We dropped in on a bred cow sale yesterday. We could only stand to watch about 30 cows sell before we had to leave. Last year we were sad to see that about 3/4 of the cows at the bred cow sales were going to slaughter. Things were as bad as they could be, right? NOT. From what we saw yesterday it's up to 9 out of 10 that are going to slaughter.
These cows were about the nicest bunch of Hereford (with a bit of Simmental) cows we'd ever seen. They were uniform, in beautiful condition, young, age verified, and vaccinated. That didn't help them one bit. We saw two cows go to a farmer,and the slaughter buyers got the rest. For about 30 cents a pound.
When the border was still closed, we went a couple of years buying bred cows instead of keeping heifers. This was supposedly during the darkest days the Canadian cattle business had or would ever see. NOT. The cows that sold yesterday sold for about the same money that we had paid for bred cows in 2004.
Just when you think things can't get worse... they do. It was enough to make a person cry. The girl who usually works the computer in the ring told us she couldn't even handle sitting out there to watch, so she worked the office instead.
We couldn't stand to watch any more, so we left.
