[landarc]

Beef is not Venison, and a lot has to do with minor age differences, unless we are talking grass-finished animals.

Most all beef, not veal, comes from animals that are a lot younger than most of use realize. When talking about cattle from most commodity sources, you are looking at 24 to 30 months of life. And they tend to be chosen and brought to slaughter by weight and not age. The exception, is times like this, when feed is so expensive, then you start to see smaller cattle being brought to market. Still, in most cases, we are talking a short time period.

Time in pasture, time on grain, types of grain or formula, level of stress at slaughter, condition of critter are all more important and almost impossible to know for most of us.