Wayward Hill Farms

08/29/2026

08/29/2026

08/29/2026

08/27/2026

It’s that time again. Let’s sling some honey 🍯 😁

08/26/2026

To find out the best way to cook lamb chops, Tasting Table spoke with Jess Pryles, BBQ chef and founder of the Hardcore Carnivore brand.

08/26/2026

Strange times. Buy high, sell low

A feeder steer purchased this week at the CME closing price of $333 per hundredweight, bought at 800 pounds, costs roughly $2,664 to put in the pen. Sell that same animal finished at 1,350 pounds into a live cattle market trading near $220 per hundredweight, and you collect $2,970. The gross spread before a single bag of feed is $306 per head.

That number does not cover feeding costs. University of Illinois farmdoc analysis puts the feeding cost of gain at $101 to $104 per hundredweight in 2026 - feed only, not total cost of gain. At 550 pounds of gain to take that steer from 800 to 1,350 pounds, the feed bill alone runs $556 to $572. Feed typically makes up 55 to 70 percent of total cost of gain in a feedlot, which puts total cost of gain well above the feed number alone. Drovers has reported that 2026 feedlot finishing breakevens are approaching $250 per hundredweight - roughly $30 above where live cattle have been trading.

At a $30 per hundredweight spread on a 1,350-pound finished steer, the loss per head is around $405 - and that is using the breakeven estimate as the floor, not the ceiling. This is not a rumor or a projection. It is the math of what it costs to buy feeder cattle at current prices, feed them to finish, and sell into the live cattle market right now.

This dynamic is worth understanding for cow-calf operators, not just feedlot operators, because feedlot demand is what drives feeder prices in the first place. Feedlot operators losing money on every finished steer cannot sustain $333 bids for feeder cattle indefinitely. Either live cattle prices move up, feeder prices pull back, or both. The record feeder price environment that has been good for cow-calf producers is the same number squeezing the buyers of those calves.

The cattle cycle has always worked this way - margin in one segment of the chain comes at the expense of another - and the current gap is wide enough that it is worth watching. Where feedlot margins go, feeder demand tends to follow. That matters for anyone making heifer retention decisions, weaning weight decisions, or forward-pricing decisions right now.

If you are selling calves this fall, are you forward contracting at today's prices or planning to hit the spot market? And if you have any feedlot exposure yourself, what does your own breakeven look like compared to where live cattle are trading?

08/25/2026

Now In stock.. along side our other local Wayward Hill Farm Honey we now have Creamed Honey and it is delicious! 🤤🍯 Come grab some today! Open 6:30-2! 🐝

08/24/2026

Nice morning to graduate some bees from the nursery and out on their own.

08/23/2026