Cattle and calves in the United States dropped to the lowest in decades as the size of the herd continues to decline, according to data from the Agriculture Department.
On Jan. 1, inventory totaled 86.2 million head, down narrowly from 86.5 million at the same point a year earlier, the agency said.
Nationally, the number of beef cows dropped just over 1%, a sharper decline than many market analysts expected, said David Anderson, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension economist in the Texas A&M Department of Agricultural Economics.
In Texas, the nation’s largest beefproducing state, cow numbers dipped by about 30,000 head, but producers held back 50,000 more heifers — an 8% increase in replacements that could signal the early stages of a slow rebuild, Anderson said.
The rebuild process appears far more measured than past postdrought recoveries, said Jason Cleere, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension beef cattle specialist in the Texas A&M Department of Animal Science. Heifer retention ratios are trending upward across many regions of the state, yet high prices are causing some ranchers to weigh shortterm returns against longterm herd growth.
Texas’ longterm cattle capacity has also been thinned by rapid urban expansion, land fragmentation, and the conversion of quality pasture into solar and other nonagricultural uses. Those losses, Cleere said, translate directly into fewer cows in the statewide and national herd.
Cows and heifers that have calved were reported at 37.2 million head, down from 37.3 million a year earlier, beef cows totaled 27.6 million head, down 1% yearover year, and the number of milk cows at the beginning of the year were at 9.57 million, a 2% increase.
The calf crop, meanwhile, was down 2% on an annual basis to 32.9 million head, the USDA said.
About 24.2 million calves were born in the first half of 2025, down 2% year-overyear, while calves born in the second half of the year was reported at 8.7 million head, composing 26% of the U.S. calf herd, the agency said.
About 18 million heifers weighing 500 pounds or more were in the U.S. herd as of Jan. 1, along with 4.71 million beef replacement heifers, 3.9 million milk replacement heifers and 9.4 million other heifers.
Steers weighing 500 pounds or more totaled 15.6 million head, and bulls weighing 500 pounds or more were reported at 2.01 million head, according to USDA.