Astro's Final Stop

When Jersey cows calve, you ALWAYS want them to give you heifers.  Heifers will, a couple years later once bred, give you more calves and fresh milk. Heifers also bring more money once you sell them.  Many people want nurse cows for calves on their farm.  Others want to buy them to show them as dairy cows in livestock shows.  Many want a family cow that will become a part of the family.

Jersey bulls are not in demand.  Jersey bulls kill more farmers than any other breed, which is odd because Jersey cows are so docile.  Jersey bulls are good for pretty much one thing - meat.  Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you want to look at it, we've had six bulls in a row!  Astro is our Jersey bull that we've had for a couple years.  He was named Astro because he was born on the night that the Houston Astros won Game 6 of the World Series.

It was time for Astro to go to the slaughterhouse.  We made an appointment this past Saturday.  I wish I had a way to weigh him.  I'm not very good at guessing weights, but I'll guess he weighs somewhere between 600 and 650 pounds.

Astro has been grass fed in our pasture in the "bull pen."  The quality of the grass will be dropping soon as the grass goes to seed.  We wanted to get him off while he is still in great condition.

We coaxed him into the cattle trailer with a bucket of sweet feed.  He jumped right in and it went easier than expected.

Now, I know what you may be thinking - How can you eat a pet?  Well, once Jersey bulls are born on our farm, from day 1 we know that they are not pets - they are food.  While it isn't easy to bring them to slaughter, we give them a good life, treat them with dignity, and take care of them.  It still isn't an easy thing to do, but let's be real.  It is foolish to raise him, sell him to someone else to butcher and then go buy meat at the store.  That makes no sense at all.  He's grass-fed.  No hormones.  No antibiotics.  No medicated feed.  All natural.

Once loaded up, we made a twenty minute drive to Morse, Louisiana.  Back in the old days, many communities had their own slaughterhouses.  They are few and far between now.  Elliott's Slaughterhouse is out in the middle of the country, surrounded by rice fields and crawfish ponds.

Elliott's does a really good job.  We've used them time and again.

We backed the trailer next to the gate.  The trailer is in bad need of a paint job.  It was my grandfather's trailer and is a 1978 model.  While it may not be aesthetically pleasing, it's still going strong.  I will try to prime and paint it once the weather gets more pleasant.

We got Astro unloaded and said goodbye.

Elliott's was jam packed with people on this Saturday morning.

It is a very small place and we actually had to wait until some customers left before we could fit inside.

We were the only ones dropping off a live animal.  Most customers inside were buying fresh cut steaks, ground meat in bulk, pork chops, smoked sausage, etc.  Meat doesn't get much fresher than this. 

We were given a cut sheet and began explaining what cuts we wanted.  We want half ground meat and the other half cut into steaks, roasts, brisket, ribs, tenderloin.

We'll get an assortment of T-bone, ribeyes, round and seven steaks.  We also want all of the 'debris,' except for kidney.  I don't do kidney.  We want the bones and the fat.  That's one thing you never think of, but when you bring an animal in for slaughter, you can get everything except the "moo."  They will dry age the meat for two weeks and then will package it all up and call us and we'll go pick it up.  Lots of fresh meat for the freezer...  And we have two more bulls growing in the pasture for next year's supply of meat.