If a Cowboy had a Genie by Daniel Mushrush
In 2013, a cowboy stumbled across a Genie’s lamp. He got off his horse, rubbed it, and out popped the Genie. “You get three wishes, 1 per year for three years!” the Genie told the cowboy. Without hesitation the cowboy said, “I want a ranch full of green grass with 10,000 pairs!” And just like that it happened. A year came and went, and in 2014 the Genie reappeared. The cowboy admitted that he was completely happy with his new ranch but it was expensive to keep a place like that running so he decided that, “For my second wish, I want a $250 CWT calf market!” And it happened! A year of high prices passed. Soon it was the fall of 2015, and the Genie returned to a down trodden cowboy who looked like a combination of shell-shocked and angry. Before the Genie could speak, the cowboy said, “I wish for the calf market to be $250 CWT!” The Genie was confused by this and asked him, “But what about last year, why the same wish?” The cowboy only looked at his boots and said, “Last year, I was holding out for $260 CWT and ended up putting all my calves on feed!” The last 24 months have been an interesting time to be in cattle industry. Market gurus generally have fallen into two groups; those who say it will go up while others say it will go down. Exchange rates, home starts in China, rainfall in South America…it is easy to see that without a Genie none of us are going to have a clue where the market is headed. That leaves us trying to manage some of the few things we can – the costs of our individual ranches. Alan Newport of Drovers wrote one of the best articles I have seen in a livestock publication in December of 2015 titled, Time to change directions. In it are the familiar concepts that help lower a ranch’s operating costs: focus on fertility, avoid high milk EPD’s, moderate cows are more efficient, etc. The time he took to compile real world numbers provided some eye openers. Here are some highlights: • Across a three state area for every hundred-pound increase in mature cow weight, weaning weights only increased 4 to 6 pounds. This resulted in a loss of $35 per unit for ranchers. • In Wyoming, a study showed that 1,300 to 1,400 pound cows took 9.5 pounds of forage to produce 1 pound of calf, while 1,000 to 1,100 pound cows took only 7.6 pounds of forage to produce the same pound of calf allowing for more animal units per acre. • Weaning weights haven’t changed in 20 years despite modern selection pressure (commercial cow environments dictate your weaning weights more than the calf ’s genetics). To read the full article, go to: www.cattlenetwork.com/news/newport-time-change-directions If you have followed our program, you know that we have followed this train of thought for quite some time. By raising moderate, fertile genetics that can flourish in tough environments, we empower our customers to become low-cost in any environment. By keeping our contemporary groups large and unbroken until every data point is taken, we have some of the most reliable EPD’s in the breed. Regardless of what the Genie decides to do with the market, our goal is to put our customers in the position to succeed. We are proud of our 2016 sale offering and would be happy show them off or answer any questions you may have.