News Update
August 11, 2017
Apply for the Century Award
Angus breeders who have been in continuous production of registered Angus cattle for 100 years are invited to apply for the Century Award. It’s an honor presented each year during the Angus Convention that recognizes the history and heritage of the Angus breed, and celebrates those committed to raising quality cattle through the decades.
Applications are available online and are due by Sept. 1. The selected individuals or families will be invited to attend the American Angus Association’s Awards Breakfast hosted in conjunction with the Angus Convention Nov. 4-6 in Fort Worth, Texas.
The Angus Convention is a premier event hosted by the American Angus Association each November and provides quality-minded cattlemen and women the opportunity to engage with one another, learn new technologies and performance measures, and explore the future of the beef business.
Last year’s Century Award honoree was Thomas-Criswell Angus, New Bloomfield, Mo.
Registration and hotel information is available online at www.angusconvention.com.
Department of Livestock Monitoring
Canine Respiratory Disease
The Montana Department of Livestock (DOL) is working with local veterinarians to monitor an outbreak of severe canine respiratory disease in Montana. DOL is aware of sick dogs in Bozeman, Livingston, Billings, Butte, Roundup and Red Lodge. Several clinics are seeing multiple sick dogs per day.
“Veterinarians have reported dogs with coughing, difficulty breathing and fever, similar to a severe case of kennel cough,” states Tahnee Szymanski, assistant state veterinarian. “Dogs with more critical infections have developed pneumonia which has been fatal in a small number of animals.
Previous vaccination for kennel cough does not appear to be protective, and young animals seem particularly sensitive. Several veterinarians in the Bozeman area are working with university and industry diagnostic labs to collect samples from pets that have been sick, in hopes of identifying the cause of illness.
Canine influenza has been suspected as the potential cause of the outbreak due to the severity of illness, the lack of protection from prior vaccination and preliminary tests suggestive of influenza exposure. However, a second sample collected three weeks later that shows an increased antibody response is needed to confirm the disease.
For more information, read the Montana DOL news release online.
Research Shows Protein on U.S. Native Grasslands in Decline
There is an alarming trend on America’s rangelands due to grazing and changing climate, and it’s already costing producers almost $2 billion annually, according to recently published work by a Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientist in Temple.
Jay Angerer, an AgriLife Research rangeland ecologist at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Temple, recently co-published “Long-term declines in dietary nutritional quality for North American cattle” in „em with Joseph Craine of Jonah Ventures, Manhattan, Kan.; and Andrew Elmore, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Frostburg, Md. Their research outlines the falling dietary value of forages on unimproved native rangelands in the United States during the past two decades due to nutrient losses associated with grazing and changing climate.
Read the full Angus Beef Bulletin EXTRA article online.
Purina and Performance Livestock Analytics
Offer Cattlemen Real-time Decision Tools
Purina Animal Nutrition and Performance Livestock Analytics (PLA) are joining forces to give Purina customers access to Performance Beef software. Built for farmer-feeders and feedlots, Performance Beef software gives producers the data they need to make real-time, profit-focused decisions.
“Performance Beef software allows producers to capture and analyze the large amount of feed data generated today,” says Anthony Robinson, associate marketing manager with Purina Animal Nutrition. “The new software subscription service eliminates data collection and entry and helps optimize operation costs.”
With easy-to-read charts and graphs, Performance Beef software:
- monitors feedyard performance,
- organizes feed inputs,
- automates delivery,
- eliminates batch sheets and;
- helps uncover insights.
The software also connects producers to their closest advisors. When a producer shares data through Performance Beef software, their Purina representative can make timely nutrition recommendations to enhance profit potential.
“We focus on delivering real-time data to help make cattle operations more profitable,” says Dane Kuper, CEO with Performance Livestock Analytics. “Our goal is to help optimize the performance and efficiency of every animal, so operations remain sustainable.”
Read the full Purina news release online.
Delayed Hay Harvest Calls for Testing
This year’s delayed hay harvest calls for hay testing.
University of Missouri (MU) Extension agronomy specialist Anthony Ohmes says farmers benefit from routine hay testing.
Hay quality varies based on forage species, maturity, management, harvest conditions, and insect or disease damage. Guessing the quality of hay fed to livestock could result in lower profits, Ohmes says. Knowing the hay’s nutrient value can help livestock owners decide if animals need supplements.
Ohmes suggests that farmers sample each lot separately. A hay lot comes from the same field and forage makeup and is grown and harvested under the same environmental conditions. “Every field and cutting will be different,” Ohmes says.
Use a 12- to 24-inch hay probe, he says. It should be 3/8- to 5/8-inch in diameter. Do not grab or hand-pull samples. Samples collected that way do not provide uniform results and could lead to misleading values.
Sample multiple bales out of a hay lot. The lot should represent at least 10%, or at least 15 random bales.
The sampling method varies for each bale type.
Continue reading this Angus Beef Bulletin EXTRA article online.
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