A Detailed Guide to Common Beef Cattle Breeds and Key Farming Techniques

With the improvement of living standards, people's demand for beef is also growing. Beef is a meat with very high nutritional value among red meat varieties, and is deeply loved by consumers. Under the impact of swine fever, many people chose to raise beef cattle this year, so what are the common beef cattle breeds? What are the key farming techniques?

I. What are the common beef cattle breeds?

1. Simmental

Simmental cattle originated in Switzerland and are not a pure beef breed, but a dual-purpose dairy and beef breed. However, because Simmental cattle have high milk production, their meat production performance is not inferior to that of specialized beef cattle breeds, and their draft performance is also very good, making them a large dual-purpose breed for milk, meat and draft.

2. Luxi Yellow Cattle

Luxi Yellow Cattle is one of China's precious cattle breeds, with a tall body, well-proportioned structure, robust and imposing appearance, and high meat value, and is famous at home and abroad.

Luxi Yellow Cattle have fine muscle fibers, good meat quality, evenly distributed fat, and obvious marbling. They are docile in temperament, strong in build and disease-resistant, and easy to raise and manage.

3. Charolais

Charolais originated in the Charolais and Nivernais regions from central-western to southeastern France, and is a world-famous large beef cattle breed. Since its development, it has been widely welcomed by the international market for its fast growth, large meat yield, large body size and tolerance of extensive management, and has long been exported to many countries around the world.

The most notable characteristics of Charolais cattle in terms of production performance are: fast growth speed and high lean meat yield. Charolais cattle muscle fibers are relatively coarse, and the tenderness of the meat is not good enough.

4. Limousin

Limousin originated on the Limousin plateau in central France, and is named after it. Limousin cattle have high meat production performance, good carcass quality, large ribeye area, full muscles in the front and hind limbs, and high meat yield, making them very competitive in the beef cattle market. Because this cattle can produce beef with marbling at a young age, calves at 8 months old can already produce marbled beef. Therefore, it is the main breed for beef production in France and some other European countries.

5. Angus

Angus originated in northeastern Scotland, and is now one of the main beef cattle breeds raised in countries such as the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Argentina.

Angus cattle have good meat performance, showing early maturity and easy fattening and high feed conversion rate, and are considered to have the best meat quality among all specialized beef breeds in the world.

II. What are the key points of beef cattle farming techniques?

1. Barn selection

The barn is where beef cattle grow and produce, and they live there from calf to market. Moreover, most beef cattle farming today is housed feeding, so the selection and construction of the barn are very important. First, the site selection for the barn requires high and dry terrain, good lighting, shelter from the wind and facing the sun, warmth and dryness, convenient drainage, sufficient water sources and convenient transportation, but it should be far from urban areas and major traffic routes, which is convenient for epidemic prevention. When building the barn, attention should be paid to choosing sturdy and durable materials, because beef cattle have a large body size, and if the barn is not sturdy, it is easily damaged by collisions.

2. Feeding key points

Feed is the most important thing in beef cattle farming. First, do a good job of feed storage, and second, do a good job of feed ratio formulation. If feed use is chaotic, the formula is unreasonable, and the various nutrients are not evenly matched, it will not only cause excessively high feed costs, but also lead to malnutrition in beef cattle, gradual weakening, and decreased production performance.

Scientific and reasonable feeding management is the key to beef cattle farming. After beef cattle are first purchased and brought to the farm, they should be raised in isolation for a period. On the one hand, this allows them to adapt to the new farming environment, and on the other hand, it allows them to recover from stress. During the isolation feeding process, beef cattle should be dewormed and have their stomachs strengthened, and attention should be paid to observing the daily conditions of the beef cattle, including their feed intake and excretion, so as to adjust feeding management measures and methods in a timely manner. Generally, after an adaptation period of 15 days with no problems, they can be grouped for fattening.

3. Preventing disease occurrence

First, after the barn is built, comprehensive disinfection should be carried out. Generally, quicklime is used for disinfection, and caustic soda can also be used for floor disinfection. Finally, fumigation disinfection with drugs should be carried out. During fumigation disinfection, the barn should be sealed well to improve the disinfection effect. Strict disinfection can effectively kill pathogenic microorganisms and reduce the spread of disease.

In addition, it should also be noted that although beef cattle have strong disease resistance, once they are infected with an epidemic disease, it spreads quickly, the mortality rate is also high, and it is not easy to cure, causing serious economic losses. Therefore, in addition to regular comprehensive disinfection of the barn, relevant vaccines should also be inoculated according to the farm's immunization program.