We make a profit, but not enough to support our lifestyle. I would need up to 10 times as many cows for that, thousands more acres and it would mean working long hours. We do it because we enjoy it and it brings in a little extra income but we don't depend on it as our primary income.

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

I am not at all sure what it is we disagree on. Since the average cattle herd in this country is less then 50 cows, I would agree that most must supplement that income. The question was "Does anyone make a living with cattle?" My answer to that was, yes they do. I probably should not have use cattle country in my response since it apparently was taken as some sort of an insult to those who are not in a situation where making their living with cattle is very likely. I don't know if it is possible to make a living raising cattle where you live or where most CT posters live, but the fact that so few seemed to know someone who did, made it appear that it would be difficult. Land prices, whether you rent or own, are probably the biggest obstacle. There are places where it is possible, if you have the knowledge, skill-set and ability to work for it and people do make a living with cattle.

there are quite a few that farm fulltime here almost all have a couple hundred head and a few run several thousand. This area is primarily agriculture and if you have 3 acres of pasture per pair you can put them on auto pilot and check water every couple days ..

 

[TennesseeTuxedo]

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

I am not at all sure what it is we disagree on. Since the average cattle herd in this country is less then 50 cows, I would agree that most must supplement that income. The question was "Does anyone make a living with cattle?" My answer to that was, yes they do. I probably should not have use cattle country in my response since it apparently was taken as some sort of an insult to those who are not in a situation where making their living with cattle is very likely. I don't know if it is possible to make a living raising cattle where you live or where most CT posters live, but the fact that so few seemed to know someone who did, made it appear that it would be difficult. Land prices, whether you rent or own, are probably the biggest obstacle. There are places where it is possible, if you have the knowledge, skill-set and ability to work for it and people do make a living with cattle.

there are quite a few that farm fulltime here almost all have a couple hundred head and a few run several thousand. This area is primarily agriculture and if you have 3 acres of pasture per pair you can put them on auto pilot and check water every couple days ..

Get decent water stations and you might not have to check that often.

 

[Dave]

Those big western ranches rarely check the cows. They check the water, and look at the grass but the cows are spread over an area too big the check. It often takes several weeks to move the cows out of one pasture to another.

 

[TexasBred]

There are plenty of people who make a living on cattle, but you won't find many with the time or the inclination to post here. It seems like most of the people with the time to post on this site don't live in cattle country so I am not surprised that they don't personally know full time producers.

It is still possible to make a living with cattle, but it does depend on where you live. In the Umpqua Valley of Oregon you can still find reasonable land to lease, but you will need to have lived her much of your life to have the connections to find it. Off the top of my head, I can think of 8 full time cow/calf operations and one stocker grower who are personal friends and have no income outside of the ranch. You won't find any of them posting here. They don't have that much spare time and most cattle questions they have can be better answered by a fellow rancher. My husband and I are retired from other occupations and run about 50 registered Angus cows on 1000 acres. We make a profit, but not enough to support our lifestyle. I would need up to 10 times as many cows for that, thousands more acres and it would mean working long hours. We do it because we enjoy it and it brings in a little extra income but we don't depend on it as our primary income.

don't have many thousand acre ranches around here but 90% of the surrounding "million" acres has cattle on it. Small operators, some making money, some maybe not but that creates one pretty good size ranch and a he// of a lot of cattle. I do know they put a lot of meat into the food supply so I'll politely disagree with your comment. ;-)

I am not at all sure what it is we disagree on. Since the average cattle herd in this country is less then 50 cows, I would agree that most must supplement that income. The question was "Does anyone make a living with cattle?" My answer to that was, yes they do. I probably should not have use cattle country in my response since it apparently was taken as some sort of an insult to those who are not in a situation where making their living with cattle is very likely. I don't know if it is possible to make a living raising cattle where you live or where most CT posters live, but the fact that so few seemed to know someone who did, made it appear that it would be difficult. Land prices, whether you rent or own, are probably the biggest obstacle. There are places where it is possible, if you have the knowledge, skill-set and ability to work for it and people do make a living with cattle.

