Grassfarmer's Pharo post

[Big Swede]

Denny a 450# steer might have brought you $500 last fall. If that steer was fed to gain 1.5# per day he would weigh 675# today and be worth about $850. I'd say that's pretty lucrative.

 

[Soapweed]

Denny a 450# steer might have brought you $500 last fall. If that steer was fed to gain 1.5# per day he would weigh 675# today and be worth about $850. I'd say that's pretty lucrative.

The market has come up significantly the past three months. This is not always a given. Sometimes it works quite the opposite. On several occasions we have sold calves right off the cow in October, and in four months I've looked back and been darned glad we sold them when we did. Sometimes a winter feed bill can be plum thrown away, when the market goes down as the calves get bigger. Luck has a big role in the general scheme of things. :wink:

 

[Angus 62]

There are fewer buyers every fall because there are less cattle feeders. Some days the buyers don't really compete as much as take turns. With less cow numbers there is more and more grass looking for cattle. There are way more buyers come spring and that is part of the price increase you see and happens most years.

I realize that some places it isn't often possible to over winter calves anyplace but a corral. Here light weight grass calves run on native grass or cornstalks are becoming more and more common.

There were a lot of ranches paid for in the days of 50 cent gas and $5000 dollar trucks. In a commodity business you get to sell wholesale, buy retail and pay the freight both ways. The spread gets bigger every year.

 

[Big Swede]

Soapweed I'll agree with you up to a point but if you look at the price cylce for feeder calves the peak is April for the last 50 years. Hard to argue with history.

 

[Big Swede]

Even though it's hard to argue with history I know you will, that's what I like about ya. :wink:

 

[Anonymous]

Up here some of the yearling folks that run down on the Missouri already have their yearlings out on grass...Have had for a couple of weeks now...

Must be some optimism in expansion of the cattle herd and coming prices as a I heard a neighbor just finished bangs vaccinating 2000 heifers they are going to breed up this summer-- and some others have been buying heifers to breed, rather than run steers this year....Thats where my heifers went...

 

[Faster horses]

This may go against the grain of those who 'think outside the box', but
here goes anyway.

The rancher that got us started back in the 60's (I know things have
changed since then--believe me, I know) gave us a lot of good advice.
His theory was to make a plan and stick to that plan year in and year out.
You might lose one year, but on average you will make money doing the
same thing at the same time every year. Skipping around and trying to
outguess the market doesn't work.

So, we've always contracted our calves by August 1 (once in awhile that wasn't possible, but we always managed to contract them by Sept.) and shipped them in October. (We started with nothing and we have most of it left.) Seriously, that advice has served us well
for 45 years now. We had to do this ourselves as no one gave us anything, but a lot of moral support and we took advice from those we
really respected. It's been a great ride for the most part.

 

[per]

This may go against the grain of those who 'think outside the box', but
here goes anyway.

The rancher that got us started back in the 60's (I know things have
changed since then--believe me, I know) gave us a lot of good advice.
His theory was to make a plan and stick to that plan year in and year out.
You might lose one year, but on average you will make money doing the
same thing at the same time every year. Skipping around and trying to
outguess the market doesn't work.

So, we've always contracted our calves by August 1 (once in awhile that wasn't possible, but we always managed to contract them by Sept.) and shipped them in October. (We started with nothing and we have most of it left.) Seriously, that advice has served us well
for 45 years now. We had to do this ourselves as no one gave us anything, but a lot of moral support and we took advice from those we
really respected. It's been a great ride for the most part.

If you do the same thing every year and are happy with the results that is a good thing. If you do the same thing every year expecting different results, well that is another kettle of fish. :wink: Even though the only box I have is that please don't disturb empty one, :roll: one could do well to heed that advice. Change for the sake of change is not always effective. Of course doing it because dad and grampa did isn't always effective either. :wink:

 

[John SD]

Denny a 450# steer might have brought you $500 last fall. If that steer was fed to gain 1.5# per day he would weigh 675# today and be worth about $850. I'd say that's pretty lucrative.

The market has come up significantly the past three months. This is not always a given. Sometimes it works quite the opposite. On several occasions we have sold calves right off the cow in October, and in four months I've looked back and been darned glad we sold them when we did. Sometimes a winter feed bill can be plum thrown away, when the market goes down as the calves get bigger. Luck has a big role in the general scheme of things. :wink:

Soapweed, your comments remind me of something I heard Derry Brownfield say on his radio show. This supposedly was a true story he told about himself from way back when.

Derry said 400 lb steer calves were selling at the time for $120/cwt. So if he had sold them that fall at weaning he would have received $480/hd for them.

But people told him this feeder cattle market was going to pick up. So he kept the calves and fed them until spring when the now 600 lb steers were bringing $80/cwt or $480/hd.

