# Boners and breakers?



## JPiantedosi (Apr 23, 2012)

I was looking through market results for a localish livestock sale and came across a couple terms I wasnt familiar with.

What are boners and breakers? (keep it clean!:hysterical

thanks

Jim


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## ramiller5675 (Mar 31, 2009)

Cull cows are called Breakers, Boners, and Lean categories to estimate how much red meat yield there will be when they are butchered. 

For a detailed explanation go to: http://pods.dasnr.okstate.edu/docushare/dsweb/Get/Document-8252/AGEC-613web.pdf


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## SueMc (Jan 10, 2010)

The first time I went to an auction I was shocked at the condition of some of the cull cattle. I know I'm not in the cattle business, nor am I a PETA type in any way, shape or form, but I'd be embarrassed to let anyone see the condition some of those animals were in if they were mine.


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## Oregon Julie (Nov 9, 2006)

Sue I agree. I am not a PETA type either, but I have seen animals at auction yards that were in such poor condition that a bullet at home would have been the way it should have been handled.


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

Why? Who is to blame?
When a dairy farmer has a cow with failing health, he may try to get her well again. But if that fails, he can take her to auction. But, first he has to wait for the drugs to go out of her system. So, she didn&#8217;t do well on medication and now she&#8217;s even worse. A backhoe costs $65 an hour and an auction brings near $1000. Every one of those cows in his herd of 100 or 1000 or 10,000 will one day be a cull cow. That is why the farmer does it.
When the dairy farms bring their cull cattle to auction, they provide a service to the farmers and the buyers. As long as it can walk, slow or not, they will auction these cattle.
In Michigan, most cull cattle are bought by two people. One guy is the buyer for a huge packing plant in Wisconsin. His job is to buy enough cattle to meet his quota of cattle that he believes can survive the 12 to 16 hour trip, through the UP. In the hottest summer days and the coldest winter nights. The other guy bids on the worst of the worst, the ones the company buyer passed by. His truckers haul cattle to the same place and he gets paid on the ones that survive. He has to pay to bury the dead ones. But by buying for much less per pound, he can absorb the loss and still maintain a wonderful home in Ann Arbor. That is why he does it.
You didn&#8217;t think that canned stew was from a 2 year old Angus steer, did you? This packing plant fills the need for low cost meat in prepared foods, Lean Cuisine, for example. The meat is healthy. Tough beef tastes fine ground up. That is why they buy them. 
I&#8217;m sure the same thing happens in Wisconsin and neighboring Minnesota. 
As sad as it is to see crippled old cows loaded into &#8220;The Last Ride&#8221;, a few years ago when milk prices dropped, lots of dairy farmers had to close or cull harder. I saw perfectly fine middle aged cows hauled to slaughter just because they fell below 70 pounds of milk per day.


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## oregon woodsmok (Dec 19, 2010)

JPiantedosi said:


> I
> 
> What are boners and breakers? (keep it clean!:hysterical
> 
> Jim


These are the really skinny ones. They will go into canned goods or even dog food. Or fast food burgers. They like to buy burger with no fat in it because it doesn't shrink so much when cooked.

Around here, they are cutters and canners. Or maybe there are 4 grades of skinny cattle.


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## WJMartin (Nov 2, 2011)

I understand what you're saying haypoint but I attended an auction a month ago with only beef cattle and there were alot of them at the end that were older and sooo skinny, I think they could have been brought in before they got in such sad shape. It looked to me like they were waiting for them to calf one last calf and had just pulled the calf off them. It was hard to watch, but I have only 8 head, not like alot of ranchers who have several hundred.


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## ramiller5675 (Mar 31, 2009)

oregon woodsmok said:


> These are the really skinny ones. They will go into canned goods or even dog food. Or fast food burgers. They like to buy burger with no fat in it because it doesn't shrink so much when cooked.
> 
> Around here, they are cutters and canners. Or maybe there are 4 grades of skinny cattle.



Go and read the link I provided above, breakers are the ones in the best condition (BSC 5?) that might be "broken" into primal cuts, boners are the next grade that might be "boned" (hence the name) and made into processed beef products or hamburger, leans are "lean", and lights (BSC 2) are the really skinny ones.

The terms breaker and boner has doesn't mean they are bony.

For what it's worth, if you read the link you'll find out that sometimes if you feed those cull cows you can make a little money by turning those leans and boners into breakers.


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

WJMartin said:


> I understand what you're saying haypoint but I attended an auction a month ago with only beef cattle and there were alot of them at the end that were older and sooo skinny, I think they could have been brought in before they got in such sad shape. It looked to me like they were waiting for them to calf one last calf and had just pulled the calf off them. It was hard to watch, but I have only 8 head, not like alot of ranchers who have several hundred.


Often the dairy cows are culled at the end of her milking cycle. Sometimes she won't breed back, so once she stops milking, there is no place for her. A cow that is giving 70 to 100 pounds of milk is difficult to keep from getting bony. If she would have just calved, they would have kept her. A just freshened cow has good value, two or three times the cull cow price. Unless she calved and had no milk, fairly uncommon. 

Often these cows are milked the morning they leave the farm. By the time they go through auction, get transported to a slaughter facility and headed to the killing floor, they have gone 24 hours without a milking.


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