Homestead, Protein Supplements, Facilities

Summary

Cattle Chat Episode Summary

Podcast: Cattle Chat
Host: BCI Cattle Chat Crew (Brad White, Brian, Philip, Bob, Dustin)
Episode: Homestead, Protein Supplements, Facilities
Date: October 4, 2024

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Episode Overview

This episode of Cattle Chat from the Beef Cattle Institute at Kansas State University tackles a range of practical questions from listeners on three primary topics:

• Getting started with a cattle-focused homestead for personal or family beef production
• Best practices for protein supplementation for cows on dormant pasture when you can only visit infrequently
• Design considerations and pros/cons in beef cattle handling facilities (alleys, tubs vs. bud boxes, flooring)

The hosts blend personal anecdotes, science, and professional experience to provide actionable insights for both beginning and experienced cattle producers.

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1. Starting a Homestead with Cattle

[03:27–09:44]

Main Discussion Points

• Definition of Homesteading:
  A homestead is raising livestock and/or crops for one’s own consumption rather than commercial sale, although occasional surplus might be sold. The focus is self-sufficiency rather than profit.

• Commitment and Daily Realities:

  • Raising your own beef is “a commitment” and is not as simple as just buying and butchering a calf:

    “Are you ready for this commitment? ... It’s a commitment. Right. You’re out there every single day watering...if you don’t have an automatic water heater, you’re breaking ice, which isn’t fun.” – Dustin [04:11]

  • Cattle chores don’t take a day off, and emergencies seem to happen at inconvenient times (e.g., just before a family event).

• Time to Beef in the Freezer:

  • Unlike buying beef at the store, there’s a significant time investment:

    “Time before you actually get to beef, depending on what stage you start, it’s a significant time before you actually have beef in the freezer.” – Brad [04:57]

• Production System Choices:

  • Do you want to breed cows or just raise feeder calves to slaughter weight?
  • Land and facilities are necessary. Lack of pasture may require purchasing feed.

• Economics & Protein Demand:

  • Homesteading is rarely economical; it’s more about lifestyle.
    • Consider whether you’ll really use all the beef from an average carcass (~1000 lbs).

    “Most homesteaders don’t do it for economic reasons...It might actually not make sense if you’re just raising for [consumption].” – Brian [05:31]

  • Alternatives, such as small ruminants (sheep/goats), might fit some homesteads better.

• Carcass Utilization:

  • Family use of all cuts, including less popular ones, is part of the experience:

    “Now mom starts serving the organ meats and there’s a lot of cube steak. ... The utilization of the carcass...there was some intangible enjoyment of eating our own livestock.” – Bob [06:26]

• Economic Considerations:

  • List all costs: animals, feed, fencing, equipment, labor, processing, and lost value if you don’t use “all of our...component.”

    “If you’re trying to save money, I would definitely run through all your numbers...It might be cheaper [to buy beef] because you can go buy exactly what you want.” – Dustin [07:40]

• Learning and Support:

  • Build relationships with local veterinarians, extension agents, neighboring producers, and feed mills.

    “The extension service is a good place to start. Having a relationship with a veterinarian...and extension service and local veterinarian are two good places to start.” – Brian [08:32] “The feed mill can help you understand a little bit about what type of feed you need at different stages...” – Philip [09:20]

Key Takeaway:
Homesteading cattle is rewarding but requires realistic expectations, planning, and commitment. Consult local resources and do the research to understand costs, labor, and your actual needs.

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2. Protein Supplementation Frequency on Dormant Pasture

[09:44–14:57]

Scenario & Listener Question

A producer with cattle in several distant locations is busy with harvest for the next six weeks and can only check/supplement each group once per week. Their cows are on dormant forage with low protein, and they want to know if feeding protein only once a week is effective or if the typical “every other day” recommendation is critical.

Insights and Recommendations

• Ruminant Nitrogen Recycling:

  • Cows can recycle nitrogen/protein and don’t require supplementation strictly every day.

    “They can recycle protein or nitrogen...they don’t need protein every day.” – Bob [11:08]

• Research Findings:

  • Supplementing once a week results in a slight decrease in forage digestibility benefits but remains better than not supplementing at all.

    “There’s a little bit of drop off for once a week...but it’s still better than no supplementation.” – Philip [12:25]

  • Cows may lose some body condition versus more frequent supplementation, but that loss is less severe than not supplementing.

