Month: September 2019

BQA Transport Training & Certification

Beginning in 2020, several packers will require BQA Transportation certification of the hauler/drivers delivering cattle to their plants.

By the start of 2020, the major beef cattle processors have requested that any livestock hauler delivering cattle to their facilities be certified in Beef Quality Assurance – Transport (BQAT). Any professional hauler or farmer delivering loads of cattle directly to a processor should plan on attending a BQAT training and certification prior to delivering their first load of cattle in 2020. Much like producer BQA, the goal of the BQAT program is to make sure that cattle transporters are implementing good animal handling and transport practices.

Transportation quality assurance plays a critical role in the Continue reading →

Hauling Cattle

– Steve Boyles, OSU Beef Extension Specialist

Handle/transport all cattle in such a fashion to minimize stress, injury, and bruising. Use vehicles to transport cattle that provide for the safety of personnel and cattle during loading, transporting, and unloading. Follow these guidelines when transporting your own livestock:

  • Perform a structural check of trailer/truck and tires prior to loading livestock.
  • Inspect trailer/truck for cleanliness (biosecurity) as well as broken gates that may injure/bruise cattle. • Check weather and route to ensure a safe and uneventful trip.
  • Verify withdrawal on any animals being sold.
  • Verify that all animals are fit to ship.
  • Back up squarely and evenly to the loading chute.
  • Load using Low Stress Handling Practices.
  • Pull away from the chute slowly and drive to allow cattle a chance to gain their balance in transit.
  • Minimize time in transit by limiting stops and using prior preparation to ensure an organized event.

This information was Continue reading →

Eastern Ohio Beef and Forage School begins October 1

– Clif Little, OSU Extension Educator, Guernsey County

OSU Extension and the Eastern Agriculture Research Station has made plans for the 2019 Fall Beef School. The dates for the school are Tuesday, October 1, 8, and 15, starting at 6:00 p.m. to 8 pm. The programs will be held at the OSU Eastern Agricultural Research Station in Belle Valley, (16870 Bond Ridge Rd Caldwell, Ohio 43724). A meal will be provided with registration. The school has been designed to address practical issues facing beef producers.

The first night will cover cattle handling. The second night will cover winter feed supplementation. The last night will focus on cattle health management and beef production record keeping.

The cost of the program is $25, which covers registration for one or all three days. Registration deadline is September 27. Please register by completing and returning the registration form found linked here.

Posted by at Posted in Events

Heart of America Grazing Conference, October 29-30

Make plans now to attend the 2019 Heart of America Grazing Conference — Kicking the Hay Habit: Optimizing Profitability. The keynote speaker, Jim Gerrish, is an independent grazing lands consultant providing services to farmers and ranchers on both private and public lands across five continents. With a BS in Agronomy from the University of Illinois and MS in Crop Ecology from University of Kentucky, he served 22 years of beef-forage systems research and outreach while on the faculty of the University of Missouri-Forage Systems Research Center (FSRC). His research encompassed many aspects of plant-soil-animal interactions and provided the foundation for many of the basic principles of Management-intensive Grazing. He was also a co-founder of the very popular 3-day grazing management workshop at FSRC. Aside from his monthly column in The Stockman Grass-Farmer magazine for over 12 years, Gerrish has authored two books on grazing and ranch management – “Management-intensive Grazing: The Grassroots of Grass Farming” published in 2004 and “Kick the Hay Habit: A Practical Guide to Year-Round Grazing” published in 2010. Today, he is an instructor in the University of Idaho’s Lost River Grazing Academy held twice annually near Salmon, ID. He typically speaks at 40 to 50 producer-oriented workshops, seminars, and field days around the US and Canada each year.

To find the complete agenda, or to register online, go here: https://2019hoa.eventbrite.com

The Cull Cow Market is Looking Up

– David P. Anderson, Professor and Extension Economist, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service

Cull cow prices continued their slow increase into September. Prices in the Southern Plains reached their high of the year, so far, at $54.36 at the end of August. That was 12.5 percent higher than a year ago. There is some good reason to think that prices may continue to be above a year ago.

Cow slaughter hit some multi-decade highs in the first few months of the year, largely driven by dairy cow slaughter. After the surge early in the year, dairy cow slaughter has fallen back to year ago levels. Over the last month, dairy cow slaughter has been almost 1 percent below a year ago. For the last two months, only 900 head more have gone to market compared to last year. Normally, dairy cow marketings tend to move higher seasonally after July and that is happening this year as well.

