Land use for rearing beef.

[Cattleman]

I always find it interesting when producers say their pasture does not yield anything near their annual crops. Yet they will spend $75/acre on their crop and nothing on their pasture. WHat do they expect. There is huge potential grassfarmer.

[Cattleman]

cowman does the dairy farmer you refer to keep cows in a confined area like a corral year round including calving ? I would wonder how large an area he confines them in. Confining cow/calf pairs year round would seem risky as far as disease in the calves is concerned.
Watching the backends of the cows head out to pasture with the calves is one of the nicest sights of the year to me !!! Mind you, I don't have to haul cows to pasture so having them at home during the summer makes checking them a lot easier.

[kpb]

grassfarmer, my home ranch is east of Carstairs and the land values here are out of sight. The silage costs I quoted were seeding, fertilizer and cutting and into the pit. I do none of this myself--I realized years ago that it doesn't pay to have all that machinery hanging around. Over the years it's worked out to about $20.50 per ton of wet silage in the pit and that included everything. But not feeding costs or land costs.
The reason that I find this thread really interesting is that it is impossible to expand down here due to land costs. About 12 years ago I bought a ranch up north near Lac La Biche and have expanded it steadily since then. A quarter costs about $60,000 there and you can graze as many AUM as down here. So that's good but what is bad is that a liner load of pairs in the spring costs about $1,000 from here to there and the same in the fall which works out to about $50 round trip per pair. And we've got a fellow working for us up there to ride and check the cows and there's fence repairs, etc.
With land costs so darn high in the corridor it's hard to expand down here. Yet, at the same time, it's the increase in land values where we make a lot of our money.
Really interested in all the comments, thx to everbody who takes the time to write.


kpb

[grassfarmer]

kpb, Tell me about crazy land prices. I moved here partly because it was impossible to expand in Scotland - our poorer quality land there sold for @$2400 acre which is more than twice what I paid at Rimbey. Farmland near me brought $200k for a quarter last summer. Land prices the world over are increasing due to the "back to the country" move by urbanites as well as their expanding concrete jungle. As you say land value appreciation can provide a good investment - but only if you are selling or trading - it doesn't put food on the table apart from that. At the same time it is a physical asset unlike paper trading on the stock market which produces better returns but how secure is that?
When I see how little agricultural land there is in the world it drives me to manage mine intensively yet sustainably - as my Dad used to say "they aren't making land any more"

[cowman]

Emerald: These cows are in a fairly good sized lot(I'd guess maybe 20 acres) and they keep it fairly clean. I don't think dairy farmers are to adverse to getting out the old syringe and treating anything that might look sick? This farmer also feeds around 1000 head year round so he has the feed wagon out everyday anyway.
grassfarmer: I wasn't trying to knock grass, just trying to show that there are other options. The locals tell me they got around 11 tons/acre barley silage this year. Not sure how they price that this year, but I think a good rule of thumb is if barley is worth $3/bu. then silage should be $30 ton? Or if barley is $2/bu. then silage should be $20/ton? So maybe $220/acre this year? I doubt many barley crops did that, but I guess a person would have to add in the value of the straw?
Not real sure how that works as I'm not a "silage person"! I hear guys talking about 16 tons of corn silage/acre but I don't know how much corn silage is worth. I also suspect some of these annual/perrenial rye grasses might have some impressive tonnage?
Around here most people doing silage rely on a custom operator to do the job. Obviously the custom operator must be able to do it cheaper? Quite often there is some fairly decent regrowth on silaged land(oats/wild oats) and an opportunity to regraze the land in the fall.
I often wonder if it is a good thing to leave grass down for too long? Seems the darned June grass has a habit of taking over, in the long haul? Also seems if you fertilize too much you tend to lose the clover? I also sometimes wonder if we get enough rain here to really grow good grass? Hayland/pasture always seems to be "dry land" while cropland seems to have more subsoil moisture? It seems in a dry year hay does poorly while wheat or barley can flourish?
Managing pastures is always quite a balancing act, in my opinion! You have to be ready to get those darned cattle off it when it is dry and put more on when it is wet. I would think intense pasture would suit a yearling operation better than a cow/calf operation, in that you could move animals off and on easier? Buy more when the grass does well, sell some when it is dry...not so easy to do with cow/calf?
When I said 2.5 acres/AUM I was guessing an average. On some of the tame fertilized pastures it would be much better. In my area we have a lot of land that is just not suited to farming(hills and pot holes)and a cow/calf can utilize this waste land and get some sort of return. In reality you need good land to pay the expenses of grain/hay farming? Not a lot of sense running expensive equipment over land not capable of growing a decent profitable crop?

