A Midwest Journal

Haven’t talked about my Missouri grass-fed beef cattle in awhile, so I stacked up some ideas meanwhile – and so I blog now:

We’re still on how to make more profit raising beef cattle, which is the first reason I’m researching mob grazing. There are other apparent benefits (such as being more environmentally responsible), but that will come later.

Milo as standing winter feed instead or hay or stockpiled grass

This year’s experiment in lowering input costs has been to raise milo (the idea from a local farmer, Harry Cope) so the cattle would eat it instead of having to feed hay this winter. I got it into the ground a bit too late, so I’m now just hoping for a very long fall before the first killing frost (3 nights of below 22 degrees) and so allow it to make seed heads. Now, a recent post over at Yahoo Groups – GrassFed Beef gave me pause, but a later post there gave me more ideas.

First, if you’re feeding grain to animals, it messes with their digestion and throws off their Omega3/6 ratios. So it’s fine to feed corn as a grass, but not the seed heads (corn cobs) it produces. (That’s from a purist standpoint. Factually, they love corn like candy. So IMHO, corn-cob chunks are a good training treat, but not good as a diet.) So trying to grow milo and feed them the grain head in winter is counter productive to making high quality beef.

Second, it still cost me to put that milo in – but probably a fifth what the same ground would produce in terms of the cost of putting hay up. So it’s still cheaper – and the experiment hasn’t run its course yet. If seeding it so late that it doesn’t really get properly developed seed head still leaves a lot of stalks standing above the ice and snow, it’s probably a decent investment and cost-saving production.

You either have to stockpile grass, or feed hay. Growing milo as as a stockpiled grass source is cheaper than hay, but not as cheap as stockpiled perennial grass.

Now, I started a couple years ago putting hay out on a field, staggered, so I didn’t have manure accumulating in one spot (as well as the mess and expense of firing up the tractor and driving through mud to deliver bales. Last winter, I got the tractor out once – and that was to pick up bales that weren’t going to be eaten that winter.

My approach with this was to put those bales on a nearby crop ground (right next door, across the fence) and put that on the poorest soil, where big sections of the topsoil had essentially been removed by earlier farming (erosion). The trick was that with all that manure and old hay left there, it was either feast or famine. Didn’t disk up very well and didn’t take planting well, either. It took most of the next summer to really digest, and when I did get something planted in it, it took off like all thunder – lots higher than anything around. Or it just sat there, waterlogged. Got the original idea from one old boy who fed round bales without bale rings to his Auxvasse Missouri Longhorns for several years on the top of one worn-out hillock and wound up with a very lush pasture out of it.

But really, that area isn’t a high producing section anyway, so I’m not losing much, I figure.

Hay as fertilizer for worn out crop ground

There was a thread on that forum lately about buying hay as fertilizer, which got me thinking. Yes, it’s cheaper to buy hay than make it. The trick is in how you feed it. Setting it up as big round bales isn’t all that efficient, as you still wind up with concentrated circles of manure, and a center with old hay. (Now the cows and calves love to lie on this when they’re eating the next bale over, so it gets some layers mixed…) But overall, it’s not all that efficient.

I did unroll a bale once down a hill and saw how they went through it. Since it was on a pasture, they ate most all of it and it wasn’t showing the next spring.The trick, with feeding anything in winter, is that the ice and snow cover it. That is where the big bales (or even small square bales thrown out on top of the snow) are easier for cattle to feed.

Some people actually advise growing your fall pastures up tall and then cutting and winnowing that grass so that it is in long, high rows so the cattle can then be strip-grazed on it (they’d waste it by tromping and laying on it if you feed too much at once).

For that poor crops ground above, here’s the next idea: Unroll that hay in contours across the land, so it will catch runoff. But use the rake to pile it back up in windrows. Then feed it that way to the cattle, with the electric fence running perpendicular to the rows, which keeps them eating only as much as they need. No more moving frozen-down hay rings or cold-to-start tractors. Plus, the ground is in better shape to try to crop it next spring. At least that’s the theory.

I’ll try this theory on the milo ground which didn’t produce well (same areas that don’t have any real topsoil.)

Just another idea until I can perfect my managed grazing to the point where I have the nice electric fences all over and can easily move my cattle every day.

Meanwhile, you farm with what you got.