So he decided keep the steers and run them for the summer on grass. He sold them in the fall as 800 lb yearlings for $60/cwt or $480/hd.

Gotta listen to Derry tell it to understand! :wink: :wink: :wink: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

 

[RSL]

This may go against the grain of those who 'think outside the box', but
here goes anyway.

The rancher that got us started back in the 60's (I know things have
changed since then--believe me, I know) gave us a lot of good advice.
His theory was to make a plan and stick to that plan year in and year out.
You might lose one year, but on average you will make money doing the
same thing at the same time every year. Skipping around and trying to
outguess the market doesn't work.

So, we've always contracted our calves by August 1 (once in awhile that wasn't possible, but we always managed to contract them by Sept.) and shipped them in October. (We started with nothing and we have most of it left.) Seriously, that advice has served us well
for 45 years now. We had to do this ourselves as no one gave us anything, but a lot of moral support and we took advice from those we
really respected. It's been a great ride for the most part.

If you do the same thing every year and are happy with the results that is a good thing. If you do the same thing every year expecting different results, well that is another kettle of fish. :wink: Even though the only box I have is that please don't disturb empty one, :roll: one could do well to heed that advice. Change for the sake of change is not always effective. Of course doing it because dad and grampa did isn't always effective either. :wink:

I agree with this. We still run "ranchy" at home, but we do employ several carefully selected new technologies including but not limited to...
DNA sire verification on replacement heifers
AI
Electric fence
Alternative grazing strategies
EPD
vaccination program
etc.
For us these "new" technologies and an adaptive management (including risk management) plan are important.
Consistency is important and there are market peaks at various times of the year, but sometimes a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. All that extra cash from retained ownership does come with some risk and use of resources.
I appreciate anyone who can adapt and succeed over the past and into the future. I think in a lot of cases the future is a lot more uncertain than the past, however I am sure in hindsight that has always been the case.
We have found that having a vision and mission statement to work towards has been the most powerful technology we have ever adopted.

 

[Big Muddy rancher]

Denny a 450# steer might have brought you $500 last fall. If that steer was fed to gain 1.5# per day he would weigh 675# today and be worth about $850. I'd say that's pretty lucrative.

The market has come up significantly the past three months. This is not always a given. Sometimes it works quite the opposite. On several occasions we have sold calves right off the cow in October, and in four months I've looked back and been darned glad we sold them when we did. Sometimes a winter feed bill can be plum thrown away, when the market goes down as the calves get bigger. Luck has a big role in the general scheme of things. :wink:

Soapweed, your comments remind me of something I heard Derry Brownfield say on his radio show. This supposedly was a true story he told about himself from way back when.

Derry said 400 lb steer calves were selling at the time for $120/cwt. So if he had sold them that fall at weaning he would have received $480/hd for them.

But people told him this feeder cattle market was going to pick up. So he kept the calves and fed them until spring when the now 600 lb steers were bringing $80/cwt or $480/hd.

So he decided keep the steers and run them for the summer on grass. He sold them in the fall as 800 lb yearlings for $60/cwt or $480/hd.

Gotta listen to Derry tell it to understand! :wink: :wink: :wink: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

That could be my life story. :shock:

 

[hillsdown]

That would be what happened to us last year BMR. I held most of my commercial heifer calves over winter because the price in the fall was so horrendous . I then sold them as replacements in March and actually did quite well; however I ended up running out of feed before pastures were ready. So had to buy expensive feed to tie me over, then the drought , so decided to disperse all commercial cattle and 25% of the purebreds at pennies on the dollar as everyone was in the same boat . Still had to buy expensive feed to help tie us over, may still run out and be up the creek without a paddle as we still have not gotten any real moisture yet..

Sometimes you're damned if you do damned if you don't.. :roll:

 

[Northern Rancher]

One of the besty ways to droughtproof a ranch is too run yearlings-in the dry they can be sent to feedlot, other grass or sold-it's worked up in this country for a long time-in the good old days guys had to sell yearlings because of floods more than drought. It's pretty discouraging to be stocked up with cows and have to dump them into a drought market. Most ranchers fear the unknown enterprise so disparage it instead of trying it. Most guys now have good enough cattle that they could make money owning them all the way. There are alot of ways to manage cattle in dry times-we've had alot of practice. It sounds like alot of guys had plans for my grass this year-but I think I'l rest it and build some more pastures. I've never been brave enough to haul my years work to town and sell it in one day. My grampa hit his thumb driving a spike too but that never made me afraid to swing a hammer!!!

 

[Mover]

A number of years ago when I was living in BC I got the U of Alberta to run a per month price list for the average price of cattle anually for each month. They went back to 1911 until about 1985. In only one year over that time was the price higher in Nov. than July. From that reliability we stop selling in August until late December and then we market through July. There is no way I would deviate from this having done it for 25 years and only having the market go agsinst me in one year.

