Death loss in feedlot cattle:
What is normal?
Dr. Pete Anderson, VetLife Technical Services
Few variables impact a feedlot close-out as much as death loss. A high death loss percentage almost guarantees poor performance and disappointing financial results. At the same time, no cattle feeder expects zero death loss in all pens of cattle. The Benchmarkâ database can be used to provide perspective: What is normal death loss? What would unusually high or low death loss look like?
Below are the averages from the VetLife Benchmark database. (Data was collected from
Jan 1, 1999 through June 30, 2002.)
Steers Heifers Mixed pens
Lots 53101 46757 8801
Head, million 8.76 7.10 .90
Death loss, % 1.23 1.40 2.16
The most common rate of death loss is zero - 35.4% of all lots of steers, heifers or mixed pens had zero death loss. In contrast, 18.8% of pens had 2% or greater death loss, 3.8% were 5% or greater and six of every thousand pens (0.6%) had more than 10% death loss.
It is interesting to note that death loss has crept upward in the past few years (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
Death loss by year for steers, heifers or mixed pens through June 2002.
Conversations with several consulting veterinarians have confirmed that this is an industry-wide event and has occurred despite higher spending on animal health products (Figure 2).
Figure 2:
Vet Med cost by year for steers, heifers or mixed pens.
This includes the total cost of processing and treatment through June 2002.
How does your yard compare? The Benchmark database includes 238 feedyards that submitted at least 5,000 head of data since 1999. The average death loss in all of these cattle was 1.39%. Grouping all cattle together, the average death loss in the individual feedyards looked like this:
Less than 0.5% death loss 5 feedyards
0.51 to 1.00% death loss 66 feedyards
1.01 to 2.00% death loss 128 feedyards
2.01 to 3.00% death loss 35 feedyards
More than 3.00% death loss 4 feedyards
These numbers are interesting but have limited usefulness because situations vary so much from one feedyard to the next. Many feedyards accept cattle that they know to be high risk because they are priced more favorably than others. Some yards accept only low risk cattle and are willing to pay extra for them. The death loss in an individual yard is not a measure of the success of their health program as much as an indicator of the nature of their business.
The Benchmark program allows more specific comparisons based on the factors that we know affect death loss.
Death loss is highly affected by season. Figure 3 shows that cattle placed in the fourth quarter will have death loss approximately 50% higher than those placed in the first or second quarter. Although lightweight placements influence this (see below) it is true of all weight classes.
Figure 3:
Death loss by quarter closed for steers, heifers or mixed pens.
(Data was collected from January 1999 through June 2002.)
Death loss is highly affected by placement weight. Below are the average rates of death loss by placement weight as well as the percentage of lots that had less than 1% or greater than 4% death loss.
In weight, lb Death loss, % Less than 1% Greater than 4%
300 4.06 13.6 34.0
400 3.18 22.2 25.6
500 2.20 33.9 14.0
600 1.49 48.7 6.8
700 0.95 66.7 3.0
800 0.74 76.7 1.5
The above data are steers and heifers combined. Although heifers have a higher rate of death loss, this can be entirely attributed to lighter weights. At any given placement weight, steers and heifers will have similar rates of death loss (data not shown). The exception to this rule is 900 lb “heifers” which have a higher rate of death loss than 900 lb steers, for obvious reasons.
Cattle feeders should be concerned if death loss for a given weight class of cattle exceeds twice the average for that group, for an extended period of time. If this occurs and the cattle were not substantially cheaper than other feeder cattle at the time, the procurement program and health program need to be examined.
In the Benchmark database, pens of 700 lb steers with no death loss gained 13% faster and had 9% lower feed conversion values than pens with 2% or more death loss. The pens without death loss also graded five percentage points higher and had three percentage points fewer cattle that received penalty quality grades. Buying and feeding healthy cattle will produce better performance and quality grade. These advantages should be considered when pricing feeder cattle.
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