Research on mob grazing continues – to make profitable grass-fed beef cattle.

Next up is to figure how to do the transition from conventional grazing over to managed grazing and then to mob grazing. First situation is both existing fences and water supply. Existing fences are built for rotating pastures when they eat everything off – conventional grazing. They aren’t set so that I can partition them easily with portable electric fences. So I’ve got some engineering to do.

My approach is as I’d been advised, to start partitioning pastures for a few years and see where you are using the temporary fences – and then put a permanent electric fence there so you can set up temporary ones which use that as a power source. So you aren’t hooking up and taking down a battery and charger every time you move the fence (current arrangement.) Means the cows don’t get moved as much as they should. (You can get around this by pivoting off a corner and giving a new pie slice each time, but there’s no back-fence which some prefer for mob grazing so what was just grazed gets to rest and re-grow.)

So I’m studying my existing fences and how I use them to see ways I could set up something that allows more mobile set up and breakdown. (Plus rig the permanent fences so the cattle will keep them cleaned up with no brush growing over them.)

This winter, at least, I’ve got a sizable set of stockpiled grass from our too-wet summer – so I can see how this does over winter.

Plenty to do with what I’ve got to work with. Always got to like having options…

The goal is to knock out cost of winter feeding and to increase the quality of forage I already have. Both will increase my profits for finishing beef cattle on pasture only.

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Update: While I was doing further research on mob grazing and grass fed beef, I found this story from Eat, Drink, Better. Seems that some of these big packers haven’t been able to keep their beef clean enough from the manure they raise it in. That’s the problem with grain-fed beef, that they simply raise these cattle in their own manure. And keeping the meat from being infected becomes a real problem. Because bacteria is native to manure. Plus that particular strain of e coli is more prevalent in feedlots than pastures.

More later – my research on this is  continuing…

While these aren’t commodity Angus, they are some of the best grass-fed beef cattle you can have – but this post today is about mob grazing, not selecting the best genetics for your cattle. That’s another subject I’ll weigh in on at some time – how we’ve gone away from the healthier, more efficient animals farmers used to breed. But the college guys are starting to figure this out with all their number crunching…

Now, yesterday, I promised you more from Greg Judy of Columbia Missouri. And I found a nice, short presentation of his over at the University of Missouri website. This was from their Missouri Forage and Grassland Council 2000 Annual Meeting, held October 30-31, 2000 at Lake Ozark Holiday Inn, Lake Ozark, Missouri – and since then I understand Judy has changed and improved his grazing techniques even more.

Leasing Land For Custom Grazing Stockers

Greg Judy
Greg Judy’s Custom Grazing Farms

Background I have been practicing management-intensive grazing (MiG) for six years, mostly with stockers. In the spring of 1999, I started leasing farms and developed MiG on most of them. Although I am in the custom grazing business, I am also employed full-time as a lab technician for an electric utility supplier.

Presently I have 600 acres with 350 acres in grass, located 20 miles northwest of Columbia. I own 200 acres and lease the remaining 400 acres. The leased land is split into five different farms which range in size from 40 to 150 acres. All my farms are rolling hills with 2 to 4 inches of topsoil over a heavy clay base.

The following is an outline of how I got started in the custom grazing business and some tips I have developed along the way.

Finding Land to Lease

• When I first started, I took a platte map and drew a 5-mile circle around my farm. Then I concentrated on prospective idle areas with no fences. (This gives you more bargaining power for a cheaper lease.)
• The minimum lease period is 5 years if you have to do any development to it. Try to get a 10-year lease if possible. The years can go by very quickly!
• The land must have around 70% open area or it is not economical for me to lease it.
• Large hay fields with no fencing are good prospects; the landowner is locked into haying it every year because of the lack of fencing.
• A bonus is several ponds or a creek that runs through the property.
• If the land has no water, I offer to build a pond on the property if I can deduct the cost of it off the lease. (Ponds add value to the property — emphasize this to the landowner.)
• The more items that are in place on the property, fence, water, corral, etc, the less bargaining power you have.

Advantages of Leasing vs. Owning Land

• No Farm Payment.
• 100% of lease payment is tax deductible.
• No land taxes.
• Minimal equity needed to get into the grazing business.

