VA Tech’s Farm Business Management Update newsletter

Folks: Please click below to view a PDF of the June-July 2006 Farm Business Management Update newsletter.

-Matthew Miller is Virginia’s Newest Farm Business Management Agent

-The Management Calendar

-Introduction to Financial Analysis of a Farm Business

-Alex and Dave’s Economic “Fore-guess”

-National Agri-marketing Association Team Finds Success in Kansas City

-Managing the Risks of Equine Businesses and Enterprises

Montana Beef Newsletter available

This months edition includes articles on

1) how the beef checkoff is moving beef supply this summer

2) biosecurity for the ranch

3) how electronic ear tags are being used as part of a herd management systems

4) early weaning effects on performance

5) protecting wheatgrass from black grass bugs

6) grazing management of spring pastures.

If you would like to view previous issues of the newsletter, they can be found at : http://www.animalrangeextension.montana.edu/articles/beef/main-beefqa.htm

Have a great summer. With the rain we have had in Montana, it is beautiful. Best regards. JP

John Paterson

Extension Beef Specialist

Montana State University

406-994-5562 (office)

406-581-3492 (mobile)

johnp@montana.edu

Korea situation frustrates Creekstone

Korea situation frustrates Creekstone

BY ALAN BJERGA
Wichita Eagle, Washington bureau

WASHINGTON – The head of Creekstone Farms said Monday that he’s optimistic that beef shipments to Japan will resume soon, but that won’t change his company’s lawsuit against the U.S. government.

“We’re optimistic the Japanese market will reopen by this summer,” said John Stewart, chief executive and founder of Creekstone Farms, in Washington.

Stewart also said he’s frustrated with U.S. efforts to reopen trade with South Korea, which stalled last week over Korean concerns with processing practices at seven U.S. packers, including two in Kansas.

FULL STORY

Panorama beef increases its natural/organic market share

Panorama beef increases its natural/organic market share

(MEATPOULTRY.com, June 12, 2006)
by MEAT&POULTRY Staff

VINA, CALIF. – Officials with Panorama Natural Grass-Fed Beef, announced today the company’s fresh beef products will be added to offerings at two Oakland area Farmer Joe’s Markets a growing natural/organic grocery store designed to serve health-conscious shoppers.

FULL STORY

Post-Calving Drenching Shows Benefits

Post-Calving Drenching Shows Benefits

Tuesday, 13 June 2006, 12:31 pm
Press Release: Merial

Research shows attractive gains from post-calving drenching of dairy herds

Research published in the New Zealand Veterinary Journal shows dairy farmers could make significant economic gains by drenching animals soon after calving.

New Zealand trials using eprinomectin show that treated cows not only produced an extra 0.6 litres of milk per cow per day , first calvers were also in calf up to 12.9 days earlier than their untreated herd mates .

The extra milk yield equates to about $30 per cow per season, generating an extra $8400 of farm income for the average herd of 280 cows.

FULL STORY

Johanns Goes Farther In Call For Farm Bill Changes

Johanns Goes Farther In Call For Farm Bill Changes

Jun 12, 2006 4:54 pm
WFRV.com

U.S. Ag Secretary Mike Johanns renewed his call for sweeping changes to the next farm bill, saying “the rural economy is really so much broader than farming and ranching.”

Johanns, addressing a USDA Rural Development conference in Washington D.C., noted that 60 million Americans live in rural America, and that 58 million of them don’t farm or ranch. And Johanns also said roughly 90 percent of all so-called farm income actually comes from off-farm sources.

FULL STORY

New Strain of Mad Cow Disease Baffles Researchers

New Strain of Mad Cow Disease Baffles Researchers

Published Date: 06-12-2006 12:54 PM CT
KEYC-TV

In health watch this Midday: mad cow disease is shrouded in a new mystery today. Researchers have announced that two past cases of mad cow in Texas and Alabama possibly came from a mysterious strain that seems to “Spontaneously appear” in cattle.

FULL STORY

Cattle rustlers making a fast buck on back roads of rural America

Cattle rustlers making a fast buck on back roads of rural America

AP – 6/12/2006 1:25 PM
KOTV, Tulsa, OK

PERRY, Okla. (AP) _ The truck raced like a phantom down the lonesome dirt road, poking its headlights into the pre-dawn darkness and spewing blinding clouds of dust. The deputy, who was watching nearby, smelled trouble.

Todd Culp saw the mysterious truck barrel through a stop sign at 80 mph and wondered where it was rushing to at 5 a.m. The off-duty deputy gunned the engine of his unmarked green pickup in pursuit.

Culp soon noticed the truck matched the description of one involved in a recent theft _ and it was hauling an animal trailer. Fifteen miles later, the driver stopped on the ramp of the Cimarron Turnpike. He jumped out. The deputy was right behind him.

FULL STORY

U.S. wants all plants approved for S.Korea beef

U.S. wants all plants approved for S.Korea beef

Ktic.com

WASHINGTON, June 12 (Reuters) – U.S. beef will not go to South Korea until Seoul approves all 38 American plants that want to export beef, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said on Monday, adding there were “minor” issues at “a handful of plants.” The disagreement over plants has delayed the re-opening of sales to South Korea, once the No. 3 market for U.S. beef, possibly until July. Both nations say they are standing on principle. For the United States, the issue is acceptance of its meat safety safeguards in the era of mad cow disease.

FULL STORY

Can we grow more rural veterinarians?

Can we grow more rural veterinarians?

Ideas to reverse the decline of rural veterinary care.

By Alan Newport
Missouri Farmers Association

This spring when Dr. Chuck Dake started looking for another veterinarian to work in his rural clinic, he knew it would be a challenge.

Dake has shared the practice with his father in their clinic near Mount Vernon, Mo., since he graduated from vet school. However his father recently won a seat in the Missouri House of Representatives. The problem Dake now faces in replacing his father is that it’s a rare young veterinarian these days who wants to treat farm animals.

Instead, new-crop vets usually prefer nights and weekends off and labor in a warm dry office instead of cold, muddy corrals or sweltering hot barns. Most also prefer not to be kicked and stomped by their patients. Hence, most new veterinarians—the kind Dake needs to hire—aren’t interested in working with him.

FULL STORY

U.S. ethanol bubble to burst

U.S. ethanol bubble to burst

The U.S. ethanol bubble is at risk of bursting in the short term, but Alternative Energy News Source says there are still long-term opportunities for ethanol investors, according to a Dow Jones article posted on cattlenetwork.com.

A report written by Russell Hasan said the U.S. corn ethanol industry would likely “face strong pressure from corn supply concerns, sugarcane ethanol imports from Brazil and new cellulosic ethanol technology in five to 10 years.”

But the report said this could be an exception for small cooperatives, the cattlenetwork.com article continued. Adding in the risk of a possible fall in oil prices and removal of government incentives, the ethanol bubble is expected to burst by the end of the decade. Still the report holds the U.S. corn ethanol industry may be profitable for the next five years.

— compiled by Meghan Richey, assistant editor, Angus Productions Inc.

Making quality hay crop silage

Making quality hay crop silage

MARK MECHLING
Zanesville Times Recorder (Ohio)

Harvesting hay crop silage is increasingly becoming popular among farmers. Bill Weiss, OSU Extension dairy nutritionist, discusses some important points in making quality hay crop silage.

In Ohio, the first cutting of alfalfa and cool season grasses usually makes up about 45 percent of the total annual yield. Therefore, the quality of first cutting will affect your dairy cows for a substantial period of time. Milk production and income over feed costs are almost always better when good forages are fed.

FULL STORY