• Adjust Feed Amount:

  • Don’t feed a single day’s ration once a week; feed several days’ rations in one go (e.g., double or more).

    “He needs to supplement an additional amount...you’ve got to give the animal excess protein that they can recycle.” – Philip [13:06]

• Monitor Cow Condition:

  • Use fecal pat appearance as a real-time indicator for dietary protein:

    “...monitor the fecal pat as an indication...if not, what you’ll see is not good. ... You want it kind of a more normal fecal pat that if it dried out you could use it as a frisbee...” – Bob [13:57]

  • Body condition changes lag behind dietary changes; fecal consistency changes quickly.

• Practical Outlook:

  • For a six-week period, supplementing once a week, especially if you increase the single feeding amount, is a reasonable compromise.

Memorable Moment:

“Your frisbee test is a two person job. You gotta have a thrower and a catcher...” – Brad [14:57]

Key Takeaway:
During a busy season, weekly protein supplementation is acceptable for a limited period if you scale up the dose and monitor cow digestion cues, especially fecal consistency.

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3. Beef Cattle Handling Facility Design Choices

[14:57–24:40]

Key Discussion Areas

• Alleyway Design: Solid-Sided vs. Open-Sided (with Walkways)

  • Solid-sided, raised walkway:
    • Safer and less stressful for unacclimated (“wild”) cattle and less experienced handlers.

      “I kind of like the solid sided, raised platform for cattle that are kind of wild and not used to having people around them.” – Bob [16:05]

  • Open-sided, on-ground:
    • Can work well for calm cattle and trained handlers.
    • More opportunity for handler-cattle interactions, but more risk if handlers are inexperienced.

      “If I have people that are not well trained at cattle handling, I want the solid sided panels...” – Brian [17:28]

• Tub vs. Bud Box for Loading Chutes

  • Tub (semicircular):
    • Easier to train inexperienced people, safer with wilder cattle.

      “Probably the more easier to train one is the tub system.” – Brian [21:41]

  • Bud box (rectangular):
    • Works very well but requires people trained in Bud Williams’ low-stress livestock handling system.

      “If I’ve got either wilder cattle that aren’t used to being handled or people that aren’t as well trained, then I think...the safer option is the...solid sided tub.” – Bob [19:14]

  • Safety:
    • No facility design can make up for lack of repair or poor training. Danger increases when facilities are broken or people are untrained.

• Facility Repair and Maintenance

  • Take time before the cattle work season to repair all attachments, welds, and moving parts.

    “What’s dangerous is facilities that are broke or broken and a person is in trouble. So make sure...the facility is really strong and ready for large animals to bang against it.” – Bob [21:41]

  • Don’t just “look” at the facility—walk through where cattle will move to spot problems.

• Flooring in Handling Areas

  • Dirt:
    • Best footing for small herds if kept dry; can get muddy/rutted with larger numbers.

      “With small herds, I kind of like dirt...as long as it doesn’t get muddy and slick.” – Bob [23:22]

  • Concrete:
    • Preferred for larger groups and easier cleaning, especially if rain or repeated use is expected.

      “In an outdoor facility, you just don’t know...I’m going to go concrete.” – Brian [23:39]

  • Gravel:
    • Least favored; harder to clean, can be rough/slippery.
  • Alleyway doors:
    • Dirt floors can interfere with sliding doors due to debris buildup.

• General Facility Philosophy:

  • Prioritize both animal and handler safety, design for calm cattle flow, keep facilities well maintained, and train people appropriately.

    “So many of the things that you guys talked about are really about...We’re trying to progress rapidly, but we’re not trying to hurry...Go slow to go fast is what we’ve said several times.” – Brad [24:40]

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On homestead beef:

  “One bite at a time, Brian. ... You just take one bite at a time.” – Brad [06:22]

• On monitoring cow nutrition:

  “Frisbee test is a two person job. You gotta have a thrower and a catcher to make sure it’s the right quality.” – Brad [14:57]

• On untrained cattle handlers:

  “It might be hard to recruit grad students after that.” – Brian [20:40]

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Timestamps for Major Topics

• [03:27] – Homesteading: what it involves, commitment, and considerations
• [09:44] – Protein supplementation frequency—science, practicality, and real-life solutions
• [14:57] – Facility upgrades before processing/weaning: alleys, tubs vs. bud boxes, flooring
• [21:41] – Importance of facility repairs and walking the site
• [23:12] – Flooring preferences: dirt, concrete, gravel tradeoffs
• [24:40] – Facility summary and cattle handling philosophy

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Final Thoughts

This episode blends practical advice, scientific insight, and humor to answer real listener questions about beef cattle care, whether for family homesteads or commercial operations. The hosts emphasize planning, education, safety, and incremental improvement for sustained success.

