This is a picture of a few cattle standing in a feed lot. Cattle that are raised for slaughter are grain fed, so they are kept in plots that do not contain grass and are fed in troughs.
In most paces the land for cattle is large and spread out. As you can see here, there is alot of room for the cattle to move around
Many farmers and ranchers have ponds, as you can see here, that allow the cattle to drink freely and the rain fills it back up. If there is not a pond available, large water tanks are set out and occasionally people will use old tractor tires as water tanks, such as the ones you've seen in other pictures.
Cattle that are raised for dairy or for other purposes, including breeding cattle are grass fed. This is a large pasture during the spring that has been allowed to grow over the winter. The cattle are rotated through pastures so that they will always have grass.
As you can see in the background in this picture, the fences buffalo have are extensively tall and made with thicker wire because of how strong these animals are. Here we see a bull calf on the farm.
This is about how large the buffalo get before slaughter. They produce large amounts of meat, but are expensive to feed and healthier than beef, therefore the meat costs more.
When the cattle first arrive at the slaughter house they are placed in a line within panels in order to wait for slaughter. Each animal is slaughtered and sliced once at a time.
After using a captive bolt slaughter gun (used to knock out the cattle) the cattle are strung up by their feet and bled out in order to keep the meat quality high.
Here you can see the steer being hung to be bled out
Once the animal and muscle is free of blood, the animal is then skinned to begin getting portioned out.
Here you can see the intestines and the stomach of the steer. These are taken out of the body cavity in order to obtain the meat.
The butchers knives are extremely sharp and they move quickly as they cut the inedible extras off the carcass.
In order to finish cleaning the carcass, the head is cut off and select pieces of meat (such as the cheeks and tongue) go to customers who are more into specialty foods.
After the carcass is cleaned, excess blood and potential contents from the intestines are washed off.
This is the cleaned carcass which is known as ‘naked’ because the hide and organs are no longer attached.
Here you can see the freezer and cooler.The meat is left here to hang and cure for a certain amount of days depending on the size and breed of animal.
The half carcasses are split up even more and a band saw is used to cut the meat into even slices.
Here you can see other pieces of the cow, such as the chuck being cut into smaller chunks in order to be fed into the meat grinder, which produces ground hamburger
This is the machine that mixes chunks of beef and fat into ground up beef which can be packaged and sold, depending on the fat content.
The different cuts of meat, at our local locker, then go into individual coolers which contain what a person orders.
These are choice (the second best grade for beef) steaks at one of the steak house chains we have in America.
There are different grades of ground beef, graded on the percent of fat with in it.
A different type of meat we have is Bison. Many people eat ground bison in patty form on a bun.
We have many different cuts of meat from cows, pigs and chickens available. This is the Beef section. Pictured here: minute steaks, roasts, as well as select and choice cuts of steak.
This is part of the seafood section (shrimp, crab legs, and crab cakes. Transported in as fresh as fresh can be) at the grocery store closest to the town we live in.
Some of the different types of fish at the closest local grocery store including Turbot, Cod and Salmon.