Insane Profits from 11 Cows on 27 Acres. Our secrets to big profits

Oh really? You're spoiled. No, don't eat that. Eating my lanyard on my selfie stick, you little pest. Kelly and I are gonna run up the hill and go check the cattle and then we're gonna tell you how we saved a bunch of money and how much money we made on our 11 mama cows last year. Hey sheepies! Kona! Pretty fat and pretty happy. Hey doggo. Oh really? You're spoiled. All right folks, so the average annual cost to raise a cow and get a calf out of her is over a thousand dollars a year. More specifically, a thousand and sixty four dollars is the annual average. But right here in the Missouri Ozarks, we have slashed those costs tremendously. How much? Well, about 90 percent over the average. So I'm gonna take and walk you through this step by step, so stick with me and we're gonna tell you how we did this. So once again, the average cost to raise a calf, that includes the mother, is about a thousand to sixty four dollars a year. That breaks down to 456 dollars in feed, 632 dollars for equipment, overhead, operating costs, the like, and roughly 162 dollars for labor. So the feed costs are one of the biggest hurdles for most ranchers. But we managed to get our feed costs for the year down to 59 dollars an animal unit. And here's how we did that. I'm getting attacked by biting flies. Hey folks, today I'm going to show you how 11 cows that are just part of our 30 animal unit herd produced their second calf crop and made roughly 25,000 dollars in value added to the herd. And it costs us just 59 dollars per cow on 27 and a half acres. So stick with me and let's break it down. Like I said before, our secret is total grazing. It's created by Jaime Elizondo. It's basically ultra high density grazing with a lot of other tools, or it's sometimes referred to as UHDG. Now for these 11 cows that are just part of our 30 animal herd, we kept them in tight groups, moving them across small paddocks, either once or twice or even sometimes four times a day. And they eat more grass, they spread manure more evenly, and trample leftovers into the soil. It's nature's fertilizer. It feeds our herd while rebuilding land. And this system keeps our costs low and our acres productive. So now let's talk about our land. So we've got 11 mama cows, like this big fat girl right here. And our stocking rate is about two and a half to one. So this herd required 27.5 acres of land to maintain these girls. That one, she's really poor. Don't mind her. She doesn't work in our system very well. Now that's pretty efficient for the Missouri Ozarks, especially for land that was so neglected. Now total grazing is turning it around. This is our second year total grazing. And these cows have calved here and the land's already healthier and more productive. Now for the numbers, our feed costs for the year for our full herd of 30 animal units, we spent $330 on mineral and salt and some vet supplies miscellaneous for $328. And we bought hay and used it very sparingly at $960. Now we had $352 in protein supplements to get them through some rank forage in the summer. So that's a total of $1,770 for our entire herd. Now our 11 mama cows are only 37% of the herd. So their share was $650. That's just $59 per animal. Now the national average for feed alone is $456 per cow. So we're 87% lower, saving nearly $400 per cow. Now we also spent $1,200 on diesel to clear some brush and some fence lines, but that's a diminishing cost over the years to come. So total grazing keeps costs low for the whole herd. And these 11 cows eat grass straight from the paddock, not pricey bought-in feeds. And that diesel is building more grazeable acres. No, don't eat that. No eating my lanyard on my selfie stick pest. So what's the payoff? Well, those 11 cows gave us 11 calves. We've had two years in a row with 100% calving rates. These 11 cows, now on their second calf crop, each produced a calf that are currently about 580 pounds. Now at $3.87 per pound, based on the 2025 Missouri prices, each calf is worth roughly $2,245. So that's $24,690 in asset value added to our herd. Now we're keeping most of these calves to grow our herd, but that value is real equity for our future. And that almost $25,000 is like money in the bank. Now just on 27.5 acres, it shows total grazing is pretty darn profitable. So why does it work? Well, total grazing works with nature. We rest paddocks for sometimes 30, 60, 90, maybe even 365 days. And during that time, the roots grow extremely deep and the soil stores carbon. Now resting paddocks grows thicker grass with deeper roots and it stores more nutrients in the soil. So with a two and a half to one stocking rate, small ranches like ours can thrive. So let's wrap this up at the bottom line. For these 11 cows, which are just part of our 30 animal herd, we spent $650 on feed. That's just $59 per cow. Add $1,200 for diesel. That's $1,850 total dollars. Their second calf crop is worth $24,690. That's a potential profit of $22,840 if we sold them. Spread over 27.5 acres. That's $830 profit per acre. That's not too bad, folks. Now daily moves and long rests made it happen. We learned to never skip a move and or overgraze our grass. And that is what keeps the grass healthy. Stockpiling summer forage all the way to winter allows us to not have to buy in hay for winter feeding. Next year, we're going to add more cattle and we're going to start playing with some cover crops, but that's for a video in the future. So the total grazing made our herd very profitable on only 27.5 acres for these 11 cows. We're healing land and building wealth at $830 per acre. So total grazing works and we're proving it on just these 27.5 acres. Want to learn more? Check out Jaime Elizondo's total grazing courses. Links in the description. Oh, and by the way, we're going to have a grazing course here on the ranch this September 5th and 6th hosted by yours truly and taught by the man himself, Jim Elizondo from Real Wealth Ranching. All right, so if you like this content, please go ahead and subscribe to the channel and we're going to be coming up with a lot more updates following this journey of how we implement this into our herd. We're still working on our genetics. You need adapted genetics. You can't just take any old cows. So there's some caveats to this grazing management system, but the numbers speak for themselves. The stuff really, really works and I'm all in. We're going to just continue doing this as we go forward and our land is just improving rapidly. It's amazing. So we appreciate your time. We'll see you on the next one, guys.