Author Unknown:Author Unknown:

This is the largest titled section of the chapter and talks about the author’s experience on the Flying V Ranch in Nebraska. The author goes and stays with a family on the ranch during the “branding time”. This ranch still uses somewhat traditional styles of round-up and branding, but of course implements some modern technology (gas torches, modern vaccination, plastic ear tags, etc).

- Today’s beef cattle industry got its start in Antebellum South Texas

- It started here after the Civil War moving north into the Great Plains

- Cattle were driven along Chisholm and Western Trails to Kansas where many railroad towns were emerging and the cattle could shipped east to slaughter

Today, fewer than 2 of every 100 Americans work on farms and ranches, but agriculture remains the largest component of the U.S. economy, and beef production is the largest segment. More than 900,000 farms and ranches raised at least some cattle in 1908 but big spreads like the Flying V account for 1 in 7 cattle raised in the U.S. and 1 out of 100 cow-calf operations.

Process Includes:

- cattle are first weaned off their mother at approx. 300lbs

- brought to feed yard at 400 (light feeders)-800lbs (heavy feeders)

- cattle remain at “custom feeders” (feedyard) until approx 1100-1300 lbs (14-18 months old)

Butchering is a skill, requiring precision to kill, eviscerate, skin, and bone an animal without damaging its hide or its meat. Into the 1880’s, “all around” butchers killed and cut up animals. They were paid by the head and worked at their own pace. But if the tasks required to slaughter and butcher an animal could be divided, the pace of work could be increased, more animals could be processed, and more profit could be made.