grass cattle

[grassfarmer]

f_s, one source of that information was Cam Ostercamps original paper behind the veil of Science. He quotes " ....Western Canada feedlots from 1979 - 2002 showing a net loss over that period of $4.85 on a twenty year average." His source was listed as Can Fax Trends.

[cswilson]

Must be alot of dummies in the feeding business then which I find hard to believe-you can take a pencil and make any scenario fail or thrive. About half the people sharpen it and try and find away to keep going and the other half break the pint off -convince themselves they should quit then drive to coffee row to tell their neighbors the good news.

[grassfarmer]

I wouldn't imply that there are a lot of dummies in the feeding sector - an average over 20 years is made up of many severe peaks and troughs so some guys will have done very well at it at times. Are we talking about a historical picture here though? it appears to have changed dramatically since 2002. How many of the big lots are now custom feeding cattle directly for the packers? I assume they get a small but secure margin by doing this and avoid market risk. How many of the other lots are now feeding everything on a custom basis? Again the market risk can be passed on to the owner of the cattle whether it be a primary producer or the dentist in town. It looks to me like this lasting damage of the BSE crisis will make it harder for independant feedlots, backgrounders and cow/calf producers to secure a fair return from the marketplace.

[smcgrath76]

FS - I believe that was from a Canfax report. I have it around here somewhere and will have to dig it out.
Feedlots and $ - nowadays a lot of feeder cattle are not owned by the same people that own the feedlot. Also, I think part of the trend relates back to FS comment on tax. Sometimes a $ lost can really be $2 earned.
The other issue is that a lot of feedlots (particularly smaller ones) have disappeared over the time frame of the study. Were they profitable? I guess only those running the lots will ever know.
Another factor is that feedlots are operating in a nearly perfectly compeitive industry (as far as competing against other feedlots is concerned - processors are a slightly different story). This produces slim margins by definition.

[cowman]

Before BSE a lot of farmer/feeders were caught in the old tax game... big losses let a lot of them get out! You know...the guy who bought 200-500 head every year so he didn't get screwed on income taxes?
Now without a doubt there are still some there but a lot of them walked? Sure doesn't help the fall calf market though? Who buys your calves now?
Heres how it worked: First year in. You borrowed the money from the feeders association. You bought $200K worth of calves. You wrote it off against that big Canola check and voila...you never paid no taxes! In Jan/Feb you sold those calves(at a loss or profit, doesn't matter)and paid off the loan. Next November, you start to get antsy because you have a BIG tax bill coming...so you pile in again to avoid paying the tax?
On and on it goes, year after year, with no end in site?
Then along comes BSE and you lose so much you can get off the treadmill! Goodbye to a lot of guys who made this fall calf thing work! A sad day for the cow/calf guy?

[kato]

That's exactly what my brother in law did. Now he spends his winters in Texas or Arizona.

It wasn't too many years ago that in our immediate neighbourhood (within 10 miles), you could put your hands on anywhere from one to two thousand backgrounded calves every spring. This was between 8 producers.

We are the only ones left. The rest are either broke or retired. All their land has been bought by two or three grain farmers.

[cswilson]

I just never could afford not to finish my calves-I've only sold a few topp drafts over the years they've never dollared out like the ones we've fed. Never raised fancy cattle but they seem to feed well.

[cowman]

Sometimes I've made money...and sometimes I've probably lost? Depends how you figure it?
In the last several years I've got this attitude of "Hey I'm not going to get screwed!" and actually have usually done fairly well by backgrounding/grassing!I like to think I don't work for nothing!
I especially never did like getting screwed on heifers! Now I know steers gain a lot better than heifers but I do believe by feeding heifers tough and throwing them out on grass I can make a good dollar? It is amazing how the old price difference shrinks between heifers and steers when they hit that 900 lb. mark?...and I believe I can get them there fairly cheap?
You know I walk into Safeway and I sure don't see any "heifer beef" or "steer beef" on the package?
I realize if I'm pounding the grain to cattle the steer will do a lot better than the heifer...but it sure as hell doesn't warrant no 15 cent discount in the fall...at least not if you are feeding them to go on grass!
I always said it sure is amazing how heifers and steers can shrink up that difference by the next fall? And also it sure is amazing how that hereford steer nobody wanted as a calf is just as worth as much as the char/cross at one year of age!

[PureCountry]

Just read through this "War & Peace" novel you boys put together, and must say it's pretty good reading. All I can say for us, is that we keep our eyes, ears, and MINDS open, through the whole process of developing our calves, so that if a chance for more profit rears it's head, we can jump on it. If a buyer makes an offer when they're 6 months old and still on Momma, then they might get sold. If that offer comes in March when they're on bale-grazing with Momma, they may get sold then. It's all aobut profit.