Benefits for customers:
While Meunier Livestock is the same farm that produces Rooted's beef, beef sold under the Meunier Livestock brand is harvested at a Provincially inspected plant and offers our customers in Alberta two benefits:
1) If customers prefer to order sides of beef, we offer a 1/8 box. This is an excellent method to order beef in bulk and sample more cuts than those available from our federally inspected products. Each 1/8 box is at
least 15 kg. Ground beef is sold separately.
2) This brand offers 100% ground beef packs. We remove the ground beef from packs containing the rest of the products so we can offer this product to customers who only want ground beef or those who wish to order out of balance from the rest of the meat cuts. These ground beef packages are larger packages than our Federally inspected offerings at 680 grams each.
Farm History:
2025 marks 125 years of farming history for the Meunier family in the Mosside area. In 1900 Telesphore Meunier left the hustle and bustle of then St. Albert, north of Edmonton, in search of untouched wildnerness that he could settle and call his own.
He set off northwest and journeyed about 100 km. He decided to settle on some high ground that overlooked an open grass meadow. This ground appealed to Telesphore as he knew he could put up winter feed for his livestock without clearing and breaking any land for the first few years. He was the first settler to the Barrhead area and the local district where he settled was later surveyed and called Mosside a few years later.
Telesphore and his wife Josephine (Majeau) built a family home on that high ground and soon raised a family. Over the next decade the cattle herd grew as well as a large herd of horses. When other settlers were moving into the area, Telesphore sold teams of horses, as they were much needed to break and settle the land. The first cattle drive occurred in 1912, and with the help of neighbors, it went to Edmonton near the area that would become Edmonton's municipal airport, where buyers would bid on the cattle. Once purchased, the cattle were driven off to the packing plant.
A few years later the railroad came to Cherhill around 40 km south of Mosside. Afterwards, grain and cattle were taken over the Pembina river at Meadowview and taken to the Cherhill market. Additionally, Telesphore had one of the few steam tractors north of Edmonton and broke much ground and threshed grain for many farms between St. Albert and Mosside.
The next chapter of the farm started in 1927 when Telesphore's son Paul Meunier married Elsie Senior and homesteaded just west of where he was raised. When the great depression came a few years later, Paul hauled logs with his team of horses for Chisholm lumber to the banks of the Athabasca River. When he was away at lumber camps, it was up to Elsie and her young family to milk the cows and feed the hogs and chickens. All that while, she raised 13 children, and the farm continued to grow from that homestead.
In 1969, four of Paul's sons started a farming venture in the area. Raymond, Don, Daryl, and Lyle incorporated and became known as Paul Meunier and Sons Farms. At that time, the farm was mainly a dairy farm but also had a farrow-to-finish hog operation and a grain enterprise. In 1993, a hard decision was made to sell the dairy operation. From then on, the grain farm grew, and a small beef feedlot was built and expanded.
In 2003, Daryl's son Chad Meunier married Stacey Anderson and began a cow-calf enterprise on the farm. Grazing land was purchased in the Cherhill area. Their passions were grass and land management, as well as the genetics and husbandry of calving and growing calves. This enterprise grew over the years as the market allowed and the farm continued to grow.
In 2016, Chad and Stacey bought the original farm and have since started a family. Both family and farm have grown since, guided by the motto “ Thriving Plants, Animals, and People “ as their cornerstone. The fifth generation is now on its way to continuing the tradition and putting its stamp on the farm and surrounding community.
