News Update
December 30, 2014
Premium Program Sets Up Stability
for Years to Come
It was a good year at the Hoot Owl Ranch.
Lots of cattlemen would share that assessment this year, but manager Kenny Stauffer and his wife Misty are confident there will be many more like it to come, regardless of the traditional cattle market. Their 2014 calves were the first commercially traded under the new Top Dollar Angus program.
Those Hoot Owl steers earned $67 per head above average for weight and type that day on Superior Livestock Auction’s video sale.
“This is going to be a year where most people would look at this story and say, ‘Why? Why put all that effort into my steers when I could still make this much money on them?’ But, it’s for the years when the market comes down — which it will — and we’ll still be able to be above average,” Kenny said. “That’s when it’s really needed, and if you’re not already working on it now, you just missed out when you needed it most.”
Stauffer has spent the last decade meticulously tracking growth and maternal data on his commercial and registered-Angus herd that grazes the panhandle’s Wildcat Hills, near Harrisburg, Neb. Every calf on the place sees a scale at birth, weaning and sale day, tracking daily gain, weaning weight and mom’s percent of calf weaned. That’s matched with expected progeny differences (EPDs) for three critical traits on the sire side: growth, carcass and maternal.
“From the day that female is born until she leaves the herd, we’re tracking her,” he said.
With that, the Stauffers have amassed individual 10-year performance numbers on every one of more than 700 cows. That data came in handy when they went to qualify for Top Dollar Angus. They had to prove two generations of sires and dams with an average of at least $80 in the Angus beef value index ($B), the dynamic market index that reports a combined value for feedlot and carcass merit.
When Kenny learned about the third-party genetic certification program from its founder, Tom Brink, he had only to call up a report from those records.
“We knew with that data, he would either want to buy our cattle or he would help us figure out what we could do better,” Misty said. “So there was a positive outcome for us either way.”
The Stauffers got both. Not only did they discover a new buyer willing to pay — literally — top dollar, they found a new benchmark for their herd’s data. A $B value of $80 or more puts animals in the top 25% of the Angus breed for gain and grade, and the Hoot Owl herd showed an $86 average across the board.
For more information, please view the full release here.
NFU Opposes Importation of Meat from Areas
with Foot and Mouth Disease;
National Farmers Union (NFU) President Roger Johnson urged the United States not to resume importation of meat from Northern Argentina and Uruguay because of ongoing concerns with foot and mouth disease (FMD), a highly contagious disease that could devastate family farmers and ranchers in the United States.
“Livestock health is critical to production agriculture and our nation’s ability to provide a safe food supply,” said Johnson in comments submitted Dec. 29 to the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). “Achieving the necessary means to ensure livestock health is a priority for NFU.”
Johnson noted that NFU supports banning livestock, animal protein products and meat imports that would jeopardize United States efforts to eradicate livestock diseases, including FMD, and that allowing imports of beef from Northern Argentina could potentially conflict with these efforts.
“APHIS acknowledges that Northern Argentina is not considered to be free of FMD,” said Johnson. “In May of 2000, the World Organization for Animal Health designated Argentina as FMD-free without vaccination. Just two months later, FMD outbreaks reappeared, culminating in the epidemic outbreak in 2001. Since then, Argentina has made multiple unsuccessful attempts to eradicate and control FMD, and concealed the outbreaks from the international community for months.”
Johnson pointed out that in addition to health safety risks, serious economic repercussions could result from an outbreak of FMD in the United States.
“The economic impacts of an FMD outbreak in the U.S. would be tremendous,” noted Johnson. “FMD is highly contagious and has the potential to spread very quickly. Given the rapidity with which FMD spreads, an outbreak would create devastating economic consequences for farmers and ranchers. Recent research has estimated outbreaks in FMD-free countries and zones cause losses of greater than $1.5 billion per year.”
For more information, please view the full release here.
Effective Management of Farm Employees Program Helps Producers Improve Farm Operations
Employees enable farm owners to do much more than they could ever achieve on their own and add skills and perspectives that owners don’t possess. Employees on the farm can either drive the operation forward or hold it back. The difference is often in the way that farm owners and managers work with their employees. To help farm owners and managers develop their skills and perspective for better management of employees, the Michigan State University (MSU) Extension dairy team is hosting a two-day Effective Management of Farm Employees program at two separate locations in January.
The events will take place Jan. 27-28, 2015, at the Doubletree Hotel, Bay City, Mich., and Jan. 29-30 at the Hilton Hotel, Grand Rapids Airport. This interactive meeting with specialists from the agriculture industry and MSU is designed to provide farm owners and managers a solid basis for building their business with employees.
The meetings begin with dinner at 5:30 p.m. on the first day in order to provide an early opportunity to develop a peer network of like-minded people and to begin to share the issues you face and better understand how others handle them. The first session, “Attracting Good Applicants in Today’s Job Environment” takes place after dinner.
On day two, there are three sessions starting with “Building Teamwork on the Farm” and then “Capitalizing on Your Employee’s Desire to Learn.” After lunch, the program finishes with a session on “Achieving High-quality Performance.”
Online registration is open for both Effective Management of Farm Employees locations. Space is limited, so participants are encouraged to register early.
The cost to attend is $160 for the first participant from a farm and $140 for each additional participant from the same farm.
For more information or questions, contact Phil Durst at 989-387-5346 or durstp@msu.edu or Stan Moore at 231-533-8818 or moorest@msu.edu.
For more information, please view the full release here.
UC–Davis Hosts 4th Annual Beef Improvement Symposium
The Food Animal Reproduction and Medicine (FARM) Club at the University of California–Davis (UC–Davis) is pleased to announce they will present the 4th Annual Beef Improvement Symposium Jan. 10, 2015. Symposium events will take place in Gladys Valley Hall in the UC–Davis School of Veterinary Medicine.
Registration begins at 7:30 a.m. PST. Register for the symposium here.
Featured speakers for the symposium include Tom Noffsinger and Frank Mitloehner.
Noffsinger spent 32 years as a beef cattle veterinarian. He is now an independent feedlot consultant specializing in facility design, stockmanship and low-stress livestock handling. He is the 2001 recipient of the Consultant of the Year award from the Academy of Veterinary Consultants. Noffsinger will speak on low-stress cattle handling techniques.
Frank Mitloehner is an expert for agricultural air quality, animal-environmental interactions and agricultural engineering. Since he joined the faculty in the Department of Animal Science at UC–Davis in 2002, Mitloehner has generated and published data that are rapidly changing how livestock facilities in California and throughout the United States are regulated. Mitloehner will address heat stress mitigation.
Other topics and speakers for the symposium include:
- Heifer Management in Drought — Nancy Martin, East Meets West Veterinary Services.
- Toxicology Case Discussions — Birgit Puschner, veterinary toxicologist, UC–Davis.
- On-farm Biosecurity — Matt Cuneo, livestock reproduction and herd health, UC–Davis.
- Social Media: Marketing Your Product and Telling Your Story — Anita Varga, Gold Coast Veterinary Service and Consulting.
- Reproduction Strategies in Beef Cattle — Catalina Cabrera, livestock reproduction and herd health, UC Davis.
- EPDs, Semen Selection and Genetic Diseases — Bret McNabb, livestock reproduction and herd health, UC Davis.
For more information, please view the Angus Journal Virtual Library calendar of upcoming events here.
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