Good prices are stabilizing the marketplace

I don’t know what we ranchers or farmers could complain about but I bet we can think of something. The grass is probably the best I have ever seen for the middle of July in our area. Cattle are at an extremely good price, all the way from calves off the cow to big yearlings.

North of where I live one rancher has had 22 inches of rain since April 26.

Tuesday, we sold a big fat cow that weighed 1,680 pounds and brought $130 per hundredweight, which figured to $2,184 per head. We had a big bull that weighed 2,640 pounds that brought $130 per hundredweight and that figured to $3,432 per head. Most ranchers have older cows or wild cows and this is an excellent time to sell them and replace them with a younger pair or a bred cow. If a cow is bigger—even though she is bred—she is apt to go to slaughter just because the demand is very good.

As I am writing this article one cattle buyer said, “What are you doing writing a book?” I said, “No, I am writing this article.” He said, “The last time I wrote a letter was to Santa. And he didn’t bring me anything that I wanted.”

Sunday the preacher said people are always trying to change other people on the outside but instead we need to change them on the inside by them getting Jesus. He said if you don’t change them on the inside it’s a lot like washing a pig and putting a ribbon on him but he will return to the mud waller because you only changed the outside.

One rancher told me he had been frustrated with the way things had been going. Then he was thinking, God, why don’t you do something? Then he felt like God said to him, “I did. I created you.”

At the sale a lot of times we have to make our own humor. One buyer said he put a picture of a very large man who was in his speedo, and it was his backside. Then he said that picture was him and posted he sure hopes his new neighbors aren’t weirdos.

I saw a picture of a very small boy with his hands together and you could tell he was praying. The little boy said, “Dear God, please send some clothes for all those poor ladies on Grandpa’s computer.” 

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.