For more questions or deeper dives, listeners are invited to contact the Cattle Chat crew via email.

Transcript

[A]

Hi, welcome to Cattle Chat. I'm Brad White. Happy to have you with us today and happy to have our crew here in the studio.

[B]

Good morning.

[A]

Brian.

[B]

Good morning, Brad.

[A]

Philip.

[C]

Good morning, guys.

[A]

Bob.

[D]

Hello everybody.

[E]

Dustin, good morning.

[A]

We're glad that you're with us and as always, we appreciate having listener questions because we're going to address a couple of those today. If you have a listener question for us, you can send it to [e-mail]. we usually address those on this Cattle Chat podcast, but if you also want to list a more in depth take on some of the topics that we discuss, we have bovine science with BCI podcast. Today we're going to talk about starting a homestead. And Brian, that was a question that you got. So we'll talk a little bit about that as well as what that might entail. We also got a good question from Brian and, or Bob and Philip relative to protein supplements and how often do I need to provide those to cattle that are out on pasture, dormant pasture at this time of year. And. And then we're gonna debate a little bit about what pros and cons of different approaches to building your facility. If you're looking at remodeling before you do fall processing. Before we get into those guys, it is football season. We haven't talked a lot about it, but I wanna ask you a kicker. Dustin's son does a lot of kicking. A kicker's an important part of the game. Who's your favorite kicker of all time?

[D]

Okay, that's easy for me.

[A]

I can guess yours.

[D]

Jan Stenrud.

[A]

Oh, I couldn't guess yours.

[D]

Yeah, he's a kicker for the Chiefs. When I was a kid, he kind of was a trend sitter. He was the first to do a soccer style kick rather than kicking. You guys don't even know what I'm talking about. Yeah, straight on. So yeah, Jan. And he still lives in Kansas City and I've met him recently.

[A]

There you go. He's probably listening to the podcast right now.

[D]

Probably is right now.

[A]

Ryan.

[B]

Well, I've never met him, so I don't know if I can compete with Bob, but I'm going to go with Martin Gramatica.

[A]

That's who I thought Bob would be.

[B]

Automatica Gramatica.

[D]

And he's got the NCAA record for longest field sons.

[E]

Freshman down at University of Central Florida or. Yeah, and he just made a first field goal this week, this past weekend is 58 yards.

[D]

Wow.

[A]

Yeah, Yeah, I saw that. Who's yours? Destin.

[E]

I was actually going to go with, you know, Martin as well. But, you know, I really haven't paid attention to kickers until more as of recent. Kicking was not a thing on my radar. But I do remember in college watching Martin kick and.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

And going to super.

[A]

Well, he was one that actually could change some games.

[E]

Yeah.

[C]

So, Philip, you know, I don't know. I try. I was trying to think of kickers and kickers just don't stick in your head all that much.

[D]

I got one for you. Again, this is old school. George Blanda, that's before me.

[E]

I don't know.

[D]

He was the quarterback and the kicker for the Oakland.

[A]

Oakland Raiders. Okay, so follow up question. There was a kicker who held the field goal distance record for a long time. It's like 62 yards or something.

[D]

Right.

[A]

And he only had half of one of his foot and he had a kicking thing that was on the front of his foot. What was his name?

[D]

Dempsey.

[A]

Dempsey. First name.

[D]

Jack.

[A]

Oh, was it Jack? I thought it was Tom.

[D]

I'm not absolutely sure on the first name.

[A]

All right, okay, enough kicker talk. We'll move on.

[D]

Contest.

