Beef price tracker 2

Your figures are getting more bizarre all the time how could an animal lose an extra 15 kg by not having water for 1 hour I've sold animals at 4 different marts at different times and some marts I've only lost 10 kg from fresh I've many times only lost 15 kg on 700 kg steers you sold a suckler bred o+ heifer last week for 4.15 kg based on losing 20 kg from home she would have made more literary in any mart

I am not going to argue with you.

At the end of the day, this thread is all about letting others know what the current prices being paid by the factories are.

All I can share with others is my own farm details.

I bought a weighting scales last year with the help of a TAMS grant.

I am just looking over last years cattle kill-out details on my spreadsheet. (Busy day in the office. Ha.Ha)

Taking the AAX cattle only, the kill-outs ranged from 49 - 53% of farm weight. Now, let me explain. When I say farm weight, it is the live - weight, after the cattle are held in a holding pen, without feed or water for maybe an hour or an hour an a half. This is to allow for a bit of loss of weight, comparable to going to a mart.

So, that is where I am getting my figure of 52% on the bullock in Nenagh yesterday.

3H & 8A

This goes back to that the greencert should have a module on calculations. If your scales is out its immaterial. You are using it as a reference point. However I have checked mine using a 500kg bag of fertilizer earlier in the year and it's spot on. It showed at 501kgs I think which is the fertlizer and bag weight. Since then we work off our own weight to check.

It's Immaterial you do you killout calculations from the factory on the weights from your scales. You then do the difference between mart and your scale weight and calculate the killout you would expect off that.

The only time it really varies in me a bit is iff killing offwet grass in the autumn. Other than that it's a fairly accurate calculation when you allow for weight abd fat cover.

I notice in mart scales it varies depending on where an animal positions itself on the scale and I assume at what point the operator locks the weight in. Would the scales in a mart ever be a cause for concern, are they regularly calibrated?

As said above further, I have seen heifers that could not feed a cat, become a fine milky cow.

A small pick of nuts will do from now on, just to coax them in.

I very much doubt if the pallet enters the calculation even the plastic around it either. Most fertlizer providers are NSAI abd ISO compliant who are quite fussy over things like that. While the bulk bag may be Inc the pallet or wrapping could not be Inc.

Even if the scales is incorrect you are using it to take a reference weight and to calculate off that. You get your killout percentage or your difference to mart weight

There not there yet but getting there. It's difficult to tell from photos. Imo you are a bit more than a fortnight away but it's hard to tell.

Similar to KK man Last fella maybe, the others are a good month away at least

what age are they?

If they were mine I would reduce there meal to 3kg,graze them on good quality grass & factory August/September,friesans not near fit until min 32/33mth,you get fellas talking about going to the factory with a 22mth old they are selling calves.

there in great nick see the oil coming through there coats well fit to kill when ever grass is scare or money is needed there 2 plus or 3 minus today there is loads being hung not near as good as them base 7:60 blks from 2 factories in the south

I would have no issue hanging them as is if need be. If price was dropping like a normal year I be doing it. However this year is different I would continue to feed away at 5kgs. They are costing less than 2.5/day to feed and probably putting on 7-10 euros of flesh a day aa well as climbing through a point or two on the grid. If the price was rising still in three weeks time, I woukd house and feed silage and 5kgs.

IIt's going to really pay to maximise cattle value for the next couple of months..

Feedlots usually want a significant discount to factory value to buy cattle like that. Often they will just slaughter them straight away and take the discount as a margin

The change in price of beef and tge outlookfor the next couple of months has changed thr economics of feeding. Last year in May price was dropping to below 5/kg base, this year it's heading for 8/ kg. Ration are as cheap as last year and tgatbis about the cheapest in the last ten years