BeefTalk: Horses and Beef, They Still Go Together

BeefTalk: Horses and Beef, They Still Go Together

Kris Ringwall, Beef Specialist, NDSU Extension Service

Annual Horse Production Costs Annual Horse Production Costs

The cost of raising beef cattle continues to go up, as does the cost of maintaining a working ranch horse, which affects the bottom line of the beef business.

The other day was difficult. The discussion centered on the horse industry as the Dickinson Research Extension Center was reviewing program costs. As the horse program was discussed, the updated costs were noted.

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Succeeding in tough times, six strategies

Succeeding in tough times, six strategies

Kindra Gordon

The Cattle Business Weekly

“The good times will come again,” says Vincent Amanor-Boadu, an agribusiness professor at Kansas State University, in speaking about today’s current economic downturn.

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Mississippi Breeders Inducted into AICA Hall of Fame

Mississippi Breeders Inducted into AICA Hall of Fame

Cattle Today

At the AICA Spring Board of Directors Meeting, March 1-2, in Kansas City, Mo., Harlan and Dorotheann Rogers were welcomed into the AICA Hall of Fame as nominated by fellow breeders for numerous years of outstanding excellence of raising Charolais cattle.

Harlan and Dorotheann Rogers live on their 2,000 plus-acre ranch, Rogers Bar HR, near the town of Collins, Miss., where they run over 700 registered Charolais cattle and 9,000 commercial heifers. Their four sons, Oby, Bernie, Doug and Joey are involved in the operation and various businesses in Covington County.

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Farmers face growing climate change dilemma: scientist

Farmers face growing climate change dilemma: scientist

David Fogarty

Scientific American

Farmers of the future will have to use cattle and sheep that belch less methane, crops that emit far less planet-warming nitrous oxide and become experts in reporting their greenhouse gas emissions to the government.

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Beef Industry Fights for Room at the Table

Beef Industry Fights for Room at the Table

The Westerner

The U.S. beef industry is trying to fight recession-related woes by promoting new, cheaper cuts from less popular parts of the steer and pushing beef harder overseas. The industry’s moves mirror those of restaurants, supermarkets and packaged-food companies seeking ways to entice budget-conscious consumers who are dining out less and looking for ways to economize at home.

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Efforts to Keep Ag. and Ranching Alive

Efforts to Keep Ag. and Ranching Alive

The Independent

A tour last week of a ranch in Sunol provided insights into how ranchland and agriculture ares being preserved in this area. The obstacles to preservation were discussed as well. There was also a presentation on the potential for and importance of locally grown commodities.

     The tour was sponsored by the Alameda County Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and hosted by Rancher Tim Koopman. Phil Wente discussed local products. Among those in attendance were representatives from Alameda County and staff from the cities of Livermore and Pleasanton.

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Vanishing Breed, In Growing Demand

Vanishing Breed, In Growing Demand 

Andrew Jenner

Harrisonburg’s T&E Meats Serves As One Of Few Links Between Local Meat Producers And Consumers

Daily News Record

The T&E Meats building sits along Charles Street on the north side of Harrisonburg, one of the neighborhood’s many squat, nondescript and easily-overlooked industrial buildings. And in another sense, it sits on lonely ground as a local, federally-inspected meat processing facility – an essential link between growers and consumers  of animals.

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Lawmakers ask for delay of new BSE rule

Lawmakers ask for delay of new BSE rule

KRVN

Members of Congress are asking the federal government to delay new rules intended to keep mad cow disease out of the food supply. Led by Rep. Adrian Smith, R-Neb., and joined by Missouri Rep. Roy Blunt, the lawmakers say the new rules create problems for getting rid of cattle carcasses

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Growth in beef exports needed, say producers

Growth in beef exports needed, say producers

ALEX BINKLEY

Peace Country Sun

Expanding export opportunities and reducing unnecessary regulations are the best ways to restore profitability to the Canadian beef industry, cattle producers have told the Commons agriculture committee.

About 65 per cent of the beef produced in Canada is consumed by Canadians but that is a fairly stable market facing increased competition from imports, John Gillespie, a beef producer and chairman of the Beef Information Centre, told the committee last week.

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Hoosier Ag Groups Come Together in New Office

Hoosier Ag Groups Come Together in New Office

 Gary Truitt

Hoosier AG Today

You have heard of the TV sit-com “The Office;” now Indiana commodity groups have come together for their own version. It has been an idea kicked around for years, to bring together Hoosier commodity groups in one location. That is now beginning to happen, as the Indiana soybean, corn, pork, and beef organizations have all moved their headquarters to the same location.

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A Dozen Ways To Improve Beef Heifer Fertility

A Dozen Ways To Improve Beef Heifer Fertility

cattlenetwork.com

How the first-calf heifer performs in the breeding season and beyond begins long before that. Bob Larson, DVM, PhD, Kansas State University, says a goal to shoot for is over 90% of cross-bred heifers pregnant in a 60-day breeding season. If the heifers are examined prior to breeding to remove any questionable breeders, the success should approach 93–95%. “If the breeding season is confined to 45 days, I would expect a lower percent pregnant,” Larson notes.

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New Red Meat and Cancer Report Criticized

New Red Meat and Cancer Report Criticized

Thebeefsite.com

A new report linking high consumption of red and processed meat to cancer has brought a wave of criticism from the meat industry.

The report published in the Archives of Internal Medicine in the US says that “high intakes of red or processed meat may increase the risk of mortality.

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A New Chip Identifies Important Bovine Genomic Traits

A New Chip Identifies Important Bovine Genomic Traits

Southern Livestock Standard

With help from a new genetic device recently unveiled by a team of animal science researchers, animal breeders may soon be building betters cows that produce more and better beef and tastier profits.

The new genetic tool is called the SNP Chip (pronounced snip chip).

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Special Sales Bring Premium Prices for Calves

Special Sales Bring Premium Prices for Calves

Heather Smith Thomas

Cattle Today

Local auction yards and alliances can be a good place to get premiums for your calves, if you take advantage of special sales. Whether these sales are for preconditioned calves, age-and-source-verified cattle, CAB or natural cattle, buyers know they can go to that sale and get what they want—and sellers are rewarded because of the demand created by special sales. Many auction yards and regional alliances are making efforts to enable cattlemen to consistently market their calves successfully, taking advantage of special sales. Even if stockmen don’t have a truckload, they can co-mingle their calves with others of similar weight, type, condition and health processing, to create attractive truckloads for buyers.

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Cost-Effective Parasite Strategy

Cost-Effective Parasite Strategy

cattlenetwork.com

Internal parasites living in your cattle could be stealing profits from your pocket and they are almost always present on a ranch.

So what can a cattleman do to fight this menace? To answer that question and develop a strategy for parasite control you need to answer several other questions first. Do my cattle have parasites?

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