Approaching the Landowner

• Some landowners are very cautious at first, but just tell him you noticed the land was lying idle and ask if he would be interested in allowing you to graze it.
• If you have a farm that is set up for MiG, ask him if you could show it to him. Make sure your farm is clean, no trash, just pretty pastures of grass and cattle.
• Ask him what his plans are for the land: Did he buy it to retire on or as an investment?
• Explain to him that your goal is to make his land look like yours. This is probably your most powerful tool!
• Explain to him the concept of MiG. How you will rotate the cattle through a series of paddocks, allowing rest periods for the grass.
• Explain the benefits it will add to his property: Increased fertility because of better manure distribution, more diverse grass species, less rain runoff, improved build up of organic matter in the soil, increased legume content, more wildlife and less brush.
• Explain to him the sequence of events that will take place to put MiG in place on his land and that it will take two to three years for some land to show progress.
• Explain to him that all ponds and woods will be fenced off to exclude livestock.
• Explain to him that the value of his property will increase substantially as a direct result of your management.
• Write a proposed lease and ask the landowner to read the contract, make changes, etc. Make sure both parties are satisfied before signing it.

Getting Started

• Have liability insurance policy for all livestock. When custom grazing, the stocker-owner is usually responsible for the policy.
• When starting out with an idle property, use the forage that is already there. I always run cows the first year to clean off the duff, along with lots of brush. By strip grazing you get better duff removal.
• Learn the patterns the cows graze, and visualize where the paddock divisions should be placed.
• I use high-tensile 170,000-psi wire with ratchets and a high voltage low impedance fencer. It is not a big deal changing a paddock division; just move one high-tensile wire.
• Frost seed 3 to 4 lb red clover on all pastures.
• Fence off all ponds and run a siphon hose over the dam to the tank.
• Fence off all timbered areas.
• Concentrate on improving the water supply and quality.
• You can have the best grass in the world, but without a good water supply, the grass is useless.

Stocker Management

• Take the stress off new calves by stopping fence walking. If calves are allowed to, they will walk themselves into a health wreck.
• Make sure you see every calf eat and drink on arrival before you leave them.
• Spend some time with them; let them know that you are not going to hurt them.
• Start with 400-pound stockers, and hand-feed them for a week on paddocks to tame them down and train them to move.
• All calves should have had their second round of shots when placed on pasture.
• Use a Capture rifle to doctor any calves that are sick. This is a huge benefit, as you don’t have to get the whole herd up to doctor one calf.

Materials Needed

• Small pickup
• An ATV is a time saver: no ruts, handy for broadcasting seed, and a good vehicle to use when building fence.
• Wire and posts
• Miners light that fits on a hard hat. This is the one tool that I use the most because of my off-farm job. By having the light on your head, your hands are free to work at anything.

Tips for Keeping Your Overhead Low

• No heavy metal machinery
• No boy toys
• Don’t buy anything that RUSTS.
• No stock trailer and truck; hire this work out.
• Loading facilities should be functional, not elaborate.

Good Investments

• Water availability
• Lime, P&K
• Legume establishment

Landowner and Lessee Friendships

• Some landowners, once they start seeing the results of your management on their property, get really excited and emotional. I’ve had a landowner ask where I could use a couple extra ponds; he built two right where I needed them!
• Sometimes the more you do, the more the landowners want you to improve their land.
• I had a landowner give me a turkey and ham for Christmas. He said, “This is for all the work and improvements you have done on my farm. Words can not express how happy I am with what you have done.”
• I personally get a huge sense of reward from this kind of landowner satisfaction; you cannot put a money figure on it!
• I had a landowner give me back a full year’s lease payment. He said that I earned the lease by the amount of work that I had done on his land.
• A landowner changed my lease contract. I had a ten-year lease, and he gave me a lifetime lease (my lifetime) on his farm.
• I give landowners a quarterly update on the progress that has taken place.