[A]

Yeah, I. Yeah, there's no prize, but yes, you for sure won. So let's talk. Brian, you had a question and really it was about starting a homestead. And I'll define kind of what that term, at least how we're going to interpret it, is you're going to raise livestock, potentially crops, for primarily your own consumption. So it's not raising it for commercial, for selling, although you may sell if you have excess in some years. But we're going to talk about what would be the cattle and what do you need to think about if I'm going to raise cattle, basically for my family consumption. And Dustin, I'll kind of start with you because I know you had some thoughts on this.

[E]

So, yeah, just run down a few things and we can all jump in. But my first thought was, you know, are you ready for this commitment? It's not just to wake up, I'm going to go do it today and then, you know, butcher it.

[D]

Take a few days off.

[E]

Yeah, it's. I mean, it's a commitment. Right. You're out there every single day watering and when it's cold, if you don't have an automatic water heater, it's. You're breaking ice, which isn't fun. And. And during the summer you're out there bailing hay. Maybe, or maybe you purchase it. But just are you ready for that commitment? Because it's always when you're late going to your Son or daughter's volleyball, softball, baseball game or church or whatever. Cows are out. So then now you got to go. You got to go put them in.

[A]

Right.

[E]

I mean, that just seems like always happened to us. But it's just, it's a commitment, I guess, is what I'm.

[D]

What I'm.

[A]

And time before you actually get to beef, depending on what stage you start, it's a significant time before you actually have beef in the freezer.

[E]

Oh, yeah, absolutely. There's depending on.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

When you buy the calves, how little they are. But even before you get the calves, I think there's a lot of work that needs to be done. Because what's your knowledge on nutrition, on all those different components of raising, you know, cattle?

[C]

Yeah. Yeah. Are you going to have cows and have to breed cows or are you just going to buy calves and grow the calves to slaughter or. Yeah, there's a whole bunch of decisions to make.

[E]

Do you have pasture?

[B]

Yeah. In facilities. And I think, you know, the other thing is, you know, really thinking about. And I assume this person is doing it for. Not. Most homesteaders don't do it for economic reasons, I don't think. Because I think if you're a small farmer, economically, it, it might actually not make sense if you're just raising for it. But what is your true demand for protein? And, and it might, you know, maybe. Maybe small ruminate would be a better protein source. It's a little less facility investment. It's a lot less pro. I mean, if you figure, you know, you've got a 1500 pound animal, you're gonna end up roughly in the neighborhood with a thousand pounds of beef. Are you actually gonna be able to consume all that? Like you said, some people sell the excess, but there's not always a market for that.

[A]

One bite at a time, Brian.

[B]

One bite.

[A]

You just take one bite at a time.

[D]

Yeah. You know, I wasn't really in a homestead type situation, but we always, you know, butchered one or two calves per year. And, you know, for a family of what, seven of us, that was about. Right. A couple of interesting things you find out as a kid doing that is. Well, now. Now mom starts serving the organ meats and there's a lot of cube steak. And so, you know, the utilization of the carcass, you know, it was. I mean, there was some intangible enjoyment of eating our own. Our own livestock. Yeah, there's. There's some things to think about. One is the, the utilization of the entire carcass.

[A]

Yeah. And I think that's something that you think about. Okay, I'm going to have beef in the freezer. You may be picturing steaks and ground beef, but there's lots of other things that. That come along with it that you can use. And the quantities that you get of steaks relative to ground beef, you have to balance that out as you go through the freezer. But there's some real value in kind of raising your own. So as you guys think about it, from. And Dustin, I'll go back to you on the economic side. We said, well, not make. This may not be a commercial venture. Right. I'm not trying to make money on this, but what are some of my big considerations that I need to think about when embarking on this?

[E]

Well, I was just thinking, you know, like Brian mentioned, Bob did, too. I mean, the cost, right. You know, you got to buy the animals, got to purchase the animals. You got the feed, you got the equipment, as Brian noted, fencing, maybe labor and all those expenses. And then you've got. I mean, are you utilizing all of our. What are you doing with the organ meat if not, if you're throwing the. Throwing it out, that's just the cost. Right. And so, I mean, if you're doing it to try to save money, I would definitely run through all your numbers, pencil it out. It might be cheaper because you can go buy exactly what you want. You're not, you know, getting hearts and livers and tongues and other components.

[A]

And Brian, what about interacting with. On the health side? What about interacting with a veterinarian or fill up a nutrition expert? As I'm going down this path.