Possibly this: I consider my area to be cattle country, albeit small herd cattle country.

To me "Cattle country" is where most of your neighbors make their living raising cattle. Since only a few of the posters on the first 9 pages of this thread knew people who made a living that way, I can only assume they are not in "Cattle country". Where I live, I am almost completely surrounded by ranches much larger than mine. There are still many places in the US where cattle are an important part of the local economy and most of your neighbors support their families by raising cattle.

 

[cow pollinater]

Cattle have been my mainstay for about two decades and I'm thirty nine(I think, maybe thirty eight... or seven). It is a recent turn of events that being a producer is the bulk of my income but that is due to giving up other sources of income which were mostly cattle related as I've had my own cattle my entire adult life.
There's lots of different ways to make money with cattle. We all like to look up to the folks that run cows for a living and do nothing else but honestly it's not that great of a plan unless you can do it so big that there is money to spare in hard years.
What we don't see here on the board very often is real dollars and cents about what people do that WORKS. Yes, you can make a living with cattle but it's not as easy as buying a few cows and plopping them out in the pasture and selling calves.

 

[cow pollinater]

Also, Most ground that will sell for what cattle will pay for is not ground that most up and comers are willing to tackle with very few exceptions. When we moved here to eastern OK it was a calculated move based on land price and carrying capacity.
I ran my cows in CA on places that nobody else wanted to mess with. If you are serious about making it work that's what it takes.

 

[bball]

What we don't see here on the board very often is real dollars and cents about what people do that WORKS. Yes, you can make a living with cattle but it's not as easy as buying a few cows and plopping them out in the pasture and selling calves.

Best comment on this board in quite a while for my 2 cents. Truth!

 

[cowgirl8]

What we don't see here on the board very often is real dollars and cents about what people do that WORKS. Yes, you can make a living with cattle but it's not as easy as buying a few cows and plopping them out in the pasture and selling calves.

Well, when one does, they are called braggers. Been living off cattle for over 37 years....but i digress

 

[cow pollinater]

What we don't see here on the board very often is real dollars and cents about what people do that WORKS. Yes, you can make a living with cattle but it's not as easy as buying a few cows and plopping them out in the pasture and selling calves.

Well, when one does, they are called braggers. Been living off cattle for over 37 years....but i digress

No, you get called a bragger because you insist on pounding it into everyone's head that you're special. In reality you're average at best.

 

[cowgirl8]

What we don't see here on the board very often is real dollars and cents about what people do that WORKS. Yes, you can make a living with cattle but it's not as easy as buying a few cows and plopping them out in the pasture and selling calves.

Well, when one does, they are called braggers. Been living off cattle for over 37 years....but i digress

No, you get called a bragger because you insist on pounding it into everyone's head that you're special. In reality you're average at best.

How many pages of OHHH wonder if anyone can make it in the cattle business.... oh brother.. I'd love for anyone to point out where I said I was special...I answer questions, I comment, I give my opinion...just like everyone else.

 

[cow pollinater]

Well, when one does, they are called braggers. Been living off cattle for over 37 years....but i digress

No, you get called a bragger because you insist on pounding it into everyone's head that you're special. In reality you're average at best.

How many pages of OHHH wonder if anyone can make it in the cattle business.... oh brother.. I'd love for anyone to point out where I said I was special...I answer questions, I comment, I give my opinion...just like everyone else.

In eleven pages you are the only person bragging about making a living with cattle. Lots and lots of people make their living that way but somehow you seem to be the one that just can't stand not to tell us all how special you are for doing it.

 

[RanchMan90]

Well, when one does, they are called braggers. Been living off cattle for over 37 years....but i digress

No, you get called a bragger because you insist on pounding it into everyone's head that you're special. In reality you're average at best.

How many pages of OHHH wonder if anyone can make it in the cattle business.... oh brother.. I'd love for anyone to point out where I said I was special...I answer questions, I comment, I give my opinion...just like everyone else.

What made you successful cowgirl?