Final Thoughts and Comments

• You need to set a goal. Start out by asking yourself, “Where do I want to be in five years?” Then write it down where you can read it everyday. This helps keep you focused.
• This is not a get-rich-quick scheme. There is a lot of work involved to get all the proper elements in place.
• Be innovative; always ask yourself if there is a better way of doing things.
• Read all the grazing books you can such as Stockman and Grassfarmer.
• You can pick up a lot of good tips by attending grazing schools and pasture walks.
• You have to be 100% committed to making it work. The first year is the hardest, but the second year is a lot easier. Things start to fall in place as you go.
• Hard work, along with good management, does not go unnoticed. You may pick up other farms just by people driving by and seeing the dramatic difference you have made with the idle property.
• I have been offered several farms to graze strictly as a result of my progress on the farms I currently lease.
• Keep the leased farms neat — absolutely no trash or idle machinery.
• Manage the property as if your livelihood depended on it — it may someday!
• I personally get a huge satisfaction out of taking a piece of marginal land and making it into a grass-grazing haven.
• Sometimes we hear a lot about the doom and gloom facing farmers today; don’t get caught up in this treadmill. You control your own destiny. There is a lot of idle pastureland out there, and if you concentrate on being a good grass manager, in time, you will get all the land and cattle you want.
• Go for it and remember to have fun on your journey!

When I last posted about this hot topic of grass fed beef, I mainly outlined the economics of it and how to lower costs and raise profits by:

1. Getting off the corn standard and switching to grass-fed beef cattle production,
2. Figuring out how to direct-market your beef to local (big-city) clients who prefer to pay extra for higher-quality food,
3. Going off feeding hay in the winter by mob grazing (intensively-managed grazing).

And I said I was going to have to do some homework in this last area. So I’ve begun.

I had a long list of PDF’s to give you, but unfortunately, this blog didn’t want to link you to them. So I’ve included the links to them as I found them on Google and you’ll have to copy/paste these into your browser to get them. Otherwise, see the end of this post for the exact words to type into Google to get the same results (and links you can actually use.)

Of particular interest right now is this Greg Judy from near Columbia, Missouri. His is a name that keeps coming up. I’ll be quoting him in a later post to follow (tomorrow).

PDF mob grazing references:

Mob grazing gets the most out of forage

CHAD Peterson sent his first mob- grazed cattle to the feedlot last … Mob grazing acclimated them to close eating quarters like they face in the feedlot. …
magissues.farmprogress.com/AMA/AM05May09/ama036.pdf

Mob grazing offers 200% more forage

GREG and Jan Judy say mob grazing has nearly zeroed their input costs. For example, they once spent $5000 per year frost-seeding and reseeding clover. Now …
magissues.farmprogress.com/MDS/MS08Aug09/mds043.pdf

Grazing program maximizes profit

GRAZIER Greg Judy believes a technique called “mob grazing” is better for … He has been using the mob concept, also known as high-intensity grazing, …
magissues.farmprogress.com/MOR/MR06Jun07/mor014.pdf

Grazing former CRP land takes care

king or mob grazing during the forages’ dormant season. Animal performance may be sacrificed, however, with mob grazing. Stands seeded to weeping lovegrass …
magissues.farmprogress.com/TFS/FS09Sep09/tfs007.pdf

Keep learning; apply what you learn

“mob” grazing techniques, has found bison will not tolerate quite as much crowding as cattle. Historical reports say bison grazed by the hundreds of …
magissues.farmprogress.com/AMA/AM05May09/ama039.pdf

Mob Grazing Missouri Farm Practice

Using what he often calls “mob” grazing, or high-stock-density grazing,. Judy estimates he’s only taking about. 30% of the forage from each paddock …
magissues.farmprogress.com/wfs/WS08Aug09/wfs046.pdf

Mob Stocking

in mob grazing is that it is less forgiving to the bottom enders. In a smaller herd, lower performance animals don’t get. As the plant matures, …
www.acresusa.com/toolbox/reprints/May08_Salatin.pdf

May-June 2007.pub

did not go into brain-shutdown mode. Their incredible experiences with. “mob grazing” is shared on pages 4 and 5. Folks, this is BIG! …
www.pharocattle.com/May_June_2007.pdf

Microsoft PowerPoint – INTENSIVE GRAZING 05_19_08.ppt …

May 19, 2008 … plants. Mob grazing can replace clipping. … Mob Grazing. • 1000000 pounds of cattle per acre stock d itensy. Mob Grazing …
msucares.com/crops/forages/intensive_grazing05_19_08.pdf

MFSI’s Return to Your Roots Newsletter Mob Grazing proves to …

Mob Grazing proves to. Benefit Grass and Cattle www. mvskokefood.org. By Rita Williams … few “mob grazing” consult- ants springing up around the …
www.mvskokefood.org/news/June%20Newsletter.pdf

MOB-GRAZING OF MORPHOLOGICALLY DIFFERENT . AESCHYNOMENE SPECIES”

Two studies were conducted using the mob-grazing technique to … “Mob-grazing” with a high stocking density on limited land area for a short period of …
www.tropicalgrasslands.asn.au/…/Vol_21_03_87_pp123_132.pdf

Now, if you want to search for this yourself in Google, type in “mob grazing filetype:PDF” and it will give you all sorts of PDF files.