 

[per]

A number of years ago when I was living in BC I got the U of Alberta to run a per month price list for the average price of cattle anually for each month. They went back to 1911 until about 1985. In only one year over that time was the price higher in Nov. than July. From that reliability we stop selling in August until late December and then we market through July. There is no way I would deviate from this having done it for 25 years and only having the market go agsinst me in one year.

What class of cattle? Culls. grassers etc. We usually market our calves (grassers) late July to the end of August and it has treated us well.

 

[Mover]

All classes. We sell our calves and yearlings on the satellite in late July for late November delivery. The open cull cow market is really sick in November so we wait until Jan. to go with them, I have even purchased old cows in Nov. and held them to Jan. for resale. Always is positve price wise but not enough margin. We wait on delivery of the calves until late as most go to California for the winter grass and it simplifies their work if the calves come then and they usually pay a premium for those calves.

 

[mrj]

This has been an interesting thread with so many good points.

Isn't the 'lesson' more or less to maintain the necessary BCS of the cows, AND to work with YOUR conditions, whether weather, terrain, man-power, annual precipitation/forage type and conditions, seasonal variations, and MORE?

We have moved our calving later into spring (April 10 start-date) due to possible (but not always!) severe winter/early spring weather which can run to -45% and wind and snow.........yet we can get a calf-killing blizzard well into May with conditions so severe it is dangerous to humans to be out searching for calves. We have lost every calf born in such storms, and were thankful it only lasted a day or two! We lack 'staff' and barn space to check them every hour as some do in winter calving, and truly believe that getting more in sync with nature, with light calf birth weight, nutrition as close to optimum as possible serves us pretty well with reasonably high calf crop percentages. But, it is a learning curve, forever it seems, as our family is into our 118th year in the business and nothing is set in stone.

Anti-animal activists will use bad situations, or maybe even manufacture them, to serve their purpose, so catering to them, or trying to work with them seems futile. Working with professionals (veterinarians, animal health care experts) and taking care of cattle properly seems the best way to go, to me. We need to expose the 'rogue' outfits misleading consumers about animal 'rights' in the guise of animal 'care'. And many of our organizations are working diligently at it. Check www.beef.org and Amanda Nolz' blog at Beef Magazine to see what Beef Ambassadors and others are doing.

It is great that many people in various parts of the country can calve at different times and keep the beef supply more steady than the historic seasonality had it. Now, if we could just get more space for dry aging hanging carcasses.........people could get even more superior tasting beef!
mrj

 

[Mover]

This could be a lengthy post that relates to calving at different times of the year in different areas.

First off I have owned ranches in Colorado, 8000 feet, British Columbia, Oregon, and Idaho.

In Colorado the ideal calf was born Apr. 10. Earlier calves went stale in May and had trouble turning around when grass grew in June. Apr. 10 calves were too small to go stale and kept right on going until they beat the older calves. This is after recording hundreds of birth dates and weights.

In BC in a large range operation the weather prevents early calving due to ice on the fields. Also the golden eagles just killed us so if we waited until the deer were fawning and the bighorns were lambing then the eagles left and we went on in peace.

In Oregon mud was the only deterrent to calving anytime so you could time your calves to meet the markets.

In Idaho you have to time breeding when there is sufficient feed for the cows to cycle. On desert range this is a MUST. Otherwise any month works, weather and mud wise.

 

[Angus 62]

I would say Mover is correct for his April 10th CO calving date as those early to mid April calves consistently had the highest WDA. I know several guys that are April 1 starting date that didn't wean any more pounds when they calved in March.

Some will hold off a little longer because we can still get some blizzards in April.

 

[hillsdown]

One of the besty ways to droughtproof a ranch is too run yearlings-in the dry they can be sent to feedlot, other grass or sold-it's worked up in this country for a long time-in the good old days guys had to sell yearlings because of floods more than drought. It's pretty discouraging to be stocked up with cows and have to dump them into a drought market. Most ranchers fear the unknown enterprise so disparage it instead of trying it. Most guys now have good enough cattle that they could make money owning them all the way. There are alot of ways to manage cattle in dry times-we've had alot of practice. It sounds like alot of guys had plans for my grass this year-but I think I'l rest it and build some more pastures. I've never been brave enough to haul my years work to town and sell it in one day. My grampa hit his thumb driving a spike too but that never made me afraid to swing a hammer!!!

NR I am not a gambler ,never have been. Maybe I am in the wrong business.. :wink: I could have bought the hay to keep my herd but didn't want to dip into my savings. Everything worked out as it should have in the end, as I lost my right hand gal and doing everything by myself with that many head would have been too much.

I am still a fan of winter calving ,they just do better born on frozen ground than wet muck and I can have them gone by mid summer while the prices are not down due to surpluses.. It is either that or calve in summer and hold them over for a year..