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Cattle Rack Rancher

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Manitoba, Canada
At this point, it is one year and two days since that catfish farmer from Mississippi dragged that poor old angus BSE cow around to five slaughter plants up here in Canada before someone would kill it for him, and managed to get our borders closed to all our export markets. Since then we've heard alot of comments about 'Why did the Canadians allow themselves to get so dependent on the American market?' and ' Why don't the Canadians process their own beef?'. So, let me tell you the truth as I know it. In the seventies, we had five processing plants in Manitoba. That was back when the Canadian dollar was worth more than the American dollar. In the early eighties, The situation was reversed and we were paying $1.25 for every $1.00 US. Suddenly, we had hordes of US buyers coming up to our auction yards and buying our cattle. Because our packers had to pay $1.25 for every US dollar, they found that they couldn't compete and slowly they went down one by one. Now, we have no packers in Manitoba. That's how we became so dependent on the American market and that's why we don't process all of our own beef. The border gets closed and now we are just so screwed. There are plans to try to get one or two of these plants up and running again but I think the same thing is likely to happen when the border opens and the Americans show up at the auction yards again. If we couldn't compete when the US dollar was $1.25, how do we compete at US $1.35? The Americans have had their hands in this thing right from day one so you think they'd feel at least some responsibility and yet I hear that 83% of comments received by the USDA ask the border not be re-opened. All I want to know is what are we supposed to do? I've got all these cows that are worth about 10% of what I paid for them, if I sold, i'd still owe a pile of money on them and yet feeding them isn't profitable either. Some days I think I should just sell, take my lumps and move to Texas because I do like the way you boys down there think :cboy:
 
I ( if I could ) borrow all the money I could and buy what ever was available at a 90Percent off sale.
 
cherokeeruby
I've never met any girls from Texas and because I'm a married man I don't expect I'd get to know any real well at this point. But if you think like Campground et al, you're my kind of people.

ollie
You can buy pretty good cow-calf pairs up here right now for about $500 US. Good open cows are worth about 17 cents a lb US at the auction yard. Come on up and buy all you like, good luck taking them home, though.

Campground
I probably would melt. We have a chance of snow flurries here today. It's not helping green up my pasture. Most years, we can have cattle on pasture by the end of the first week of May but we've had really cold weather up here as well as a snowstorm that locked everything down for two days last week. The power went down and I had to get out my generator to keep the house warm. Nasty year.
 
What does the best 3 year old pairs cost and how much is realestate?
 
I hear you, CRR. Last sale I saw a pair split and sold separately because they couldn't get a bid for $350.00 for them as a pair. Mind you, the cow was a bit worked up, but she was middle aged and the calf was fat and healthy. In the end she sold for 17.00cwt and the calf sold for $100.00.
The top price for pairs that day was $860.00 for some great first calf pairs - the heiferrettes and their calves were excellent quality and in suberb flesh. Made me shake my head, as I'd paid $700.00 for similar quality bred heifers last fall and then had to feed them for the winter. It really would not be an exaggeration to say there is little if no profit in cattle in Canada at this juncture. At least not for the producer.

Hang in there and best wishes from BC.
 
cherokee is a neighbor of mine down the road, she is like all Texas women, very pretty. next time you go on vacation you should all come to Texas. you might even want to relocate here, we have plenty of people from across our southern border who relocates to Texas, thousands every year. so any of you are more than welcome to come here and we could all come on this web site and talk, and talk about cattle trends in our own state, and we would all be neighbors then (tongue in cheek) sold a load of calves yesterday, averaged $1.05 a pound, liked less than a dollar bringing $600.00 per head. we have never seen calf prices like that here before, at least i can't remember. maybe it will get better for all of our northern neighbors in Canada, hope it does for you
 
My heart goes out for our "Northern Neighbors". I have had my back up Against the Wall a few times before and it certainly isn't comfortable.
I would love to see 100% of the cattle be tested for BSE so that we could resume all exports. IMO Anne Venneman and the USDA and the Canadian Government are dragging their asses.
What I can't understand is, if an independent packer can test for BSE for $15.00 per head why is the USDA saying it cost $75.00 per animal to test. Sounds like a kickback for someone, to me. If someone on this board has the smarts to draw up a legal petition to have her ousted and have someone that would represent the Farmers and Ranchers of this country, in their best interet appointed by our Great President George W Bush, I would gladly sign it.
Arnold Ziffle this sounds like a Job for you.
 
ollie

I don't actually go to the auctions, so I can't be specific as to what each pair looks like. But my brother sold a nice Simm cross cow with a 200 lb calf at side and got $800.00 for her about US $625.00. He also sold a good 940 lb tarentaise steer and got 47 cents a lb about 35 cents US. Land up here depending on what you are looking for: sandy land where you can graze 30 pairs on a quarter section runs about $250.00 Cdn. Top quality potato land with irrigation runs around $2000.00 Cdn.
Good grazing land runs around $500.00-$750.00 Cdn.

The biggest problem we have up here is the uncertainty. If we knew the border wasn't going to open, we would build processing plants and try to open other markets to boxed beef. If the Americans are coming back into the market, this is probably futile as we can't compete with the American dollar.
 
k~b ranch":343uw0oc said:
ahh???? george bush our great president (not) appointed anne venneman!!
Yeah k~b ranch
I guess you would like a bunch of F'ing socialist lliberals as the leaders of the Free World and this Great Land called the USof A.
 
ahh???? k~b ranch-

Who do you think YOUR president, Al Gore, would have appointed? Let me guess. Probably somebody like Little Tommy Daschle? Fidel Castro? Or probably the Dem with the most experience in the field. The one y'all still drool over. Jimmy Carter?
 
k~b ranch":2zkor73u said:
ahh???? george bush our great president (not) appointed anne venneman!!


I learned early on that some of these guys would never let a little thing like, say, FACTS, ever get in the way of a made up story.
If Rush Limbaugh says it, then by gosh, it's the truth! Or whomever the Democrat basher of the day is.
 
Eric, I'm afraid we might have "misunderestimated" you. Wasn't sure you had the ability to learn anything, much less learn it early on. What you been doin'? Listening to Al Franken and that new Liberal radio network? Lots of wasted gray matter there. I know you surely wouldn't let any of your yuppie, Metroplex buddies catch you tuned in to WBAP, so I'm kinda confused about your reference to Rush. Whassup?
 
Texan":17galhvo said:
Eric, I'm afraid we might have "misunderestimated" you. Wasn't sure you had the ability to learn anything, much less learn it early on. What you been doin'? Listening to Al Franken and that new Liberal radio network? Lots of wasted gray matter there. I know you surely wouldn't let any of your yuppie, Metroplex buddies catch you tuned in to WBAP, so I'm kinda confused about your reference to Rush. Whassup?
Good post Texan. Got me kinda Curious also.
 
LOL....no actually, I find politics extremely BORING...I have never tuned in to Rush or Al Franken or KLIF since Norm left....My radio in my office stays tuned to Stern in the mornings, and as soon as he is off the air I switch it to the Ticket!! But I am pretty sure Rush is pro Bush isn't he? As I recall he didnt much like Clinton, which is strange since neither one of them are exactly ideal family men.
 

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