[B]

Yeah. And. And I think, you know, it depends a little bit on what your background in raising that species of livestock is. Right. And there are a lot of good resources out there. Like, extension service is a good place to start having a relationship with a veterinarian. And if it's, you know, if you're raising backyard poultry, you might want to check with your veterinarian and see what their level of comfort with poultry production is. You know, find a veterinarian that. That'll help you with livestock, get some information, develop a basic health manager. Even if it's one animal, you still need a health management plan. But yeah, that those are kind of the extension service and local veterinarian are two good places to start. And Philip can speak to nutrition, too.

[C]

Yeah, I think from nutrition center, your veterinarian is going to know some stuff, and then you can get some information from the extension agent. Another place might be just talking to some Other producers in the area that you might know, or finding a good feed mill. And the feed mill can help you understand a little bit about what type of feed you need at different stages of the production cycle for that animal.

[A]

That's a great point, Phil, because if you're. If you're raising them from calves, you're gonna have to go through all production stages. And maybe even if you're gonna. Then you're gonna have to do breeding. So sorting some of those things out. But it's very doable. It can be achieved. There's lots of people that do it. So if it's a passion of yours, I'd say jump into it by starting with the research. So, good points for you guys. I want to switch to a listener question. And Bob, you and Philip discussed this one and had talked to a producer. And I'll set it up and frame it as this is a producer that has cattle in multiple locations, also has a farming operation. So they're currently busy harvesting, and the cattle are at a location that's far enough away that about once a week is all they can get to make a trip to check the cattle for the next six weeks while they're doing harvest. The problem is they would like to supplement those cattle with some protein because they're on dormant forage where the protein is very low. So is it worthwhile to supplement them once a week when the recommendation they received is supplement them every other day?

[D]

Yeah, a little bit of background. This was a question from a producer that he asked in that. And he also kind of set me up and that he said he had already talked to a couple of nutritionists and a couple of people from another university. So I asked him how many different answers he had gotten so far, and it was several.

[A]

And that was just while talking to you.

[D]

But his basic question was because, you know, he's got cows on three different locations, and they're quite a bit of distance between the three locations. And he's busy with farming, and he knows that once. So in about six weeks or so, he's going to take the cows from all three locations and put them on corn stalks. And at that time, time, he'll be able to supplement, you know, three times a week, however often he needs to. But right now, for the next six weeks, although he, you know, he admits his forage quality is getting. He's got plenty of forage, but the forage quality, the protein levels is pretty low. So one of the great things about a ruminant or cattle is that they can recycle protein or nitrogen in that they don't have to have in order to keep the rumen microbes, the rumen bacteria, healthy. They don't need protein every day because every other day it'll recycle around to keep, keep the protein levels up. His real question was, and he knew all of that, his real question was, well, how seldom can I get by with it? Is once a week enough? And he was feeding about 4 pounds of distiller's grains once a week to cows on a poor quality native grass pasture. And his question was really, is that, is that helping me get through the next six weeks? So I kind of turned to Philip and asked him what he thought.

[C]

Well, so there's some research that has looked at supplementing every day, three times a week or just once a week, comparing those in the same study. And there's a little bit of drop off for once a week in the improvement in forage digestibility that you get with protein supplementation, but it's still better than no supplementation. And so I would say that once a week for six weeks is probably going to be fine. His cows might lose some body condition score compared to if he was able to go supplement them three times a week, but they're going to lose less body condition than if he stops supplementing them all together. So I would say that he should continue to do it once a week if he can. He needs to supplement an additional amount. He doesn't want to supplement just one day's worth of supplement once a week. He needs to supplement multiple days worth of supplement all at one time, which can have some issues of its own if we're not careful. But just from a protein perspective, you got to give the animal excess protein that they can recycle.

[D]

So you'd like to see him go up to like £8 once a week or something.

[C]

Yeah, he was doing, you said he was doing like £4.

[D]

That's my understanding.

[C]

Yeah. Yeah, maybe go up to £8. I mean, I think he would probably be okay from that perspective as far as rumen health and things like that, that would extend that root and nitrogen recycling for several days and he probably wouldn't even notice any loss in condition.

