We are starting another year with most of us badly needing moisture.
Cattle prices are basically good with calves selling at a very good price particularly on steers long weaned from 350 to 500 pounds. Feeders are selling good enough that it is hard to lock in a profit. Fat cattle are selling better than they have in a long time, but we still have a problem with the packer monopoly.
It will be quite interesting with the two large packing houses that are planned by Amarillo, Texas, and North Platte, Nebraska. I still say the best way for a packing house to survive is to get two or three large grocery chains to invest. Then they will buy their meat from the packinghouse. And whenever the packer-retailer lowers his beef to zero it won’t run them out of business.
One big problem most of us have is expenses. If you operate in a big or small way the amount of interest you are paying now compared to two years ago has changed your bottom line. Feed is high and in short supply. A lot of items are hard to get and almost knock you down when you get the bill. If we don’t learn anything else from this, I hope we figure out we need to make as many producers as we can in America.
We need to open up the drilling for gas and oil in the United States and stop China from taking over America. Russia and China are trying to get more friendly and that is a huge item.
On a brighter sport we still live in America and, if you believe in God, there are better days ahead. I don’t know why I was so fortunate to be born in America and have so many freedoms and others were born in countries where they will never know what that feels like. Don’t take freedom for granted.
As a sale barn owner by law if a buyer’s cattle are not paid for by that sixth day then on the seventh day we have to pay for the cattle. For some of you when you die please let us be your pallbearers. We have carried you so long that we would like to finish the job.
When I was in high school, it seems when I was about a junior, I got sent to the office several days in a row. The principal said to me, “Do you realize this is the fifth time this week that you have been sent to the office for misbehaving?” He said, “Now what do you have to say for yourself?” I said, “Well, I am glad it’s Friday.”
Editor’s note: The views expressed here are the author’s own and do not represent the view of High Plains Journal. Jerry Nine, Woodward, Oklahoma, is a lifetime cattleman who grew up on his family’s ranch near Slapout, Oklahoma.
