Agricultural News
Research Shows Angus Cattle Consistently Top the Auction Market
Tue, 09 Apr 2013 11:48:14 CDT
Want to top the auction market? A recent survey says raise Angus cattle. Data from nine cooperating auctions from Kentucky to California and spanning 660 lots sold last fall showed Angus cattle are worth $5.30 more per hundred-weight than their non-Angus counterparts. That was an all-time high for the combination of five weight steers and heifers in the 14-year "Here's the Premium" study.
"If that's what the average Angus genetics are worth, you can imagine how much more they would be worth if you actually had some track record on performance, post-weaning performance, grade, and some of that to go with," says Steve Suther of Certified Angus Beef.
The survey also noted weaned or vaccinated cattle earned more than $7 per hundred-weight compared to other lots. Premiums for Angus calves have grown in a near-linear trend since 1999 when the goal was to show ranchers that consumer preference mattered all the way back to the cow-calf level.
"We wanted to help producers understand how having a branded beef program concentrating on premiums was relevant to them considering most of them were selling their calves at weaning," Suther says.
Dividing those 14 years into two equal periods shows a per-head Angus steer advantage growing from $21.21 cents in the first seven reports to $31.40 in the last seven years.
"I also thought that as cattle prices went higher over those 14 years that since all cattle would be worth more and more, there couldn't continue to be a higher and higher Angus premium, but that has proven to be not the case. During those 14 years we've seen great genetic advancement and the ability of Angus cattle to grow and grade and, including at the same time, we've seen advances in maternal traits and all the other reasons why people might bid higher for those Angus cattle," Suther says.
Video auction data shows a similar trend in higher values of cattle with Angus breeding.
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