Beef on Dairy
Tim Hammerich
News Reporter
New genetics in the dairy industry are opening up opportunities to produce beef animals. Traditionally, dairy cows needed to be bred to dairy bulls for replacement heifers, new advancements open the door for them to be beef producers which dairyman Greg Bethard says helps with efficiency, sustainability, and the bottom line.
Bethard… “We're creating we think a really quality stream of really high quality beef that's grading really well. And the quality of the meat is fantastic. And the thing that's different about our dairy on beef is that we know everything that's happened to every animal every day of its life. From the time it was conceived until the time it's harvested, we can tell you anything that happened to the animal: all treatments, completely agent source's verified. So we can tell the story on every animal and we can control the production practices. If there's an advantage for feeding animals in a certain way, or rearing them in a certain manner, we've got the ability to be able to do that. And unlike traditional beef cow businesses: ranches, cow calf operations, they tend to be kind of seasonal in their production process where they calf certain seasons. We have the same number of calves born virtually every day, year round. So we can have a really consistent, steady supply, which I think differentiates us a little bit.”
There’s also a reduction in carbon footprint from this by replacing a dairy calf with a beef calf that would otherwise need to be produced elsewhere.
