A Steer Story Part 2

Since promised the rest of the story, and since I can not go back to sleep here it is.

Again disclaimer: if you don't think animals should be eaten ever, and are put on earth to be man's friend, then just don't read this your going to be offended.

So the the wedding calf went off to live with Joel's parents, until he could be weened. He eventually came to live on our small acreage here in the pacific northwest. Now to be clear, Joel and I are not farmers or ranchers, Meaning we don't do this as our main source of income (it barely provides any income). We are what you call hobby farmers. We keep a small number of cattle head on our property and rotate a few out every year either to slaughter or auction.

I named him Dowry, but my father-in-law and all my nieces and nephew insisted on calling him chocolate (cause of his color, how unoriginal). So he grew, and grew and grew. Joel said early on that he wanted to see how big he would get. Which would take a few years. Since it is generally thought best to slaughter a Steer at 3-4 years, cause they have done the bulk of there growing, and they usually have the best flavor at this time, but we decided that he was more of an overgrown pet.

He was the friendliest of all our animals, since he spent all that time with Joel's dad he became used to people and would come right away to a grain bucket. He would get lonely if separated from the others.  He was King of the herd, not always first to the food, but boy did they know to move out of his way when he got to the barn.

We have several fond memories of him. One involving me, a grain bucket and him coming barreling toward me full speed, so I booked it to the fence.  Only to discover Joel on the other side laughing, asking "why didn't you just drop the bucket? he would have stopped where ever the grain was". "well I didn't want to Lose the bucket" I replied.

A few not so fond. Like the time he kept ever so easily stepping over the fence into the neighbors field. This just happened to be on the weekend Joel was out of town, so cattle corralling was my responsibility (oh yeah I was like 5 months pregnant). This became his thing for the next 18 hours til Joel got home, he would step over the fence, I would see him. I would got over to the neighbors field, he would see me and step over the low spot in the fence. This happened about 3 times, He was the only one who got out, because he was the only one big enough to get over the "low" spot in the fence.

Sometimes he would go spend his summers over at Joel's brother's house, and spread his love and good cheer to their neighbors (when I say love and good cheer, I really mean  hoof holes and cow pies in your lawn). I will say that after living in the country for the past nine years you really can see the true heart of your neighbor when this happens, they either are very helpful about it, or really  angry.

Well he kept getting bigger, his height was more than 6 feet at the shoulder blades, and we guessed that his weight was over 2000 lbs. Some steers that get big are just shorter and bulkier in stature, but he was tall and lean. Joel's Mom thought we should take him to the local county fair, so he could be the novelty BIG animal that they bring in every year. But Joel and I had no desire to sit around the fair for a week shoveling his manure and answering stupid city slicker questions 500 times a day (Please insert "what is the difference between a Bull and a Steer?").

Joel started to notice that he was having a harder time getting around, his hind legs were getting stiff and arthritic. Which is a problem, we had heard, happens to bigger animals. We just didn't want to keep hold of him for to much longer and see him suffer in pain. So we decided that we should get rid of him at the next auction. We toyed with the idea of slaughter, but he was so big we didn't know how we were going to eat that much meat. This was a tough decision, and even up to the night before Joel and I both lamented that we didn't want to see our gentle giant go, but we couldn't watch him suffer either.

 The trailer came to haul him and another animal away and off to the auction they went. As the trailer pulled out with him in it a few tears welled in my eyes.  Although I wish now we had gone to the auction, it didn't work out for us to go. We heard through the grapevine that he was the talk of the auction. His final weight was 2620 Lbs!

 I have often been asked  "don't you have a hard time eating an animal you have seen and named?" I always answered "no because after you chase a cow those feeling go away, but there is one that I will have a hard time getting rid of.."  It was hard to say goodbye to him, but I know that it was the right this to do. To think of him and the suffering he would endure with us keeping him, as opposed to the suffering we endure of having to get rid of him.  I know we did the right thing.

Although I wish we had done a few things, like keep the hide, or take more pictures of him growing through the years. I had one stipulation, get a photographer out to take our picture with him. So we did.

I have tried for two days to upload some of those pictures, but my computer has not cooperated beyond this one. so I will try over the next few days to upload a few more.