One and a Half Ton Steer Sold For $1,670

Cletus, the nearly 3,000-lb steer sold at auction, yikes!.. to be slaughtered....

Apr 30 2010

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

(AP Photo/Montana Standard, Walter Hinick)

Brand inspector Joe Launderville, of Deer Lodge, serves to show the scale of how large ''Cletus''really is, April 28, 2010 in Ramsay, Mont. Launderville himself looks like he's been overeating during the winter. Maybe it's time he was sold for slaughter, too. He'd fetch $537 in today's market.

The nearly 3,000 pound Hereford who kept the herd in line on an Avon cattle ranch for years was sold for $1,670 at auction, only $1.79 a pound. If the average person reading this weighs 160 lbs. that means you are worth only $268, for slaughter. That ought to deflate some bloated egos; a steer worth 10 times more than you.


RAMSAY, Mont.— A nearly 3,000 pound Hereford steer that kept the herd in line on a southwestern Montana cattle ranch for nearly a decade has been sold for $1,670 at auction. Owner and breeder Bill McIntosh of Avon watched the bidding Tuesday at the Montana Livestock Auction in Ramsay, saying he hates to see him go, but he's got to be practical. Practically a murderer.

"The cattle market is about as high as we're apt to see it, I think, and finally I can get a little bit of the feed bill back," McIntosh said, noting that Cletus ate about 90 pounds of hay per day during the winter. McIntosh didn't bother to say how much he ate during the winter but I'll bet anyone $20 it cost more than Cletus' hay.

The 10-year-old steer, named Cletus, was sold to a Minnesota buyer and sent to slaughter, probably thinking he was only being transferred to another pasture with taller grass. Poor bastard.

Cletus was the largest steer McIntosh has ever seen and the heaviest to come through the auction yard in memory, said field representative Dick Perkins. When Cletus entered the auction ring, the crowd whistled and gasped but no one yelled out, "Save Cletus," "Save Cletus." It seems like everyone in Montana is bloodthirsty when it comes to livestock.

McIntosh said he was a bit disappointed that the steer fell 50 pounds short of the 3,000-pound mark. Cletus weighed 3,100 pounds last year.

"I guess he wintered a little rough," McIntosh said. Yeah, that knocked $179 off his price, you greedy scumbag, Bill.

Cletus has always been big, about 725 pounds as a calf, and just kept getting bigger, even though he wasn't fed anything out of the ordinary.

"Grass in the summer and hay in the winter," McIntosh said.

Cletus was used as the lead steer, which keeps the herd calm and headed in the right direction. How much was that worth to you, Bill?

"He had a nice life, just eating and sleeping," McIntosh said. Until he ate a little too much, and then, straight to the meat grinder to help pay for those new alligator boots Bill sports around, now, the pig.

In an 11th hour appeal, at the slaughter house door, which was denied, Cletus, speaking through an interpreter, requested that his cherished owner, Bill McIntosh, who had provided him such a rich, carefree life, be slaughtered and ground up with Cletus own meat so the two could be united always.

McIntosh nixed the deal.