I hate to be a negative person but if you follow our fat cattle business it is hard not to be.
Last Friday (Nov. 9) the choice beef price cutout was $215.99 and select was $198.83. Even if you multiply a select price times a yield of 63 percent that figures $125.26 not counting any value for offal. This is downright pathetic. That figures none at choice, $215.99 times a yield of 64 percent equals $138.23.
If you say this is not a monopoly and free trade I will say you are an idiot or in bed with packers or retailers. I want to ask cattle organizations: Who has the guts to take this all the way to the president of the United States?
Evidently no one. This message should be taken to our secretary of agriculture.
Our whole cattle business and the opportunity for this generation and the next to survive, let alone thrive, depends on it. I will be right honest with you, from what I see, it is hard for me to encourage my kids to pursue this business unless we see a change soon.
They can sell the beef as high as they want and give us whatever they want. It’s like being in a dictatorship and most cattlemen and feedlots are afraid to speak out or you will be boycotted. My advice is to get your head out from under that rock or expect a short life for the individual cattleman.
I have often wondered who Pete is and why we always do it for Pete’s sake.
This past weekend I ran in a half marathon at Las Vegas, which is 13.1 miles. I saw a sweatshirt in front of me running the same race, which said, “I am only half crazy.” Another shirt said, “If you find me laying in the road please just drag me across the finish line.” No, I did not place but I made it in 2 hours, 17 minutes. I was just happy to get across the finish line. Two other friends of mine, Tom and Michelle, ran the same race in California and they are still alive too.
The teacher took her kindergarten class on a field trip to see their police station where they saw pictures tacked to a bulletin board of the 10 most wanted criminals.
One of the youngsters pointed to a picture and asked if it really was the photo of a wanted person. Yes, said the policeman. “The detectives want very badly to catch him.”
The youngster asked, “Why didn’t you keep him when you took his picture?”
Editor’s note: Jerry Nine, Woodward, Oklahoma, is a lifetime cattleman who grew up on his family’s ranch near Slapout, Oklahoma.
