meat prices,raising your own

[Rick]

I'm not going to get into this but I will say you are not correct in your assessment. Believe what you want, however. My view is neither my head in the sand or viewed through rose colored glasses. It's a view based a daily study of the numbers. It is as simple as that.

But the OP wasn't about the state of the union. It was how to stretch meat dollars or alternatives. I use coupons and catch the meat that's on sale. I rarely buy steak but that's just because we don't eat it very often.

[JPGreco]

I know the cost discussion is the main discussion, but I'm curious. OP, if my only income was in the form of a disability check, I'd be terrified right now. I know SS won't be around when I'm older, thank god I don't pay much into it.

However, if you can raise livestock, you can also work several jobs. So you can either raise your own food (which as stated, may cost the same or more in the long run) or get a part time job. Personally, depending on my disability, I would much rather work a job than try to raise livestock under most conditions. Not to sound like a dick, just something to think about. Raising animals isn't a walk in the park and require a lot of attention. Is that work worth the return in investment or would finding a job you can do be a better investement of your time?

[shiftyer1]

Unless those animals are chickens depending on your location, in my case I have chickens. For the most part they pretty much take care of themselves. I use the deep litter method in the coop so that is minimal cleaning. They have enough to pick at they only get food when I throw out scraps. The only daily effort is walking out to collect eggs from the coop. Actually if you make a nest box by the door and once they get used to using it they'll lay at the door so theres no walk to get the eggs.

I do think that if you raise your own meat you need to learn to butcher for it to be truely cost effective. Being disabled this could be a little complicated unless you can work out a swap of somekind.

[LowKey]

Like BH51 said, you need to do some reading to find out WHEN to butcher. There is a certain point at which a meat animal has eaten and vetted more than you want to pay for the meat. With a cow, unless you're pasturing, it can get darned expensive. Pigs can too. I've been scooping up some Storey Guides on raising goats and rabbits. Lots of good info there.

If I buy steak, I get it at the bulk store. You can get a whole eye of round for $15 and get 15 steaks out of it. Or get a sirloin for $50 and get 15 steaks out of it.
Same goes for pork. Buy the whole loin for under $20 and do your own cutting.
Chicken around here, you have to wait for the sales. Too many yuppies buying their 'diet' food.
Fish, I catch. Usually 4 big bluefish at the end of the summer will give me fish steaks to mid-february before it starts getting grainy in the freezer. Or 2 blues and a keeper striper.

[Dink]

has anybody noticed the prices of meat in general lately?i am disabled and get a small check so any jump in meat prices hurts and everything is going up it seems almost weekly.i am thinking of getting some goats,chickens,and maybe eventually some cows.atleast a little at a time.and maybe a pig or two,i really like pork.it is going to get to the point i believe that there could be riots if this trend keeps going on,i even see people trying to raise chickens in there apartments just to have eggs and a little meat.i will eat a goat in a heartbeat,its okay but not the best meat.shoot hamburger is already over 2dollars a pound and the way everything else as well keeps going up you will have to become more self sufficient

I am on full disability with minimum payments and grocery store prices are killing me. I garden and can a LOT of my own veggies, get a lot of fruits from farmers markets and will have a nice orchard up and running by next spring. I have butchered 3 Irish Dexter bulls since last fall, and have a Black Angus/beefmaster steer fattening as we speak. I butcher 1-2 yearling calves a year and generally sell half of each one, which ends up paying for most of the feed it took to fatten them, so that is a win-win for me. I buy and butcher at least 1-2 hogs per year, at least 50 young chickens per year, at least 20-30 young ducks per year, deer hunt EVERY SINGLE DAY that they are in season, hunt squirrel, rabbits & coons...and basically anything in season and eat it ALL, I am not picky or squeemish. I fish and no matter what I catch, it gets cleaned and divided up into 1 gallon ice cream tubs and covered in water then frozen or salt cured. I can't handle grocery stores hardly at all any more, and only go there to get salt, sugar, flour and things I cannot easily produce at home. I like raising my own meat, it tastes SO much better. And I know what is (or is not) in it. I butcher and process it all myself, and feel good knowing the animals were raised as pets and lived a relaxed easy life instead of being cramped up in a feedlot somewhere.

