Cow-Calf Corner | December 16, 2024
Strong Feeder Markets Encouraging More Selling
Derrell S. Peel, Oklahoma State University Extension Livestock Marketing Specialist
Oklahoma combined feeder auction prices spiked to record levels the week after Thanksgiving, especially for the lightweight calves and stockers. The price of 500-pound, Med/Large, No. 1 steers was $360.99/cwt., a new record price. Lightweight feeder prices dropped back the second week of December with the 500-pound steers posting the third highest weekly price of the year of $342.57/cwt. just slightly below the spring price peak of $349.43/cwt. in March. The bigger feeder cattle prices have continued to grind higher. The price of 800-pound Med/Large, No. 1 steers in Oklahoma was $260.58/cwt. in mid-December, pennies higher than the previous record weekly price at the end of June.
The red-hot feeder cattle market in December has prompted strong feeder cattle sales to end the year. At the end of August, year to date Oklahoma feeder cattle auction volumes were down over 102,000 head from last year, a decrease of 12.5 percent year over year. However, dry conditions prompted more feeder sales with year over year larger weekly volumes for nine consecutive weeks in September and October. By the beginning of November, year to date feeder auctions totals were down just over 50,000 head year over year, 5.0 percent less than one year earlier.
Auction volumes dropped ahead of Thanksgiving, dropping the year to date decrease back over 74,000 head in two weeks. However, large volumes in the last two weeks of November and the first half of December has brought the year to date decrease down to just over 36,000 head, a scant 3.1 percent down from last year. The Oklahoma weekly feeder volume for the second week of December was 47,448 head, the largest weekly volume in several years. With just one week of auction sales remaining for the year, the Oklahoma combined feeder auction total for 2024 is 1.14 million head compared to 1.18 million head last year.
Although the total feeder auction volume has decreased relatively little this year compared to last, there is one change that could be significant. Figure 1 shows the reported heifer percentage of Oklahoma weekly feeder auction volume from 2022-2024.
Figure 1. Heifer Percent in Oklahoma Feeder Auction, 4 week MA, Weekly, 2022-24
Since the middle of the year, the percentage of heifers in the weekly volume has decreased significantly compared to the past two years. The average weekly heifer percentage since July has been 38.7 percent compared to 43.1 percent in the first half of the year. The average for the entire year in 2023 was 42.6 percent and in 2022 was 41.7 percent. This may be an indication that Oklahoma producers are holding back a few heifers in late 2024. The data is not definitive but could be an early indication of some heifer retention, at least in Oklahoma.
Derrell Peel, OSU Extension livestock marketing specialist, explains how markets are reacting to the avian influenza situation before discussing the news of the discovery of the New World screwworm discovery in Mexico from SunUpTV on December 7, 2024.
Just How Do Santa's Reindeer Get the Job Done?
Glenn Selk, Oklahoma State University Emeritus Extension Animal Scientist & Mark Z. Johnson, Oklahoma State University Extension Beef Cattle Breeding Specialist
It is the “most wonderful time of the year” and this week Dr. Glenn Selk joins us to address the age-old questions of what permit Reindeer to pull Santa’s sleigh all over the globe on Christmas eve.
Have you ever wondered how Santa's reindeer can make that monumental journey on Christmas Eve? Let's look into some key facts about reindeer that may help us understand how they transport Ole St. Nick on his appointed rounds over the world. First of all, historians report that reindeer have been domesticated by humans for over 5,000 years. Since Santa himself is no spring chicken, we can assume that they have worked together for quite a while. They should not have any trouble finding their way around. There is no need to worry about them getting lost. We do know that reindeer are like ruminants. They are like cattle in this regard. They have four compartments to their stomach. Of course Santa gets them filled up with hay before he leaves the North Pole, so they should have plenty of feed stored in the four compartments to make it all around the globe. Also, cattle nutritionists have known for years that hay digests more slowly than grain, therefore the big meal that the reindeer eat before the journey should last even longer. Or just like your mom says, "It'll stick to their ribs!". As for drinking water, that should be no problem whatsoever. In their homeland the water is all frozen so they are used to getting the moisture they need by eating snow. So as the sleigh is parked on snowy rooftops in cold weather cities, the reindeer can take on the moisture they need if they get thirsty.
