Mart Price Tracker

Like that I’ve eaten in restaurants 3 or 4 times in the last few weeks for various different reasons. Beef is always on the menu and is always what I order. There definitely has been an improvement in the quality of beef in restaurants too.

You’d want to be getting the gates and all from the pen!

Prices are so good now I wouldn't push it.

What grade do you think that bullock would have made? If he was a well fed U grade he’d kill out 62-64% of his mart weight so he’d hang at around 530kgs. That’d be €5.66 per kg which is exactly what they’re making in the factory now.

I’d a 720kg yard weight Charlaois heifer kill out U= and 432.4kgs last week, she made €2,456. Had I brought her to the mart I wouldn’t have expected her to be any more than 680kgs on the scales. She’d have had to make over €3.62per kg live weight to better the factory price. Her dw would have been around 63.5% of her mart weight at that.

If brought to the right factory it would be. The better the confirmation the higher the KO will be. Also with age and weight like that they really come into their own. If he made a U+ I wouldn’t be surprised to hear he made €3,200 - €3,300 in the factory.

Based on yard weights over the last 8-10 years I’d be seeing the following KO%

O-/O= 49-52%

O+/R- 50-54%

R=/R+ 53-57%

U’s 56-60% with the very best KO I had being 2 U+ heifers about 3 years ago making 62% but they were exceptional.

Mart weight, depending on travel time and standing time in the mart, could be anything from 4 - 8% less than yard weight so KO based on mart weights would be 2-3% higher.

That would all be factory dependant too. There’s a private abbatoir in the midlands where you’ll easily get 5-10cent/kg more than the main factories are paying but killouts would be way back. You’d do well to get a U grade to kill out 55% there so the extra 5/10cent is the most expensive 5-10 cent you’ll get on that animal.

The reduced killout could knock 30kgs of meat off the animal, worth about €170 at the minute, whereas even at 10cent extra on the remaining meat, the extra value is only €35 so you’re down €135 on a 650kg U grade for the sake of chasing the few cent extra.

The Jex's should probably have gone to the factory. Allowing for mart weight they would surely have averaged 250 kgs. At a bad P price of 4.5/ kg they would have come into over 1100 euro each.