Saline County Round Up
September 2017
Upcoming Events
September 5-9: Saline County Fair
September 6, Weds.: SCF Cattle Judging – 6pm
September 9, Sat.: SCF Premium Sale – 9:30am, starting with Pullets. There will be plenty of good Hyline Brown egg layers to be auctioned. Come out and support the youth projects! Anyone can add on any amount of money to their projects.
September 14, Thurs.: Saline County Cattlemen Meeting – 6:30pm at the Saline Co. Fairgrounds.
Round Up
For the past year I have been trying to emphasize adding value to your cattle. We have talked about many ways to do this, and most of our producers are attempting to do this in one way or another. There is a market for anything and everything – at a certain price! In the cattle business, we have to take the best offer, whatever it is.
Some of the ways that come to mind to add value are:
Weaning Calves and getting them on feed.
Selling Bred Heifers that are highly desired.
Selling Matched Groups of Calves.
Selling Calves that your Buyers are wanting, not calves that they are willing to buy, but Calves That They Really Want.
A Pre-Vac Program plus getting them weaned & on feed.
Selling Custom Beef straight to the consumer – the latest Marketing
Strategy I have seen is the “One Cow Burger” – meat not mixed with other animals.
Selling Grass Fed Beef, Natural Beef, Organic Beef can add value If you can sell it, however, there are a lot of people out there wanting to eat “Politically Correct” meat.
Selling In Pot Loads to capture premium for volume at preferred Markets.
I think the most obvious way to add value is to Add Weight To Your Calves.
We need to use creep feed when it is cheap enough, because that will add weight, BUT the most effective way to add weight is by using a Bull that will add weight and conformation to his calves.
By using EPD’s (Expected Progeny Differences) we can select a Bull to add Weaning weight and Yearling weight without sacrificing efficiency in other traits. Spending an extra $1000 - $1500 on a Bull that will add weight, and improve your Females as well, is a no brainer. The Bull is responsible for 65-85% of your herd, depending upon how many Heifers you keep out of him.
The next way to add value is to use Genetics to improve Carcass Characteristics to enable the producer to sell on the GRID, and to take advantage of the carcass characteristics he has bred into his cattle. Carcass Characteristics are Highly Heritable and improvement can be made much more quickly that with reproductive traits.
There is always a price differential between Choice and Select carcasses. Cattle that consistently grade CHOICE – especially Medium to High Choice – will command a Premium. I know most of our producers cannot put together a Pot Load of Calves that have the Genetics to command a premium, and we sometimes feel like it is futile to try to take advantage of, but Buyers will remember your calves, if you can put together groups of 10 head of outstanding calves each year!
Cattle Producers have to be Aggressive in their Marketing if they want to take advantage of their Genetics!
*When will you start feeding hay?
*Do you know where your best hay is stored?
*Do you have your herd separated by their nutritional needs?
*Can you get to your best hay in order to give your young (weaned) animals better nutrition, and in order to get those heifers you are keeping bred on the first exposure?
Yes, we have a lot of hay this year, but there is only one way to know if it is worth feeding – have it tested! Poor quality hay is the most expensive hay you can feed, even if it’s free. Why? Because, your cow cannot eat enough of it to meet her nutritional needs.
If you are buying hay, a $22 test could save you a lot of money.
Ronald A. Matlock
County Extension Agent – Staff Chair