So have fun with this!

(For part one, part two – visit those links. Meanwhile, we join our author after he just explained how he figured out how to make more money doing less on his grass fed beef farm…)

Now, this all doesn’t look like much money for having to go out and check our beef cattle twice a day, every day. Certainly wouldn’t pay your expenses if you think you have to make $50K per year to make a living. Practically, the Feds say you are below “poverty level” if you make less than $24K for a family of four (which is something like $16K if you are an individual – but they still take taxes out of almost every paycheck and hold it for you until the end of the year. Such nice folks we have in government.)

Means that most rural families are “poor” according to the government and are so eligible for massive handouts from the rest of the country which are comparatively “rich” and can afford to pay for everything we “need.”

But when you look at a lifestyle where you can raise everything you eat and if you don’t buy the hype that you have to have a color TV and a boat to take to the lake on summer weekends – or a 3,000 square foot house and all the latest gizmo’s which make life easier. When you look at life as a very simple operation (if you leave Madison Avenue and the Government out of the equation), then your actual cost of living is very small.

Once I got my credit card bills paid off and started working as a contracted laborer (freelance web design), I found out that I didn’t have the commuting expense to work and back so many times a week. I quit watching TV and suddenly didn’t feel “compelled” to buy this or that – or even see the latest movies which were coming out.

I started having more time to myself, and felt more at ease and secure and healthier.

No, I don’t “make” anywhere near the $50K slot. But I don’t have to work for someone else except every now and then – and I don’t have to leave home to do it. The quality of my food is completely under my own control. What vegetables and beef and fruit I eat are how industrious and efficient I am with my time and the resources around me.

True, my parents bought and paid for this farm with their own jobs and I am simply reaping this harvest based on their work. But I also keep the farm running and my Mother live a comfortable retired life, not having to fix things or simply rent out the farm because she can’t manage it.

My income is also taken out in non-taxable ways – such as barter and payment in other “currencies” than money. Working for my room and board is one example.

I then spend the bulk of my time on stuff I want to do, and am not taxed for thinking or writing or blogging. I give tons of stuff away that is really useful.

So I don’t really feel I need a lot to live on. My health is excellent and I don’t carry insurance. Don’t really need to. Isn’t insurance something a little counter-productive, since you are hedging a bet against yourself?  The taxes I do pay whenever I buy something or license something – all these go toward supporting the schools and hospitals and roads. Even though I mostly don’t use them.

I don’t need a lot of income, so don’t need to pay tax on it.

The result is that I can say that a farm which makes $16,000 a year from raising beef cattle is sustainable and outrageously profitable. At that rate, I could buy a used tractor every year. Or get a loan for more land and pay it off in a decade or so.  Or simply stockpile some savings instead of giving it away to insurance companies – so if I did have to get medical treatment, I could simply pay the bill that way. (Like I do with my dentist – I was paying more for insurance and the deductible than I was in just paying for the treatment when I needed it.)

That’s the Kool-Aid I make. Look at the incredible prosperity you are already surrounded with. And quit listening to people who say you have to buy this and that. Quit figuring that you need approval from others, or inflated ideas of security, or that you need to be controlled or control others. These three points – approval, control, security – Levenson’s Sedona Method says are the base for all the chronic thinking we have floating around our heads. Get rid of those base considerations and the thought can simply be let go, released. Keep doing that consistently or intensively, and your mind quiets right down. You aren’t habitually thinking so much – and can actually quit having to “think your way” through life.

And you can come up with ideas about how you don’t need to “make a lot of money” to be abundantly prosperous and fulfilled.

There’s also the benefits of going through the pasture, checking your cows, scratching them where they seem to like it – and getting the satisfaction from those simple actions. Raising calves and watching them grow – like any crop, but more mobile.