Nothin beats doin it yourself and being self sufficient!!

[edr730]

Your my kind of woman Dink. There is nothing that compares to years of daily experience.

[farmerjane]

We haver been raising our own meats for about two years now, when I peek at the meat department in stores now I absolutely fall out.

I have two milk cows (One Jersey and one Jersey/Holstein) they each have a calf each year. In addition to that we buy day old bull calfs from a nearby Dairy. I raise them up on the extra milk from my heifers then put them on pasture. With about 6-8 calfs each year and my two girls they graze on a 5 acre patch. I plant turnip strips in the winter for thier protein and hay that is cut off the other 10 acres that we get bailed on the halfs. For us it works out to be $35.00 for day old calf, raise until they are a year to year and half old, Pay $0.70 per lbs hanging wieght for butchering and packaging. So I get steaks and all for less than a dollar a pound. Occationally I barter part of the meat with a local "Hunter" who does the butchering and Packaging so it coast even less.

Here in Texas we had the drought last year, so far not as bad this year. Alot of people here have sold off most of thier herds. Corn prices are already going up. Our butcher told me about 3 months ago, that by next year people could be paying somewhere close to 5.00 per lb for hamber and much higher for the steak cuts. It really made me feel better about raising our own meat.

Strangly enough, it seems the more I do to save money by doing more ourseves, it seems to cost more for everything else. It feels sometimes like the more I try to do, the more they raise prices so it feels like I am spinning my wheels.

[Rick]

Of course, when you add in your labor it's about $350.00 a pound. (snort, giggle)

[farmerjane]

Of course, when you add in your labor it's about $350.00 a pound. (snort, giggle)

Sooooo True. If only I could convience my husband my labor was worth that much. But then again he would just want to lower my budget money. ha ha Luckily I have children who still think it is FUN to work the farm. I will enjoy that help as long as I can. They each get a calf as a gift each year, in which they raise and sell for thier own pocket money. Teaches really good work habits.

[Rick]

Mom! I've missed you!!! Uh...say....where's my calf?

[Kamel]

I bought a pork loin roast for 8.99 and got a 12 pack of dr pepper and a bucket of loaded mashed potatoes from crocker for free.

[crashdive123]

Mom! I've missed you!!! Uh...say....where's my calf?

I've got a hunch that the only ones you'll be seeing are just below your knees.

[farmerjane]

Mom! I've missed you!!! Uh...say....where's my calf?

The calf only cost me $35.00, the work they do around the farm for "FUN" is worth more. I get the better end of the deal, plus I dont have to buy items i fell are not useful. Our motto is you dont work you dont eat. If a calf is all it takes for another pair of working hands, let me know if you want a bull or heifer. ha

[Celticwarrior]

I have 12 chickens and 6 meat rabbits right now, plus a buck for keeping 'em happy. I don't keep a rooster, but a friend a little ways away has a couple of the same (rhode island reds) so I breed to them if I want replacement chicks. If I had more room than the 4 acres here, I'd get a couple of miniature cows (Derry or Highland minis) for milk, but as it is I have a co-op with the same guy and his wife with the chickens where I pay for half a cow, half the feed and vet bills for it, and I get half the milk (pasteurized and everything). Last year I got half a steer when they butchered their fall stock, which added to my venison, fish, pheasant, ducks, and some cheap supermarket turkeys from Thanksgiving time, pretty well filled my freezers. I use my milk allotment to make cheese, yogurt, and other dairy products at home. Push comes to shove, I could probably support some pigs, a couple sheep, and a handful of miniature cows, but I just don't want to get tied down to all that right now. I am satisfied with my current arrangements right now. Pigeons might be something I would consider raising too, in the future. Depends on what happens with meat prices this year.

