Betty Jo Gigot, Editor and Publisher

It was a good day at Mc6 Cattle Feeders. The sun was shining, melting the early snow from the 55,000-head capacity feedyard, and Dan McWhorter’s presidential candidate had just been declared a winner. Katie, McWhorter’s oldest daughter, was getting married in another week to a man he really liked, and the feedyard was full. How could it get much better than that?

The Mc6 designation stands for Dan, his wife Mary, and their four children, Katie, a nurse; Emily, a grant writer in New York City; Hannah a senior at Baylor University; and Hank, a freshman at Baylor.

Building toward a goal
Born and raised in Hereford, Texas, McWhorter, Mc6 owner and general manager, returned to his home turf after graduating from Texas Tech University. His father, D.C., was in the grain and feedyard businesses, and eventually became one of the original players in the development of Friona Industries.

McWhorter developed a growing yard in the area and ran it for several years before going on to run a commodity company with his brother. Ten years later, he purchased a farm and ranch northeast of Hereford to have a place to run cattle.

The rest is history. Pens that would hold 1,500 cattle fresh off pasture soon gave way to a mill and more pens where cattle could be finished. Until last year, new pens were built every year, bringing the yard to 55,000-head capacity.

“This is a good operational unit,” McWhorter said, when asked if he was through building pens. The company feeds for people across the nation, spreading the word of their expertise by mouth, although as the customer base has shrunk, many of the cattle fed on the property belong to McWhorter.

A hands-on manager, McWhorter knows that owning a feedlot has several different facets. “You have to keep the yard full to generate income,” McWhorter said. “And my experience in the risk management business helps keep us protected. I was pleased to get out of the commodity business, but that experience comes in very handy with what I do now. This business is difficult and gratifying at the same time.”

A compact unit, the company runs stockers on their own wheat pasture and feeds corn silage raised on the feedyard’s 2,000-acre farm.

Optimistic
McWhorter is very optimistic about the industry. “We have broken in to a different trading range,” he said. “We are on a different plateau.”

Cattle at the yard are sold live or on the grid to Excel, Tyson and Swift with some going to National Pack.

He also totes the area where he is located. “Cattlemen in the Texas Panhandle realized in the early ‘60s that there was excellent grain and cattle available here. It is the perfect climate for cattle feeding. Although we are now grain deficit, feeder and calf supplies are plentiful.”

He and manager, Warren White, buy yearlings across the country and McWhorter brings all of his calves in from south Texas using Capital Land and Livestock as a supplier.

“Jim Schwertner is a pleasure to do business with,” McWhorter said. “He is honest and knowledgeable.”

Water, seemingly always in short supply in his neck of the woods, is plentiful at the Mc6 location, and that is important to McWhorter, who is in the business for the long haul. McWhorter is a strong supporter of the TCFA and has served on the TCFA Board of Directors. He also is a strong support of the beef checkoff, citing its funding of promotion and research and development as essential to the industry.

Newest on his list of responsibilities is a 10,000-acre ranch in the sandhills of Nebraska. Located near Brewster, the first crop of Angus calves will come off soon. “That has been a fun project,” McWhorter said. To be honest, McWhorter seems to have fun at whatever he does, and he seems to do it all well.