[D]

One of the, as I, as I talked to this guy, one of the things that he said was the local veterinarian actually, I think gave him pretty good advice and that was to really monitor the fecal pat as an indication of is he supplying enough protein in that? If he's not, what you'll see is not Good digits. So that a tall fecal pat more dry, that type of a, you want it to be kind of a more normal fecal path that if it dried out you could use it as a frisbee, those types of things. And so you could monitor that, which would be a quicker response than monitoring body condition because it may take a while for body condition to drop. And if you're getting those tall dry feces, then probably need to increase the protein, either the amount or the frequency. Maybe go every five days or something like that. Like that. So he's got some options. And it is a relatively short time frame of six weeks. And so it's not like we're talking about the plan from now till grass comes on in the spring, it's for the next few weeks.

[A]

I think that's a good point guys. And so it makes sense in this scenario. I like the idea of monitoring the feces because the body score is just too much of a lag. But your frisbee test is a two person job. You gotta have a thrower and a catcher to make sure it's the right quality. So thanks for answering that question from the, from the producer. I also have several other questions for you guys. As we think about processing, pregnancy testing, weaning calves, this is a good time prior to the day before to think about any facility design, facility changes we might want to make. And all of us have seen a lot of different facilities. So I want to get your input on a couple specific aspects of processing facilities. First, one I'm going to start with is if you could choose between an alleyway leading to the chute that is either solid sided with a raised walkway so the people are above the cattle, or open sided where the cattle can see out, the people are on the ground. You can easily get in and out of the alleyway. Which of those two do you like?

[D]

Well, I'm going to say it depends and a couple of things that it depends on. Are we talking about cows in a cow, cow and calf herd that I interact with frequently? Are we talking about some stocker cattle that I buy in that really, let's just say it, they could be wild, they could be not used to people because I kind of like the solid sided raised platform for cattle that are kind of wild and not used to having people around them, I think it's a little safer and a little bit easier to deal with. Although if you've got a cow herd or stocker cattle that you've really acclimated to the area, oh, you can make those open sided alleyways work really well. But the cattle need to be trained and the people need to be trained to use them. Well, in my opinion.

[C]

When you say solid sided, are you saying solid sided all the way 6ft tall or are you saying solid sided for bottom three feet and then open.

[A]

The top solid sided all the way up?

[C]

Yeah, I haven't used any system that was built that way. Most of the ones I've used are. They're solid on the bottom three feet and then they're open in the top three feet. So I don't have a whole lot of input on that. I can see Bob's point, but I don't know that it makes a huge amount of difference unless you've got something that's really distracting to the cattle when they come through that alleyway.

[A]

Yeah, good point. So your external environment is important on that selection, Brian.

[B]

Yeah, and, and I, I think it depends too, but I think it depends for the cattle attitude is important, but the people are just as important. And so if I have, and this might sound a little backward, but if I have people that are not well trained at cattle handling, I want the solid sided panels because the inclination is to stick your hand in there and try to do stuff. And that's a good way to get somebody hurt. But if I have people that are well trained in handling cattle, the open sided work fine. A, because the people are generally able to move the cattle better. And B, if they have experience handling cattle, I think there's, there's still a chance for injury, but there's less of a chance with that kind of facility set up. So my, my personal preference is open sided.

[A]

But yeah, and I think that would be a good, good point, Brian, on the people side of it as much as the cattle and what you're used to. So next, as, as we get them into the alley, we have a couple of options. And traditionally there would be a tub or a semicircular pin at the back of the alley with a swing gate that swings around that circular pattern you see more and more. Also what's called a bud box or a narrow rectangular area behind the pen. The big difference between those two in the tub, nobody has to get in the tub. Now there are times that people do and maybe should or shouldn't, but you don't have to get in the tub in the bud box. Someone has to be in there because you walk the cattle past the alleyway and then you close gate and they walk up the alleyway. What's you guys preference on either one of those for loading an alley.

[D]

Again, I'm going to say it depends and that we're a little bit confounded here with the bud box. Those are really the design of Bud Williams and a lot of people that have put those in have gone to some training, you know, a Williams school. And so you've got people that have been trained on how to use that box and gosh, when they do and it's, and it's solid and done well, it works really well. Again, I'm kind of going to agree with, with Brian. If I've, if I've got either wilder cattle that aren't used to being handled or people that aren't as well trained, then I think kind of the, the safer option is the, the tub, a solid sided tub in that scenario. But I've, that doesn't mean that's not. My preference is well trained people with a Bud box.