[wholsomback]

Well I shoot most of mine so a rise in prices doesn't bother me as much as a dollar for a green pepper,you know how many 5 kids and a wife can eat.Give me meat and I'm happy.

We have plenty of wild hogs here in Texas so I don't forsee me going hungry any time soon.

Oh and by the way the channel cats were biting last week so I picked up 20 for the freezer.

[wildWoman]

Raising your own meat can be pretty expensive if you have to buy much of the feed, depending on where you live. I slaughtered all our ducks this winter It was partly the cost of getting the feed - buying it in town, transporting it down to the closest village and then getting it way out here - it was almost half a Beaver load. The other thing is that livestock tends to tie you down more; now that we have no more ducks and just two dogs left, my bf and I can actually go on trips together without having to organize a housesitter. On the down side, I really loved having them around and having little ducklings every summer. And no more fresh eggs and garden fertilizer now.
So there are a number of things that play into the pros and cons of raising your own meat. Oh, and I always HATED how you're like god when it comes to killing them, because unlike with hunting, your livestock has zero chace to get away. You make the decision of who will die today and execute it. I just don't want that much power over an animal's life, especially when I've known it from day one.

[BENESSE]

Raising your own meat can be pretty expensive if you have to buy much of the feed, depending on where you live. I slaughtered all our ducks this winter It was partly the cost of getting the feed - buying it in town, transporting it down to the closest village and then getting it way out here - it was almost half a Beaver load. The other thing is that livestock tends to tie you down more; now that we have no more ducks and just two dogs left, my bf and I can actually go on trips together without having to organize a housesitter. On the down side, I really loved having them around and having little ducklings every summer. And no more fresh eggs and garden fertilizer now.
So there are a number of things that play into the pros and cons of raising your own meat. Oh, and I always HATED how you're like god when it comes to killing them, because unlike with hunting, your livestock has zero chace to get away. You make the decision of who will die today and execute it. I just don't want that much power over an animal's life, especially when I've known it from day one.

It's something I could never wrap my mind around.
Needless to say, I'm vegetarian.
Now I'll go watch the oncoming...

[Celticwarrior]

Whether it is an animal I have raised (specifically for food, not as a pet) or a wild animal I hunt and kill, I still have the same respect for it, the same grief over taking its life, and the same feeling of being a part of the natural cycle as I eat the meat I have killed, like billions of predators before me. We were born to eat meat, have canine teeth for ripping into flesh, have stomachs and gall bladders teeming with acids and enzymes specifically designed to break down meat, and our bodies function best when meat is a part of the diet.

I feel remorse for having to take a life....any life. I wouldn't be human if I didn't. But to get the food I need for myself and my family, a life must be taken. Whether I buy it in a supermarket or I slaughter it myself, a life is a life. I don't believe in such spiritual mumbo-jumbo as spirits and souls and such, but it is true from a physiological standpoint that the animal's essence, it's flesh and blood, becomes a part of me. That being true, I must honor that sacrifice and use the energy it gives me to survive and to thrive another day. Ancient native peoples knew the costs and the benefits of taking animals' lives, and were duly respectful of them.

If someone chooses to be a vegetarian in this day and age, where we are so separated from nature and all its cruel realities, that is certainly their business. But I don't have a problem killing and eating an animal, because that is what we were both built to do. They are prey, I am predator. They fulfill their role in the tapestry of life by becoming food, just as I will become food for some form of life after I am dead. I am no different than a lion or wolf or eagle. I take their life, and it feeds me for another day. Being a carnivore is not what I do, it is what I AM.

[oldtrap59]

Our chicken breeding program this year has been rather heavy on the rooster side so this winter I seeus eating alot of chicken. However, our pullet and FFa sales will more then pay the feed bill. Same with the rabbits. Sales of breeding stock will cover the feed.

OT

[wildWoman]

Sales of breeding stock will cover the feed.

Excellent! That was my experience with our ducks, too. Also a good reason to look into keeping breeds that aren't available locally, but still a good choice for the area - might make it easier to sell the little ones and get a higher price for them.