I Know that when a cow is butchered there is a certin pertcentage of waste?

Question

But can someone give me a pertcentage of total lbs recieved after the beef has been cut and wrapped. Iwas once told that you could expect to lose at least 30% of live weight to hanging weight, but noone has ever told me what %you lose from cuttin and wrapping.

Answer 1

You should not lose much at all from hanging weight (assuming the hanging weight is just dressed, headless, gutted carcass) to what you get in package. I've butchered myself. Mostly, other than some bone you might bone out, it's just trimming, and that you should get back in hamburger. If there's a big difference, more than a few percent, I'd be asking some serious questions about where the rest is from whoever is butchering it. They could be skimming trimmings, and a lot of trimmings, off to make hamburger and selling it off. The hanging weight should be a little less than half (40% or so) of the live weight. I don't know who told you there's a 30% loss of weight from live to hanging, but it's more than that. You've gotta remove guts complete with food and waste inside, a head, skin, tail, renal system, etc. The packaged weight, again, should be almost as much as the hanging weight. Hope this helps.

Answer 2

Its about the same for most big game animals. Compare it to whitetail deer
120 lbs field dressed deer = 155 field weight
about 50 to 60 lbs of meat after butchered. Thats 35% of field weight and 50% of field dressed weight.
Cows are about 10 to 15 percent more than that.

Answer 3

IN livestock evaluation we always used the calculation that you would have 63% carcass weight off the live weight. That is at least for steers. IT would probably less for cows since they have already had a calf.

Answer 4

I wouldn't be surprised if absolutely every pieces part is used one way or another.