The point is that all your “pay” for living in this universe isn’t coming to you in a check or through an electronic account somewhere. And it doesn’t need some government approval or license. Take a walk in the early morning or at sunset and see if you are getting paid very amply for the little time you invest.

That’s the meal I cook, the Kool-Aid I drink . Join me.

(For part one, part three – visit those links. Meanwhile, we re-join our author after he just explained how he got into raising grass fed beef cattle in the Missouri instead of pushing pencils in California…)

Our profit numbers reflect the efficiency of grass fed cattle. Inputs are some hay during the winter, for the two years you are raising them, plus the vet costs when you wean them. If you sell your cattle at 1,000 lbs and get about .80 per pound at auction (on average), you’ll net about $800 per head. Direct market this and you can make about $1K. Take out about $300 in hay cost and you’ll profit $700 after two years.  (The trick is that the same cow which gave you that steer or heifer you just sold meanwhile produced another which is one year old, and is about to deliver a third.

If you sell that calf immediately after it is weaned, you get about $500, but have to take off what it took to keep that mother (plus one bull per about 50 cows) on hay during the winter before, so you make about $350.

Let’s look at the land. As I mentioned, we’ve been doing both crops and cattle as production. Under conventional farming methods (moving cattle when they ate everything they could), a cow needs about 2.5 acres to live the year in Missouri. (And you have to hay some of that against winter.)

The 60 acres we have in cropland would then generate sustenance for about 15 cows. Those 15 cows, after a 9 months gestation and 7 months to weaning, would produce 15 x $350 = $5,250 profit. If you wanted to feed those calves out to get a higher profit, you’d have to replace some of those cows with yearlings.  You only have so much land and so much grass. Say you had 10 cows and 100% survival on birthing – so you then sell 5 of those calves so you can keep 5 to feed out to full maturity.

5 calves =  5 x $350 = $1750

5 calves fed to maturity = 5 x $700 = $3500

Total = $5250

Profit is the same for all that extra weight you put on, right?  Trick is that you can set up more options with direct marketing so that if you get them properly inspected and butchered (read: higher cost of overhead) and then sell the parts at farmers’ markets – you can make as much as $3,000 per animal. Of course, that is a lot more work. Your profit for farm-raised grass-fed beef would run probably about $2,000 per head.

Compare this to row crops, where we make about $1,000 t0 $2,000 profit off that same acreage every year. Net margin increase using pasture-finished cattle over row-crops = $5250 – $2,000 = $3250 at minimum, with the potential for about $10,000 if you inspect, butcher, direct sale  = $8,000 profit margin increase.

Row-crops are low-profit because you deal in commodities. The seed companies, fertilizer companies, chemical companies, and equipment dealers – all work to get the biggest slice of that pie you create by farming. If I wanted to raise stuff which was non-commodity – or would direct sell specialty seeds, for instance, to gardeners, I’d make considerably more income from row crops. (Sell a bushel of corn, you make $4; buy a bushel of corn seed – pay $100 – $200. The reason corn is profitable is because some places can make 200 bushel an acre out of 1/5 of a bushel of seed. Not on my land – it grows better grass than crops. Our average is about 80 bu per acre.)

Pasture-finished cattle has less variables than grain fed or finished beef – if it rains too much so you can’t get a crop in, you can raise grass anyway. If it’s a drought, you simply sell the calves early instead of having no crop at all (and still have the expenses of planting and soil prep and spraying.) Corn depends on the weather.

Needless to say, I’ll be taking our farm over to entirely a grass-finished cattle operation shortly. Just need to finish building my herd up to size. We’ll be at about 20-30 head and able to then generate $7K – $10.5K each year as profit.

Further profit will be by lowering inputs through real intensively managed grazing, which will minimize/eliminate hay costs. Dropping our cattle frame size will improve efficiency by about another 20%, so we can add another 5-6 head, or another $1750 to $2100 profit annually. If we direct market (part out) those beef, we’d add another $6K profit.

The next step is to move entirely out of winter hay, through managed grazing practices and so make grass-fed beef pure profit, since the pastures don’t have to be fertilized or sprayed to get production. (One further step would be to certify these pastures as organic, but this is really just adding another input cost. Right now, locally-raised grass-fed beef gives the same premium as organic – so government-trademarked organic beef is less profitable.)

While there is a ceiling on what you can make, it’s much, much higher than conventional farming methods with commodity products. Your profit is under your own control.