Beef cow culling has lagged behind a year ago over the last two months. Beef cow slaughter over this time period is almost Continue reading →

Harvesting Options for Summer Annuals

– Mike Estadt, AgNR Educator, OSU Extension, Pickaway County (originally published in The Ohio Cattleman early fall issue)

Summer annuals such as sudangrass or sudangrass X sorghum hybrids are likely near ready for harvest.

This month I drove across I-70 interstate to Kansas City, Missouri. Along the way I observed at least a dozen semi-trailers headed east with loads of high-quality hay. Some of this hay may have been delivered to Ohio where very little good hay has made this year. I also saw several fields planted with summer annuals where corn should have been.

Beef producers in Ohio who have planted summer annuals such as sudangrass or sudangrass X sorghum hybrids and pearl millet as a substitute for high-quality cool season grass hay should prepare for the immediate harvest beginning this month.

Most smaller beef operations are not set up for feeding silage so there are two options available. Green chopping and hay/baleage.

Green chopping may be an option for producers especially if Continue reading →

Posted by at Posted in Forages

Pricing Standing Forage in the Field

– Mark Sulc, OSU Extension Forage Specialist

Valuing a standing forage crop can be a challenge, especially when a variety of ‘cover crop’ species could be on the market this fall.

How to value a standing hay crop is challenging. Assigning an appropriate value includes the buyer and seller agreeing on the market value for the hay and then adjusting for harvest costs and other factors that contribute to the price of hay sold in the open market, some of which are challenging to quantify.

A new factsheet and Excel worksheet are available to help you arrive at a fair price. These resources consider just a single crop of forage that is ready to harvest as hay or haylage. The grower’s base price equals the price they could receive for the crop from the hay market less harvesting/storage/marketing costs. Hopefully, this covers production costs and generates a profit. During price negotiations, it must be recognized that Continue reading →

Time to Take a Last Hay Cutting

– Mark Sulc, OSU Extension Forage Specialist

Now is the best time to harvest the last cutting of hay for this year!

The best time to take a last harvest of forages is this week and next in Ohio, for the least risk to the long-term health of the stand. This is especially true for alfalfa and other legumes that need the fall period to replenish carbohydrate and protein reserves in the taproots that are used for winter survival and regrowth next spring. This fall rest period is particularly important this year, because our surviving stands have suffered a great deal of wet soil stress this year. Adding the stress of fall cutting will be like adding insult to injury, in our opinion carrying a higher degree of risk this year than normal.

Unfortunately, many fields this year may not be at a reasonable harvest stage during the next two weeks, because the rainy weather early this season blew apart our normal harvest schedules. Many producers are faced with . . .

Continue reading Time to Take a Last Cutting

Posted by at Posted in Forages

Backgrounding; A Phase of Growing Calves in Preparation for the Feedlot

– Steve Boyles, OSU Beef Extension Specialist

Backgrounding is a term used to describe a phase of growing calves being prepared for feedlot placement. As compared to wintering programs, backgrounding emphasizes a faster rate of gain, with relatively more grain and less roughage.

An example of a typical backgrounding operation would be to feed 400 to 500 pound steer calves to a weight of 600 to 700 pounds. If the feeding period was to be about 120 days, a ration and management program that produces an average daily gain of 1.5-2.5 would provide the desired sales weight.

Advantages of Backgrounded Feeder Calves

  • Provide a market for homegrown grain and roughage that might otherwise have little market value.
  • Calves are efficient converters of good quality feeds.
  • Avoid the stress and resulting health problems associated with shipping of young calves through the marketing system. Because of the potential death loss and health problems associated with handling and shipping of young calves, the cow herd owner has an advantage over those who purchase their calves through the marketing system.
  • Avoids the seasonal fall market glut and targets sales during seasonally strong feeder prices.
  • Provides more flexibility to spread marketings and choose among potentially profitable alternatives.
  • Provides additional flexibility for marketing heifers either as feeders or as herd replacements.

A study at the University of Nebraska in 2018 exhibits the advantages of first Continue reading →

Cattle On Feed, August 1 Report

– Brenda Boetel, Professor, Department of Agricultural Economics, University of Wisconsin-River Falls

The United States Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (USDA, NASS) released their monthly Cattle on Feed report on Friday August 23, 2019. The latest numbers released by the USDA showed aggressive marketings and were neutral in total numbers on feed and placements. Total cattle on feed on August 1, 2019 numbered 11.1 million head, slightly above August 2018. Pre-report estimates expected cattle on feed numbers to be up 0.6%.

Placements in feedlots during July totaled 1.71 million head, down 2.2 percent from 2018. Pre-report estimates anticipated placements down only 0.5%. Poor pasture and range conditions helped contribute to Continue reading →