Snoop Dog, last year’s Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo Junior Grand Champion steer, was described as stout and muscular.The champion represents the model steer the beef industry wants. But looking through the winning profiles in the Stock Show’s 127-year history, it’s clear that beauty standards have changed.
Like fashion trends, what makes a champion steer attractive is constantly evolving. Just ask Lee Pritchard, a resident of Bells, a city almost two hours northeast of Fort Worth, who has been involved with the Fort Worth Stock Show his entire life.
“If you were to look at the photos, you’d say ‘How did we get there?’” Pritchard said.
A swinging pendulum
Pritchard points to the 1960s as an example of the change over the years, when champion steers were expected to be as tall as its owner’s belt buckle.
“They always called them belt buckle cattle,” Pritchard said.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the pendulum swung the other direction with the introduction of the exotics breeds, Pritchard said, and the steers became a lot taller.
“Physically, when you’re judging a class of steers, frame size is something that’s visually easy to see,” Pritchard said. “And it got to a point where the taller the steer, the better. And, you know, judges were selecting for those larger-framed animals during that time frame.”
Changes to the genetics and physical attributes of steers can take decades, said Wade Shackelford, who worked for years as an agriculture teacher at Prosper ISD and has been involved in the Fort Worth Stock Show.
When European bloodlines bred with Hereford and Angus breeds, cattle with larger frames were the result. At one point, the cattle became a little too tall for the industry, he said. Meat processors couldn’t fit the cuts into the boxes allotted for them.
“That’s one thing about the industry, you’ll notice, is that it’s like a pendulum,” Shackelford said. “And we’ll swing that pendulum one way or the other. And it’s always extreme.”
Jacklyn Jones Doyle is a Tarrant County agriculture and natural resources extension agent at Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. The shifting physical appearance of the steers changes based on the meat industry demands, she said.
Between the 1970s and 1990s, certain breeds of steers could be as tall as 83 inches. Now, the standard for height is about 60 inches.
Currently, the meat industry wants cattle to gain meat on their bones with less feed, Jones Doyle said. That drive to produce more “efficient” cattle has been spurred by a historiclow rate of cattle production due to long-term drought, she said.
“These cattle need to be efficient enough in order to produce the most amount of beef that they can in order to supply the demand (of) the United States,” Jones Doyle said.
The 2023 grand champion steer, Snoop Dog, was a 1,343-pound heavyweight black European Cross that sold for $440,000 — a weight that aligns with what the industry is demanding. But those who have been involved in the stock show for years, such as Shackelford, know the pendulum is bound to swing again. Industry demand is always a factor, but Shackelford said progressive breeders can shift trends too.
“(Breeders are) kind of on top, and all of a sudden, everybody else has what they have,” Shackelford said. “They can’t sell on the market what they’ve got, so what’s the best thing they can do? Change the trend.”
As for competitions, at the end of the day, judging is subjective. A lot of steers deserve awards at the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo, Shackelford said. But champions always depend on the opinions of a day’s judges.
Seth Bodine is a business and economic development reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at seth.bodine@fortworthreport.org and follow@sbodine120 on X, formerly known as Twitter.
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