PROCEEDINGS OF THE 5TH WESTERN DAIRY MANAGEMENT CONFERENCE 69 more→ Getting the Most From Your Dairy Beef

Most dairy producers have focused their management expertise on production of milk, not meat, and their food quality and safety efforts on milk products. Dairymen receive 4 % (vs. 16 % for cow/calf producers) of their gross revenue from sale of salvage cattle and 96 % from sale of fluid milk (Roeber et al., 2000a), justifying their emphasis on milk production and their nonchalance about the value of salvage cattle. There are, however, financial incentives for dairymen willing to become well-informed on the use of meat from market cows and bulls and to promote value by managing their herds to minimize quality shortcomings and defects, by monitoring the health and condition of market cows and bulls, and by marketing salvage cattle in a timely manner (National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, 2000). Contrary to the popularly held belief of most produc-ers, not all of the beef from market cows and bulls is used in the production of commodity ground beef. In fact, beef from market cows and bulls is widely used in the retail and food service sectors in a variety of product forms. Roeber et al. (2000a) interviewed packers during the 1999 National Market Cow And Bull Beef Quality Audit and reported that 43.6 % of cow and bull beef was sold as 100 % Visual Lean (for use in restructured beef roasts) or as primals/ subprimals (for sale as steaks/roasts in supermarkets and food-service operations), leaving 56.4 % for use in ground beef and sausage products