The Texas beef cattle herd could be on its way to a rebuild after hitting its lowest numbers in a decade, according to Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service experts.
Beef cattle prices remain strong, but the Texas herd has continued to shrink due to drought and back-toback years of below average grazing and hay production. Recent rainfall has provided some optimism to producers for 2024. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Michael Miller) David Anderson, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension economistintheDepartment of Agricultural Economics, and Jason Cleere, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension statewide beef cattle specialist in the Department of Animal Science, both in the Texas A&M College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Bryan-College Station, said Mother Nature will determine whether Texas’ beef cattle herd continues to shrink or rebounds. They agreed that rebuilding herd numbers will rely heavily on rain and soil moisture supporting forage production for grazing through 2024 and winter feeding into spring 2025.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service cattle inventory report released Jan. 31, the nation’s beef cow herd fell 2% since last year to 28.2 million head. Anderson said the report estimate is the lowest number of U.S. beef cows since 1951.
The beef cattle herd in Texas is the smallest – 4.1 million head – since 2014. The Texas herd started to recover from the 2011-12 drought after that low point.
From 2010 to 2014, the Texas herd shrunk from 5.14 million to 3.9 million, a 24% decline, Anderson said. There were 4.65 million beef cows in 2019, but those numbers have fallen 12% since due to the drought’s impact on forage production in back-to-back years.
Declining beef cattle numbers across the state ripple into national markets because Texas carries 14.6% of the U.S. herd.
Like a big ship reversing course, Anderson said rebuilding cattle herds takes time.
“Higher sale prices are an incentive for producers to expand the herd, but a lot of producers have been feeding hay since mid-July, and that has led to deeper culling of herds,” Anderson said. “The stage is set to expand, but the key is rainfall and conditions allowing producers to hold back replacement heifers that are the future of our herds.”