[cswilson]

Most of the long time profitable ranches up here run a cow-grass yearling operation-which is really the most flexible-you have the cattle numbers to handle the phenomanal may/june growth we get plus the flexibility to move yearlings if it gets dry. THE BIG PLUS IS YOU DON'T CALVE IN THE WINTER LOL.I'll tell you how ranchy this neck of the woods is-there are guys that seed quackgrass on purpose. It really is a great pasture grass if you know how to manage it.

[kpb]

cs wilson, I agree completely with you--I also think running a cow-calf and yearling operation is the best because you can adjust the yearling numbers easily to fit grass conditions and feed available. That's what we try to do.
cowman, where I live (Carstairs) I generally budget for 7 tons per acre of silage (barley and tritacale with a little oats)and that is conservative. I think over the past 12 or so years we've likely averaged 8. Last year we had 10 due to the moisture. We have slight re-growth and can graze in the fall for a little while. I think you would get a lot more from corn but your inputs would be a lot higher and the risk is higher.
Our cost for putting in the pit has not changed a whole lot. We end up around $20.50 per ton in the pit (custom seeded and cut). ten years ago it was about $17 per ton. Our custom guy charges us strictly on time, trucks and acreage and not on the prevailing barley price. However if you go to buy silage from someone I think the right formula is 7 to 8 times the price of barley.


kpb

[cowman]

In the December Cattleman magazine they have barley silage listed at 27.88/ton and corn silage(Ont.) listed at $14.63/ton! Incidently they have barley listed at $2.23/bu and grain corn $2.54/bu. Now I would say that was mighty optomistic on the barley price?
But even if silage should be priced at 10 times the price of barley then the price should only be $22.30/ton? As I've said I don't know anything about silage, but these numbers would indicate you should be able to buy silage pretty cheap? Of course trucking would soon eat up any profit made by buying it cheap?
I often wonder how many people who buy their feed really factor in the trucking, when they consider the advantages of not growing their own feed. Not bad when you can just haul it yourself...not so good when it has to come forty miles!
Also, one other thing? If silage is $27.88/ton at 60 percent moisture and the same grain crop put up as greenfeed is $50/ton, which makes more sense from a cost factor? Say the greenfeed is around 12% moisture: That would mean you are getting 1760 lb. of dry feed? Silage(at 60%) would work out to 800 lb. of dry matter? $50 devided by 1760 gives you a dry matter cost of 2.8 cents a lb? Silage at $27.88 would give you a dry matter cost of around 3.5 cents? Seems to me you are paying quite a bit for the added water...or am I missing something?

[kpb]

Cowman, The biggest advantage to me of using silage is that I know I'm always going to get a crop. I've never not had a silage crop whereas I've had a few greenfeed crops turn into straw after a couple of rains. Also silage is the best for mixing in barley, mineral and protein supplement when feeding calves so that everyone gets the same ration. Finally, I'm set up with bunks for silage.
Generally I would say for the above reasons that silage is a better crop for feeding calves but hay is better for feeding cows (cheaper).
Lastly I know that the magazines quote silage at 10 times barley price but whenever I've bought it in the past it was 7 or 8 times (admittedly a few years ago). Silage generally only works, in my opinion, if the crop is close to home. Otherwise the transportation costs kill you and it's real heavy with all that water in it.


kpb

[kpb]

Anyone considering feeding their cattle in a small area year round vs sending them out to pasture should check whether or not the require an approval under the Agricultural Operations Practices Act. Section 1(b.6) of the legislation states that a' confined feeding operation means fenced or enclosed land or buildings where livestock are confined for the purpose of growing, sustaining, finishing or breeding by means other than grazing".


Glad I am far enough away so as not to be able to hear you YELL cowman !!! This legislation came info force on June 1/04 as an amendment to the AOPA Legislation which came into force January 1/02.