 Our lambs are pasture raised, grass fed, and are great tasting and tender. If you have never tasted American Lamb you are in for a real treat! Most store-bought lamb come from New Zealand or Australia and carries a strong odor and flavor. Our American lamb has a delicate sweetness and is extremely mild. Our Lambs are fresh from our farm and is a treat you won't find in the grocery store. We will have a limited supply of locker lambs so check with us. We will sell those Dorper lambs that do not meet the breed standards plus we will have some Dorper/Katahdin lambs. If you would like to notified when lambs become available, please e-mail us with your name and phone number or e-mail address. We sell naturally raised lamb we use no Hormones, Steroids or Antibiotics. Our lambs move freely on the farm. They are fed grass, their mother's milk, and a sheep mineral. The lambs are sold at about 5 months when they weigh around 100 lb. We sell live lamb. We will take the lamb to a nearby slaughter house for the customer; however, the customer is responsible for processing arrangements and the cost. We sell the lamb for $1.50/lb live weight. Processing adds another $45-$50 to the lamb price. A 100 lb lamb will dress out to about 50 lb.
Why grass fed
Lower in Fat and Calories. There are a number of nutritional differences between the meat of pasture-raised and feedlot-raised animals. To begin with, meat from grass-fed cattle, sheep, and bison is lower in total fat. If the meat is very lean, it can have one third as much fat as a similar cut from a grain-fed animal.
Extra Omega-3s. Meat from grass-fed animals has two to four times more omega-3 fatty acids than meat from grain- fed animals. Omega-3s are called "good fats" because they play a vital role in every cell and system in your body. For example, of all the fats, they are the most heart-friendly. People who have ample amounts of omega-3s in their diet are less likely to have high blood pressure or an irregular heartbeat. Remarkably, they are 50 percent less likely to suffer a heart attack. Omega-3s are essential for your brain as well. People with a diet rich in omega-3s are less likely to suffer from depression, schizophrenia, attention deficit disorder (hyperactivity), or Alzheimer's disease.
Another benefit of omega-3s is that they may reduce your risk of cancer. In animal studies, these essential fats have slowed the growth of a wide array of cancers and also kept them from spreading.
It has been estimated that only 40 percent of Americans consume an adequate supply of omega-3 fatty acids. Twenty percent have blood levels so low that they cannot be detected. Switching to the meat, milk, and dairy products of grass-fed animals is one way to restore this vital nutrient to your diet.
The CLA Bonus. Meat and dairy products from grass-fed ruminants are the richest known source of another type of good fat called "conjugated linoleic acid" or CLA. When ruminants are raised on fresh pasture alone, their products contain from three to five times more CLA than products from animals fed conventional diets. (A steak from the most marbled grass-fed animals will have the most CLA ,as much of the CLA is stored in fat cells.)
CLA may be one of our most potent defenses against cancer. In laboratory animals, a very small percentage of CLA a mere 0.1 percent of total calories greatly reduced tumor growth. There is new evidence that CLA may also reduce cancer risk in humans. In a Finnish study, women who had the highest levels of CLA in their diet, had a 60 percent lower risk of breast cancer than those with the lowest levels. Switching from grain-fed to grassfed meat and dairy products places women in this lowest risk category.13 Researcher Tilak Dhiman from Utah State University estimates that you may be able to lower your risk of cancer simply by eating the following grassfed products each day: one glass of whole milk, one ounce of cheese, and one serving of meat. You would have to eat five times that amount of grain-fed meat and dairy products to get the same level of protection.
Vitamin E. In addition to being higher in omega-3s and CLA, meat from grassfed animals is also higher in vitamin E. The graph below shows vitamin E levels in meat from: 1) feedlot cattle, 2) feedlot cattle given high doses of synthetic vitamin E (1,000 IU per day), and 3) cattle raised on fresh pasture with no added supplements. The meat from the pastured cattle is four times higher in vitamin E than the meat from the feedlot cattle and, interestingly, almost twice as high as the meat from the feedlot cattle given vitamin E supplements. In humans, vitamin E is linked with a lower risk of heart disease and cancer. This potent antioxidant may also have anti-aging properties. Most Americans are deficient in vitamin E.
http://www.eatwild.com
Did the Locker Plant Steal Some of My Meat?
by Duane M. Wulf, Ph.D.
