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About Sharidon Farms :: Lowline Cattle Breeders

Sharidon Farms is a small family farm located approximately 40 miles NE of Kansas City.

We raise fullblood Lowline Angus cattle of superior genetics, selling both registered Lowline seedstock and all natural grass finished beef. We use a team of Brabant Belgian draft horses to provide part of the power for chores around the farm such as mowing, raking hay, harrowing, planting seed, etc.

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Sharidon Farms

Why Lowlines?
We started out raising beef for our own needs and found ourselves expanding to accommodate requests for beef sales to family, friends, friends of friends, etc. Direct marketing of our beef provides us with a significantly higher level of income per animal produced than selling feeder calves to the local sale barn.

Our customers are looking for the health benefits of beef naturally finished on grass,without the use of hormones or antibiotics. This all natural product commands a higher price in the market.  It also fits well with our desire to pursue highly sustainable agriculture methods.  These are also less costly and labor intensive for us than feeding grain.

Lowlines  consistently produce very tender and well marbled beef from an all forage diet, without any of the "special feeding" to produce or the "special cooking" warnings you commonly see with other forage based beef.  We would never have continued raising Lowlines if we had to convince our customers to "adjust their palates" to accept the grass-finished beef flavor or to provide them with meat tenderizers and special cooking instructions when they bought our beef.

We both work full time off the farm as well and managing our farm as efficiently as possible is crucial to our success.

Rotational grazing allows us to naturally raise our cattle on forage alone on a small acreage and saves us time by reducing our day to day labor.  Instead of harvesting and taking feed to the cattle, we take the cattle to the feed.  In addition, we reap the benefit of on-going pasture improvement by the natural distribution of free fertilizer the cattle leave behind as they graze through a paddock.

Lowline cows calve easily unattended and the calves are vigorous, up and about immediately.  This is very important to us since we do work off the farm and are not always immediately at hand during calving. Unlike commonly related calving problems with traditional cattle we have not experienced any difficultieswith our full blood Lowline cattle.

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Answers to common questions about Sharidon Farms Lowline cattle management.
  • We do not creep feed our calves.
  • We do not regularly feed grain to our cows or bulls.
  • We rotationally graze, primarily on fescue pasture with mix of some other cool season grasses and legumes.
  • We feed this same grass mix as hay in the winter to supplement, as needed, any stockpiled pasture.
  • We offer free choice loose mineral mix (no added antibiotic).
  • We do not implant growth hormones or routinely treat with antibiotic.

Heifer calves average 40-45 lbs at birth

Heifers are bred at 13-15 months of age, weight 550-650 lbs
First calf at 23-25 months of age, weighing 800-900 lbs

Mature cows 850-1000 lbs, hip height 43- 45”

Bull calves average 45-50 lbs at birth

Steers are generally cut at approx 10 months

Mature bulls 1200-1400 lbs, hip height 45-47”

We slaughter steers at 700-800 lbs, usually at or before 18 months. This timing is due to customer demand and desire for slightly smaller sides of beef. None of our customers have requested grain finish to evaluate rate of gain on grain ration.

We realize 50-55% retail cut from our carcasses, over our traditional cattle which yielded 40-45%

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