The calf run

[cowman]

I wonder just how heavey the calf run will be this year?
Seems to me a whole lot of little guys have bailed somewhere along the line and a lot of the ones left have taken to at least backgrounding their calves so as to capture a bit more money? I get around central Alberta a fair bit and I see a lot of places where the owner had some cows, the pastures haven't been grazed at all? My hay buyer tells me a lot of his smaller customers are gone.
I suspect with all the cheap feed around the cow/calf man might just be expecting a decent price or he may just feed them himself? The backgrounder made a killing last year and in all likelyhood has a lot of silage put up. He either buys or he pays the taxman in a big way?
I would suggest you hold your calves off the market as long as possible. When the tax money comes to town it could be very HOT!

[kato]

Around here it seems the calves are hitting the market fast and furious. A lot of guys in this area seem to be more willing to take the money and run. Maybe it's because Manitoba has suffered more than Alberta has, but there are a lot of people here who don't have a lot of faith in the future. The prices are good right now, and who knows what they'll be later?

Another factor could be the fact that there were a huge number of unseeded acres this year, and the crops that were grown weren't all that great. There are bills to be paid, and no crop money to pay them with. Hay seems to be the only thing in a surplus, and there aren't any buyers for that.

[cowman]

Spent some time at the sale in Innisfail yesterday. They had about 3,000 head, probably one third yearlings.
The calf sale was a presort and generally prices were good. Good calves...lots of big calves! I think the char crosses topped the sale overall with the blacks also doing well. There were some really good Sim calves and they hung right in there on price. Generally 600 lbs were around $1.30 and 750 lb were in that $1.20 range. Lighter calves didn't do much better per pound than the 600 lb calves and there was a definite preference for the bigger calves.
They sold a few old cows as breds and they might have made 25 cents a pound.
It was fairly obvious that the late harvest is definitely delaying the farmer/feeder from wading in? An order buyer for US interests took a lot of the bigger calves.

[PureCountry]

The neighbours sold theirs about 2 weeks ago on the satellite sale through VJV in Ponoka. They topped the sale with 720lbers @ $1.32. That was 70 head, then they got $1.15 for their heifers @ 650lbs on 70 head. They celebrated for a couple days, then it rained some more, and more, and more, then froze.

Ah the bliss of having both worlds.

I heard of one other neighbour through the g****vine who took a B-train of wheat in and found out it had all sprouted. I'd think it'd be a little tough to go home and get back on the combine to do the rest of the field after that. Poor bugger.

[madcow]

I was at the feeder sale in Truro N.S.Saturday, just observing.I was quite depressed as were the prices!.There were a few singles and a few small groups that were in the decent range. A pair of charolais steers weighing 640 lb9 (320 each) brought $1.17 and a pen of light semmintals was in that range, As the sale went on the prices seemed to drift downwards, too many calves and too weak a market .A lot of calves 600lb & up were in the 70s & 80s, lighter stuff , 5 & under was in the 90s to $1.05.I didn't stay to the end but no one called to say it improved. Fat steers were $1.51 at the PEI plant last week,yippee. I heard through the g**** vine at the sale that the Quebecers are guaranteed a base price of $1.86 for fats, anyone know if that's correct?Last months feeder sale averaged $1.03 with some Quebec buyers present,no Quebec buyers Saturday
Many producers here are worse off than ever this year ,prices haven't improved much,input costs are up and we don't have any useful aid programs on the horizon. CAIS hasn't been worth a tinkers dam here either.

[cowman]

So tell me madcow, how does anybody stay in business when they are getting such dismal prices? Those 320 lb. steers at $1.17 comes to $374.40! Can anybody afford to keep a cow with that kind of revenue? Even your 600 lb. steers at 80 cents only comes to $480!
We never got those kind of poor prices out here!
I don't think the $1.51 rail price is out of line, but someone is sure screwing you on your feeders? Maybe time to consider feeding them yourself? At $1.51 rail a 1200 steer should yield 720 lb. X $1.51 equals $1087 or$607 over the price of yor 600 lb. feeder steer! Cost of gain should be in that 40 cent a pound range or $240? Should give you a profit of $360!
My advice would be feed them yourself. Our feedlots would just love to be able to screw us like you are getting screwed!

[cattleman2]

cowman: Do you want to feed a couple hundred calves at 40 cents? Don't think many people can do it for that. I have heard 53 to 60 this year depending on the quality of the cattle.

