Veteran Cattle Feeder Offers Tips for Successful Feeding

Problems can arise when ranchers decide to take their calves all the way through to the feedyard, according to a representative of the cattle feeding industry. But many of those problems can be overcome by working together and establishing a rapport.

Charlie Christopher with AzTx Cattle Company said producers seem to want to feed when the cattle cycle is so low that they're not going to be able make a profit on the animals no matter what they do with them. When the cattle come out of the feedyard, they lose money or don't make as much as the producer thinks they ought to, so he comes away thinking ill of feedyards. Christopher believes there are some things ranchers can do to improve their cattle feeding experience.

Healthy, quality, uniform calves will be the most successful in the feedyard, he says.

"Uniformity is not critical," he said. "You can overcome lack of uniformity at the feedyard by sorting cattle that get ready before other calves do." Christopher said he recommends sorting the calves that vary by more than 100 pounds and with different frame score and body styles before they get to the feedyard.

"The trick to feeding cattle successfully is don't feed them one day longer than it takes to get a bid from a packer on them," he said. "When I started in 1969, we had a yard southwest of Amarillo that held 60,000 head. The uniformity of the cattle in our feedyards now is better than it was then, but we've got a ways to go."

He said he's seen individual cattle walk off a truck at some of their feedyards that made him think there hadn't been breed selection in this country for a 100 years.

"The calf shouldn't have been born," he said, shaking his head. "His father shouldn't have been born. His grand daddy shouldn't have been born."

While uniformity can be overcome to some extent, health is absolutely the most important thing for the producer that is going to feed his own cattle or try to develop a reputation among buyers.

He said he tells ranchers who do not vaccinate their calves but just wean them and put them on a truck to a feedyard to please send them to one of his competitors. The rancher is not going to like the results, and the feedyard is going to get the blame.

"Ideally we recommend cattlemen give calves their vaccines at weaning, put them on a good nutrition program and about 10 days later come back and re-vac with your pasteurella, your seven-way and your IBR," Christopher said.

They need to keep the cattle at least 30 days, preferably 45 days, to monitor their health and establish a good eating pattern.

"I've known people who get away with keeping them two weeks," he said. "I know people who got away weaning them on Interstate 10, but that's pretty rare."

He said that once the calves are pre-conditioned, the rancher has a product that he can be proud of if he sends them to the feedyard or if he sells his calves.

"If somebody buys those calves, they should give you a premium for them," he said.

He admitted that it costs money, labor and time, but it pays.

"I submit you really are getting paid for it maybe more than you realize," he said. "It's a hard thing to know how to value your calves when you get ready to sell them."

Some people may not have the facilities to do all that.

"There are people around that will take cattle into a backgrounding situation," he said.

A rancher can take them to a backgrounding operation and retain ownership, but the key, he said is not to haul them very far.

"Keep them close to home," he said. "If you put them on the truck very far, you've defeated your purpose."

Christopher said the AzTx feedyards are always looking for good cattle to feed. The Hereford, Tex, based company started with feedyards in Arizona and Texas. The property near Mesa, Ariz, however, became more valuable for development than for feeding cattle, so AzTx eliminated the feedyard in Arizona. It has expanded into Colorado and Kansas, and has added another yard in the Texas Panhandle.

"We have five feedyards in three states," he said.

The Hereford Feedyard is their oldest yard. Farwell Feedyard is on the Texas-New Mexico line. There is Dimmitt Feedyard in Dimmitt, Tex., Rocky Ford Feedyard in Rocky Ford, Colo.; and Garden City Feedyard in Garden City, Kan.

"All those facilities have steam flaking, as most large facilities do," he said. "We fill in with alfalfa hay mainly as our roughage."

The complete ration is formulated by different nutritionists at the different yards.

"One of the things that we feel makes AzTx somewhat different than the other large conglomerates," Christopher said, "is each one of our feedyard managers runs his own operation."

AzTx is owned by the Josserand family of Hereford. It operates much like a family, not a large corporation.

The company feeds up to 10 to 15 percent of the cattle in its yards, Christopher said.

"Most of the time, that's partnering with cattlemen," Christopher said.

Christopher said the cattle feeding industry is constantly changing.

Ten years ago, AzTx recommended not mixing steers and heifers when feeding them.

"We proved ourselves wrong," he said. "We do it all the time. If the cattle have been running together, whether they were raised together or put together and held together, we are very successfully feeding them in the same pen, both steers and heifers. The only disadvantage is we have to feed a heifer ration to those cattle which is usually a $1.50 to $2.00 per ton higher than the steer ration because we feed a ration that keeps the heifers from cycling."

In the long run, however, he said that's not a major problem.

He said it is also becoming more common for neighbors to combine their cattle in a feeding operation.

"As long as your cattle are pretty uniform in size, you can do a very good job with that," he said. "There's two ways to figure the feed bill, he said. If one producer puts in 40 and the other puts in 60, the feed bill can be split on a percentage basis if the cattle are uniform. Or the bill can be figured on the percentage of the weight if there is a different weight on one producer's cattle versus the other's. We can prorate the feed that way."

Christopher said they will work with ranchers to figure out the best plan for their calves. Yet he admitted that cattle feeders sometimes have a bad reputation.

"I talk to a lot of cow-calf producers, and they just don't trust us," Christopher said.

He said he encourages them to look at the cattle feeding industry.

"If you think raising cows and calves is competitive, just look at the cattle feeding business," Christopher said. "If people are going to do bad things to you, they're not going to last very long in the industry. There's a lot of good people in this industry."

He said feedyards won't be around long if they don't do a good job for their customers and do it efficiently.

"What they're there to do is take care of your cattle, put good feed out there so the cattle can perform to their absolute genetic ability and keep you informed," he said. "If they don't keep you informed, I invite you to try somebody else. There are people that will keep you informed in this industry."