TYD said:
please i hope this is not taken the wrong way but do you guys also implant the steers you use for personal use or just the one you sell
The only reasons to not implant beef are 1) to gain a premium from people who want to buy "natural" or organic beef because of perceived health reasons 2) to get a higher percent of your cattle to grade choice or prime. I like lean beef so I like implanted beef. Plus the ribeyes are bigger. ;-) As far as safety issues, look at the data below from the Center for Global Food Issues.
Human Safety of Growth Enhancing Pharmaceuticals
The first and foremost question about growth promoting hormones, of course, is whether their use is safe for consumers. In one word, Yes.
The first safety factor is the way they are given to cattle. Except for MGA (administered via feed), FDA regulations only allow growth promoting hormones to be administered through time-release implants placed under the skin of the animals’ ear. Each implant contains a specific, legally authorized dose of hormones. The implant ensures that the hormone is released into the animals’ bloodstream very slowly so that the concentration of the hormone in the animal remains relatively constant and low. Because the ear is discarded at harvest, the implant does not enter the food chain.
Second, there is no incentive for producers to “overdose” an animal on hormones. Each implant contains the optimal dose for maximum economic return, and administering simultaneous implants would have little impact on further weight gain. It would only waste money. This economic reality, coupled with the USDA’s annual monitoring program, safeguards the system and ensures that hormones are used properly and safely.
Third, the doses are low. The science indicates that use of supplemental hormones in cattle has only a miniscule impact on hormone levels in beef – well below the natural hormone levels in beef or the amounts produced naturally in our own bodies. According to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), a person would need to eat over 13 pounds of beef from an implanted steer to equal the amount of estradiol naturally found in a single egg!1 One glass of milk contains about nine times as much estradiol as a half-pound of beef from an implanted steer. And remember, it’s not just animal products that contain hormonally active chemicals. A half-pound potato has 245 nanograms (ng, or 1 billionth of a gram) of estrogen equivalent, compared with 1.3 ng for a quarter pound of untreated beef and 1.9 ng for beef from an implanted steer.2