Department of Animal and Range Sciences
South Dakota State University
To determine how much meat you should get from a market animal:
Pounds of Meat = (Dressing Percent X Carcass Cutting Yield) X Live Weight
Therefore, two factors affect the percentage of meat that you will receive:
- Dressing Percentage
- Carcass Cutting Yield
Dressing Percentage
Dressing Percentage = The percentage of the live animal that ends up as carcass.
Dressing Percentage = Carcass Weight / Live Weight X 100
Dressing Percentage is affected by:
- Gut fill: The more gut fill at the time the live weight is taken, the lower the dressing percentage will be. If an animal is weighed right off of full feed, the dressing percentage will be 2 to 5% lower than if the animal is fasted for 24 hours prior to weighing.
- Muscling: A heavier muscled animal will have a higher dressing percentage than a light muscled animal.
- Fatness: A fatter animal will have a higher dressing percentage than a lean animal.
- Mud: Cattle with a lot of mud attached to their hide will have a lower dressing percentage than clean cattle.
- Wool: Lambs with long wool will have a lower dressing percentage than recently-shorn lambs.
Average Dressing Percentages: Market lambs: 54%
Carcass Cutting Yield
Carcass Cutting Yield = The percentage of the carcass that ends up as meat.
Carcass Cutting Yield = Pounds of Meat / Carcass Weight X 100
Carcass Cutting Yield is affected by:
- Fatness: Leaner animals will have higher carcass cutting yields than fatter animals.
- Muscling: More muscular animals will have higher carcass cutting yields than less muscular animals.
- Bone-in versus Boneless: This will dramatically affect carcass cutting yield. If more boneless cuts that are made, then the carcass cutting yield will be lower than if bone-in cuts are made. If bone-in chuck roasts, rib steaks, T-bones, and bone-in sirloin steaks are made, the carcass cutting yield will be much higher than if boneless chuck roasts, ribeye steaks, strip steaks, and boneless sirloin steaks are made. It is important to note that the amount of edible meat will not change, but boneless cuts will take up less room in your freezer. If you get soup bones and short ribs, the carcass cutting yield will be higher than if you have these items boned and put into ground beef.
- The Amount of Fat Remaining on the Meat Cuts: If the meat cutter leaves more surface fat on the meat cuts, then the carcass cutting yield will be higher than if the meat cuts are closely-trimmed.
- The Leanness of the Ground Product: If the ground product (ground beef, ground pork, pork sausage, ground lamb) is made very lean, then the carcass cutting yield will be lower than if the ground product is made with more fat. For example, a typical beef carcass could have 20 more pounds of ground beef if it is made into 70% lean ground beef than if it is made into 92% lean ground beef.
LAMB EXAMPLES:
Average market lamb, shorn, weighed full, 120 lbs., bone-in chops and roasts, closely trimmed, regular ground lamb:
(.51 X .75) X 120 = 38% X 120 = 46 lbs. of meat
Average market lamb, shorn, weighed empty, 120 lbs., bone-in chops and roasts, closely trimmed, regular ground lamb:
(.54 X .75) X 120 = 41% X 120 = 49 lbs. of meat
Average market lamb, shorn, weighed full, 120 lbs., some bone-in and some boneless chops and roasts, closely trimmed, regular ground lamb:
(.51 X .68) X 120 = 35% X 120 = 42 lbs. of meat
Lean, heavily muscled market lamb, shorn, weighed empty, 120 lbs., bone-in chops and roasts, closely trimmed, regular ground lamb:
(.57 X .78) X 120 = 44% X 120 = 53 lbs. of meat
Fat, light muscled market lamb, long fleece, weighed full, 120 lbs., bone-in chops and roasts, closely trimmed, regular ground lamb:
(.48 X .65) X 120 = 31% X 120 = 37 lbs. of meat
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