Grass Finished vs. Grain Finished

We’ve been asked quite a bit recently whether our animals are grass fed or grain fed, so we thought we’d address it here!

🌱🌽Our animals are fed a combination of grass and grain. They’re on pasture for a majority of their lives, and once it’s time for them to be finished they get moved to a well-balanced diet of grain and forages (typically hay or silage). We do this because we have found that animals finished on grain are ready to butcher at a younger age (usually around 18-20 months), producing more tender cuts, along with better marbling.

I did some further research on this because it is such a hot topic right now, and what I found was super interesting! Nutritionally, their fat, protein, and iron content are fairly similar. The types of fats are where they differ: grain finished beef is higher in omega-6 fats than grass finished. Omega-6’s are generally over-consumed in the U.S., and this is often blamed on grain finished beef. However, vegetable oil, soybean oil, canola oil, and all the other seed oils you can think of are also high in omega-6’s- and these oils are found in virtually every snack food and fast food on the market. The trick is to balance where these omega-6 fats are coming from in your diet: locally sourced beef, or junk food.🥩🥨

This whole thing isn’t to say that one method of finishing beef is better than the other- we’re happy that you’re supporting local agriculture either way! I just found all this research interesting and thought I’d share it with you all.