How do they keep warm while flying around on Christmas Eve? The fur that they have is very thick and can hold a lot of air. The "blanket" of insulation combining fur and air helps keep them warm in even the coldest of climates. Plus flying around Christmas night in many areas of the world that are warmer than they have at home should not be a problem.
How do they fly? Well that’s a tougher question, and we really do not have that one completely answered. However, let’s look at what we do know about them. Reindeer are amazingly fast runners on the ground. A newborn baby reindeer at one day of age can out run the fastest person on earth. By the time that they are fully grown it is hard to tell what speeds that they could reach. Next remember those huge antlers. Antlers of adult male reindeer can be as much as 4 feet long! Just think about it. Each reindeer has 2 sets; that’s 8 feet of antlers and with eight reindeer (or nine if we count Rudolph on foggy nights) that is 64 to 72 feet of total antler span. A typical small airplane only has about 20 - 30 feet of wingspan. Certainly it seems feasible those eight reindeer running that fast with all that antler span could get off the ground.
There are a couple of myths about reindeer that we should clear up. You have probably heard the poem that says that they have tiny reindeer feet. Actually they have a very wide large hoof that they use at home to dig through the snow to find grass and moss to eat. You've got to think that those wide hooves would come in handy for sliding to rather sudden stops on the small landing sites that Santa has to work with on Christmas Eve. And you've probably heard the song about “up on the house top click, click, click”. Well it is true that reindeer do make a clicking sound as they walk. They have a tendon that snaps over a bone joint and makes a clicking sound on every step. These are just a few facts about Santa's Reindeer. Maybe this will help us understand that age-old mystery that occurs every Christmas.
In a Classic Cow-Calf Corner on SunUpTV, Mark Johnson invites Glenn Selk back to Cow-Calf Corner to discuss the most important ruminant animals of the season: Santa’s reindeer.
Supplementing Wheat Pasture Stockers
Paul Beck, Oklahoma State University Cooperative Extension Beef Cattle Nutrition Specialist
In a past article Cow-Calf Corner Newsletter, November 25, 2024. I mentioned that it requires about 5 pounds of wheat forage dry matter (DM) per pound of calf bodyweight at the start of grazing to maximize steer performance. This forage allowance (the pounds of forage DM per pound of steer bodyweight) should result in gains throughout the fall and winter of over 2.5 pounds of gain under normal conditions. For example, to maximize performance of growing 500-pound calf we need to have 2,500 pounds of forage DM per steer. With a normal stocking rate of 2 acres per steer, this is 1,200 to 1,300 pounds of forage DM per acre. (A good thick stand of wheat pasture should be about 6 to 7 inches tall at 1,200 to 1,300 pounds per acre).
If we are slightly overstocked or have less forage available due to poor wheat growing conditions, forage allowance of 3 pounds can provide enough forage for about 2.5 pounds of gain per day. We can increase performance by feeding a small package energy supplement at 2 pounds per day (5.8 pounds/calf 3 days per week) to the growing calves, increasing gain by 0.5 pounds per day. This supplement should provide digestible energy and does not need to be high in protein because of the high protein content of the wheat forage. The supplement can be composed of grains (ground corn or milo work great) and digestible grain milling products with low protein content (soybean hulls and wheat midds), but we can provide extra protein with feeds like corn gluten feed or dried distillers grains if they are competitively priced on an energy basis. We often design these supplements to carry required minerals (calcium and magnesium are often deficient in wheat pasture) and monensin (100 to 200 mg/calf/day), an ionophore that will increase daily gains and reduce the incidence and severity of potential bloat. (Monensin is highly toxic to dogs and horses so care should be taken in storage and feeding feeds containing monensin to keep out of reach of non-targeted animals.) Research at OSU has shown that providing a free-choice complete mineral designed for grazing cattle on wheat pasture along with the energy supplement is as effective as feeding it in a complete package.
If wheat pasture is short but we need to keep the same stocking rate we have in the past, we can maintain stocking rates with higher supplementation rates or other feeding methods to offset the reduced availability of wheat pasture and low forage intake. This will be the topic for my article next week.
Paul Beck explains how to estimate the number of cattle to stock on wheat pasture on SunUpTV from November 26, 2018.