[PureCountry]

I've never heard of anyone charging less than 55 cents per pound of gain.

[BFW]

If Cowman had to feed two hundred calves he'd be so busy chopping wood to keep the water bowls from freezing he wouldn't have time to enlighten us here on Agriville! Cowman, I used to think your comments carried a certain amount of wisdom with them, but really you're just a blowhard.

[cowman]

Well the last issue of the Cattleman lists cost of gain for feed at 34 cents. Now overall they list total cost of gain at 55.76 cents so if madcow feels the need to pay him/herself $15/hr. to feed them then I guess you would need to add that? But whatever, it all goes into the same wallet!
If you are feeding cows anyway it doesn't cost much more to run the tractor a couple of extra minutes?
I don't think madcow was talking about 200 calves?
I always feed my heifers out and it sure doesn't take a lot of time to feed and bed 60 heifers. I would definitely say 40 cents per lb. of gain is right in the ballpark...of course I'm not paying someone else to make money on my cattle.

[madcow]

cowman ,I think your only talking about feed costs of about $120 per tonne max if the steer is a good converter,
marketing ,labour, cost of money and other overhead is not considered. I think the word 'profit' is wrongly used,return over feed costs is more accurate .Barley here runs between $115 and $155 /tn depending on time of year.If you really think about it,the word 'profit' doesn't fit in paragraphs containing any reference to agriculture anymore ! sad ........all the news,Teachers on strike,Packing plant workers ,,on strike CAW settles ccontract dispute,,,all want and expect better wages and benefits,better working conditions. Does anyone ever consider the farmer anymore.

[cowman]

Actually madcow very few people do! They really don't care if you are sinking or treading water, they just want cheap food!
Consider this: You raise the raw product and everyone else makes more money on it than you do? Why? Because you are not "connected" and because you will continue to do it no matter what!
In most businesses if they have a years losses they walk away period! They put their resources somewhere else that is more profitable!
Now farmers don't do that for a variety of reasons? A good portion of that reason is taxes. Sell it all and you get to pay the taxman a good portion of that? What would happen if the government had a tax holiday on the sale of farmland? Or even brought the capital gains exemption in line with inflation for that matter?

[madcow]

true cowman,true

[sagewood]

Well after reading all your words of wisdom this morning, makes me want to drown myself in the shower...but I agree any other business person would just pack it in and leave the business to go to something more lucrative. I hear so much about the 'quality of life' issue--oh please. I know people working at Walmart who have better benefits, easier working conditions and certainly a better quality of life. The myth of the loving family riding the range, but being just salt of the earth people seems to prevail in the urbanites mind. At Strathmore on Thurs. the prices for calves were certainly better than in the past couple of years--my good steers (600 - 700#) brought from $129 to $133 range and the heifers brought from $117 to $128, so I was pleased. These were good white and buckskin calves with lots of hair and good structure, so the buyers went after them. I had also birth date verified them with the CCIA folks. I don't know if that made any difference, as I saw some of the better calves later in the sale bring close to these good prices also.

While there talked to a neighbor who is subdividing some land near Calgary and no doubt when it goes through the the cash does roll in, he will pocket over a million in Cdn cash. Good for him I say--given the opportunity I do not know anyone else in the same situation who would not jump at the chance. The old lament about the loss of good farm land rings pretty hollow when you cannot pay your bills from the lack of income from it and some urbanite wants to purchase a bit of grass to live and play on. A lot of young and not so young ag. people in the Calgary area are selling with smiles on their face and moving further afield to continue their ag. lifestyle. The difference after selling out for them is that they have serious cash in their jeans even after buying up a bigger chunk of land on which to run cattle. So the beat goes on--some person who can't make it out there anymore, gets bought out and retires and the moneyed folks carry on with their life choice.

I know we can't all be as lucky as to get bought out for 3 or 4 million per quarter, but we can dream. When this bubble bursts in Alberta, all of our asset sheets will look poorer if the value of our land goes down...

[sagewood]

until then our land base is worth more today than it was pre BSE. The booming economy and the opportunity to earn an excellent living is certainly luring many young people away from the farm and who can blame them.
Farming is a state of mind I think, some people love to farm and will continue as long as they can remain viable but it certainly is not without many sacrifices. But on the other hand, working in any of the other AB. industries is not without sacrifice either.