What would be the total costs of keeping a breeding age beef cow for one year?
Input costs per cow for the cow/calf enterprise have increased a lot over the last few years. Although calf prices have been good, profitability of the cow/calf enterprise has decreased. The primary costs for a cow/calf enterprise are feed costs. With this in mind, the longer a manager can meet the cow’s nutrient needs by grazing forages or grazing plus limited supplementation, the lower the feed costs and consequently, the lower the annual cow costs. On our beef website, http://beef.unl.edu we have developed a number of Profit Tips that address avenues to attack high input costs. Also, the following web address addresses Cattle Budgets. There is also a downloadable spreadsheet that you can use and put in your own costs. http://www.ianrpubs.unl.edu/epublic/live/ec857/build/ec857.pdf A few years back, cow costs were very close to $1.00/cow/day. Now I would suggest that the costs are more like $1.50/cow/day.
