Well we have a few head on feed. LOL I would Never try to finish cattle on hay alone. It just does not work. The calves get too gutty and do not finish correctly. Plus it will take too long. Any cattle over 30 months old can not be graded Prime or select anymore.
Here is some things to think long and hard about.
1) Cattle feeders, with years of experience, average $100 profit per head when finishing cattle. So your feeding fifty head will not CLEAR that much money. It will gross a lot but not clear that much.
2) Even starting with 20 head right now will take $17-20K to purchase right now. So your going to need to have capitol ready to get started.
3) We are in a down turned market across the AG sector. The future prices right now are not good for next year. So the odds of you having a loss on a pen of calves is greater than it has been.
You can feed on self feeders/stuffers. The rate of gain will be good but the cost of that gain will not be as good as the guys that feed regularly/bunk. For smaller groups self feeders actually is a better choice as you can limit the need for extra equipment. As for the calve over eating. You will have to limit feed the calves over a few week period get the calves used to eating your ration and on full feed. After that they will be OK on a self feeder. You can not let it go empty for very long or you run the chance for them to founder when you fill the feeders again. A few hours and your OK but over night MAY give you troubles.
Truthfully you maybe better off buying smaller calves and just back grounding them with your hay. Buy 3-4 weight cattle and grow them with your hay and some grain to 7-8 weight and sell them. The top end is where it takes time and full feed with little hay in that ration once they get over 800-900 Lbs. So work on the lower end and let some one else finish them. You will have less risk this way too.
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