[A]

But, but not well trained people. And a tub is, you're still going to have, you're going to have injuries. I mean, so that's the. I think it is, is not a safety measure. Having a tub is not inherently more safe would be my opinion.

[D]

I disagree. It depends on. And maybe it's because you haven't seen a Bud box used by really untrained people.

[A]

Have you seen a tub used by really untrained people?

[D]

Yes, I have.

[A]

That's where you get broken arms, you get broken hands.

[D]

But I actually think it's safer than if I'd taken those same people and put them in a Bud box situation. I guess I can't prove that because.

[A]

We could, we could do this study. It's going to be a lot of paperwork filled out.

[B]

It might be hard to recruit grad students after that.

[A]

Might be hard to recruit people for that.

[B]

I guess my personal preference and maybe it's just because what I grew up with is the tub system and really I think I can hammer home the point. Don't overcrowd the tub. Doesn't mean people will listen to me. But there's kind of one big point with running a tub, right? And it don't overfill it, don't overfill it. And like, and if I can, can I can take somebody that has very little cattle experience and say don't overfill this and I can show them here's what half full looks like. And if they can do that and they'll figure out, I agree you can get hurt running a tub. But if they can do that, they could probably run it Right. It's going to take a lot more for me to train somebody to use a bud box. Right. And I don't know that I even really know how to use it. Right. But I think just. It does depend on your situation. But I think of the two, probably the more easier to train. One is the tub system.

[D]

Okay. One more thing I'd like to say is it's really important, though. And you started off with saying we've got a little time before fall processing and stuff. Make sure everything is attached. If we're using wood, they're attached. Well, if we're using metal, any welds that need to be repaired, what's dangerous is facilities that are broke or broken and a person is in trouble. So make sure this is a time to repair. Make sure that the facility is really strong and ready for large animals to bang against it. Yeah.

[A]

In any of these facilities, if the gates don't swing, well, if you can't close what you need to close at the time, it's a real problem. So you're absolutely right.

[B]

This time, for maintenance, it's not just the people, too. It's the animals running through it. And so watch. Walk through it. Like, don't. Don't just look at it from the outside where you're at. Walk through it where the cattle are going to run in that piece of loose metal that's sharp. Fix it. Right. Like if there's something that's not working, not just functional, like a gate's not moving or whatever, but if there are pieces that need repaired, repair them now because you've got time and you're not trying to work cattle through it.

[A]

Okay. Last. Last one. I'll ask you guys. Flooring within the alleyway and the cattle handling area. So you're. It's an outdoor. Let's say it's an facility uncovered. And your options. You could do some concrete, you could do dirt. You could put gravel in the alleyway. Any preferences?

[B]

Oh, that. The alleyway or where the tub is.

[A]

The alleyway and. And around the chute. Man.

[D]

I'm gonna say, you know, with small herds, I kind of like dirt. Dirt. It's actually better footing as long as it doesn't get muddy and slick. But if you've got quite a few cattle, it'll get muddy and slick and so then you want some concrete. So it kind of depends on how many cattle you're going to push through there.

[B]

Yeah. I think Bob and I both agree gravel is not the best. I would prefer concrete just because you can clean it. That's probably the biggest thing. You can clean it. I agree with the footing. Like, it's probably not as friendly and. But Bob made one important. He said, if it's not muddy and slick in an outdoor facility, you just don't know I'm going to go concrete.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[C]

Well, I think too, some of it depends on how your alleyway works. Before the show, we were talking about sliding doors versus if you've got sliding doors that. That section off the alleyway and you have a dirt floor, you're going to get dirt kicked up in that groove on that alleyway, and then those doors aren't going to work.

[A]

And so sliding doors that don't slide are much less effective.

[C]

Yes. So thinking about the flooring and not just how the cattle go through it, but how it's going to function. The facility's going to function.

[A]

Yeah. And being able to clean it out after you're done, I think is important. But having them have good footing as they go through also helps them stay calm. So many of the things that you guys talked about are really about. We're not trying to. We're trying to progress rapidly, but we're not trying to hurry or rush the cattle through the system. Go slow to go fast is what we've said several times. So appreciate your input on facilities, and thanks for joining us today. If you have a question, topic, or issue you'd like us to discuss, send us an email at bciasu. Edu.