Farm prices

Originally published Sheep Production Nov/Dec 1984

FARMER’S JOURNAL

Clark BreDahl
Greenfield, Iowa

 

Dispatch from Morman Trail Farm:

You know, it’s kind of a nice feeling
to survey the livestock industry from
the top again. Lamb prices have shown
remarkable stability over the past
three and a half months up to Nov. I —
and my friends in the hog and cattle
business have been noticing.

One local cattleman claims he is so
deep in the hole that his toes stay at a
constant 55 degrees. Another who is
big in the swine business suggested
that the continuing controversy over a
slogan for Iowa’s auto license plates
could easily be resolved with the motto
“root hog or die!”

Much as I’d like to, I really can’t
gloat over the situation, though. First,
because I raise a few cattle and hogs
myself, and second, because over the
past couple of years we in the sheep
business have paid a few extra dues
ourselves … and I just hope prices will
stay up long enough now to steady the
boat a little.

Some would say the sheep industry’s
current “most favored” status is
merely the result of the killer blizzard
that devastated flocks and herds last
spring in parts of Wyoming, South
Dakota, North Dakota and Montana.
Since slaughter levels for the year-to-
date are still running above 1983, that
arguement doesn’t quite hold up. I’d
rather believe it’s been due to strong,
stable demand for our product.

And as I recall, the last time we saw
lamb prices in this $67-70 range, pelts
were worth $ 10-13 apiece. Now they’re
only bringing $3-5 … surely that’s an
indication the meat is selling itself!

 

As we wrap up corn harvest this
week, I’m reminded that a few years
ago one of the big buzz words in the
ruminant animal industry here in the
Mid west was “salvage feeds.” I don’t
know how many times I heard it said
that we in farm country wasted more
feed than our ranching friends out
west had to start with. With all the
crop aftermath from millions of acres
of corn and soybeans, there was, if
you’ll-pardon the pun, at least a grain
of truth in that statement.

But salvage feeds haven’t turned out
to be the bonanza many ex pected. One
reason, I suspect, is that the relative
low quality of feeds such as corn stalks
or soybean straw, makes mechanical
harvest of those materials impractical
in most cases. If they are removed, risk
of soil erosion is increased, and
nutrients taken off in the vegetative
matter must usually be replaced with
expensive commercial fertilizer.

Letting the animals do the cleanup
work themselves has always seemed
the most feasible alternative to me —
though this has drawbacks, too. It
requires constant vigilence to insure
that ewes in particular don’t get too
much grain when first turned out.
Cattle get first crack at our stalk feeds
but even then we have occasionall;
had ewes find enough corn to cause
acidosis or founder. And usually what
grain they find comes at a time in their
production cycle when grain isn’t
necessary, or even desirable in the diet.

The other factor that makes grazing
crop salvages a highly inexact science
is the weather. I have run pregnant
ewes right up to two weeks before
lambing in mid-January on nothing
but residues, sale and mineral. But
there have also been years when
excessive rains or early snow have
buried the fields after only a week or
two.

Right now I wish my crystal ball
would show more clearly which lies in
store for us this year.