Key takeaway points are that by moving to grass fed beef production you lower input costs and are able to move into a much higher premium by direct marketing to local consumers. This model is consistent with marginal land which is normally used for beef production in the Midwest. Deep topsoil areas of Iowa and Illinois are natural for raising corn and other row crops – more power to them. But you won’t see my beef going to their feedlots…

(Next: Life on a profitable grassfed beef farm – how much money do you really need to live on and how prosperous is prosperity and how poor is “poverty”?)

Having some fun just living life. Things are starting to work out.

I was listening to an MP3 from Greg Habstritt at Finer Minds, who mentioned that phrase above, ” You have to eat your own cooking and drink your own Kool-Aid.” So I thought to share what I’ve accumulated and been practicing.

Just returned from an all-day farm tour yesterday, and this is a partial debrief from this. I was there to study grass fed beef in southern Missouri farms (although we also saw plenty of grain fed beef as well – just no organic stuff.)

First, my lifestyle choice has been to live on a farm and work it while I got my online business operating and producing income.

Let’s review that farm first. (Now, the below figures are based on my own experience on my own farm – your mileage may vary, go ahead and see if you make make yours more profitable…)

My Dad was ailing and my life in California under a corporate cult (most are, actually) was miserable. So I left everything I had established over 20+ years and moved back to Missouri. Call it a mid-life crisis resolution or whatever – it simply made sense, though I had no savings, retirement, insurance – anything people would call security.

The farm  was mixed row-crops and cow-calf finishing operation.  And it wasn’t really sustainable. The farm was supplemented by my Dad’s pension. When he passed, my Mother paid off the bills with his life insurance (which is what that is actually for) and then started running the farm based on her pension plus what we made the farm produce.

The grain crops, if we made anything, pretty much ate up any profits in equipment, fuel, seed, and fertilizer costs. The time I spent on the tractor was discounted (free) as the farm costs paid my room and board. Theoretically, anyway.

The cow-calf operation theoretically made about $4,000 per year, based on 20 calves being backgrounded. This was after the feed bill. Now I was able to increase that to $5K by selling them as feeders (right after they were weaned) and not having to grind, mix, or buy feed. Vet bills for the occasional sick steer also dropped. That feed lot started producing forage again.

But $4K for a 250 acre farm wasn’t really sustainable, since we had electricity, water, taxes, etc. Still basically running on my Mother’s pension and savings. (The government started making her take out certain amounts of her savings after she go so old… Thanks a lot.)

My own ideas were to make a living, home-based on my online business activities. So farming hours were slotted out, and the rest of the day was my own to invest. No wife or kids of my own, so I could simply throw everything at that. (But let’s not digress — back to the farm.)

Grain crops gave some profit, but it took all summer to produce. And was the most variable based on weather.

While this may seem non-sequitur, the two crops that are the easiest to raise on our land are grass and trees. Very little inputs, but harvesting eats up your profits. Usually, it costs more to bale hay than you can buy it for. And trees take longer to grow, such that you can only sell a tree after 50 years, usually.  Doesn’t pay enough in that one sale to pay someone to grow them.

The best harvester for grass and trees is a natural one: cows (or sheep and goats, or a combination or two or three of those.)

Reason being is that grass grows better in partial shade and cows will eat more grass in the shade than in the sun. Cows eat grass and turn it into meat. Meanwhile, they’ll trim the trees within reach and keep down the competition of new sprouts (mostly) by stripping off their leaves (it helps de-worm the cattle.)

Cows take about two years to grow on just grass.

And if you generally leave them alone to fatten on grass, they do fine. Better than fine, actually: beef which is pasture finished is lower fat, lower cholesterol, higher omega-3 & -6 – so is generally considered “heart-healthy”. So it’s better for you to eat.

Meanwhile, cows deposit their manure (and urine) on the grass and under the trees to fertilize them. The trick is to manage your herd so that they spread their wealth more widely – as they tend to rest under trees and deposit there when they get up, just before they go out to eat again.  You want trees in your pastures, spread out so that there is probably a 50/50 mix of sunny and shady grass at most times. And move your cows regularly so that they let the grass grow back.

(This author continues telling how he brilliantly rescues a small farm and returns it to sustainable profitability overnight – well, at least he sees the light after 8 years of hard work… See Part 2)