Planning for winter feeding becomes complicated in 2013

Planning for winter feeding becomes complicated in 2013

Clay Wright

The Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation

Typically, planning a winter feeding program has been fairly straightforward: estimate the number of cattle to be wintered, the amount of standing forage that will be available and how much hay is needed to get to spring grass. Then a least-cost supplement (if needed) to fill in nutritional gaps was easily identified. It’s still timely in August to start the planning process, but it may be a little more complicated in 2013 than usual.

Full Story

Saving by Grazing

Saving by Grazing

Becky Mills

Progressive Farmer

Mitch Baltz has four-year-old hay on hand, and it doesn’t bother him one bit. The Powhatan, Ark., producer believes the first priority in feeding cattle is letting them get all the nutrition they can from pastures.

Full Story

Creep Feeding Beef Calves

Creep Feeding Beef Calves

Julie Walker

iGrow

Creep feeding is a way to provide nursing calves with supplemental nutrients with the use of a gate that restricts the access of cows to the feeding area. The type of creep feeds available vary from grain-based feeds that primarily supplement energy, to limit-fed high-protein feeds, to “green creeps,” which are high-quality pastures grown for the sole purpose of grazing by nursing calves.

Full Story

Cattle producers young and old should plan accordingly for drought

Cattle producers young and old should plan accordingly for drought

Texas A&M

Texas beef cattle producers should plan for future periods of dry conditions as drought patterns exhibited in the 1950s continue to prevail in current models, according to an expert.

Full Story

Culture of Beef is the answer to ‘Cultured Beef’

Culture of Beef is the answer to ‘Cultured Beef’

Capital Journal

An Associated Press story from London that we carried in our Aug. 6 issue informs us that scientists there are to the point of taste-testing hamburger grown in a laboratory from cattle stem cells. It sounds like something of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, but it’s not fiction, it’s here already. Lab-grown beef apparently gets high marks for texture, not so much for taste.

Full Story

Feedstuff Availability Allowing Producers To Keep More Heifers

Feedstuff Availability Allowing Producers To Keep More Heifers

Beef Producer

With pastures slowly starting to look better and feed prices on the way down, heifer retention is in the beginning stages, a Purdue University economist said Tuesday.

Though beef cattle numbers have been falling since 2007 due to drought conditions that drove feed prices higher and pasture quality lower, favorable weather is appearing on the horizon, returning better prospects for grain crops.

Full Story

Cows are ‘customers’ of Vt. vodka company

Cows are ‘customers’ of Vt. vodka company

WPTZ

When Chuck Thorburn, the owner of Circle T Ranch in Hartland, Vt., calls his cows, they come running. Their hustle may be because they know they’re about to get a real treat. "Stillage is like candy to them," Thorburn said.

Full Story

Why Hide the Brutalization of Farm Animals?

Why Hide the Brutalization of Farm Animals?

James Greiff

Bloomberg.com

Editor’s note: Stories of this ilk are included in the blog to inform those in our industry how agriculture is being presented to and perceived by the public.

It’s hard to think of an odder pair of political bedfellows than Mary Matalin, the Republican strategist and admitted red-meat eater, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which has done things such as running ads of famous people in the buff to discourage consumers from wearing articles of clothing made from animal products.

Full Story

Pinkeye leaving mark on cows

Pinkeye leaving mark on cows

Clint Thompson

University of Georgia

There may not be an “epidemic” of pinkeye in area cattle but the bacterial disease still presents a major concern for cattlemen. It’s an issue that consumed Jacob Segers during his first month on the job as University of Georgia Cooperative Extension’s new beef battle specialist in Tifton.

Full Story