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Hosted by members of the University of Minnesota Extension Beef and Dairy Teams, The Moos Room discusses relevant topics to help beef and dairy producers be more successful. The information is evidence-based and presented as an informal conversation between the hosts and guests.
00;00;11;03 - 00;00;27;03
Emily
And welcome everybody to The Moos Room. Emily and Bradley here. And we are joined by a returning guest today. One of our wonderful U of M colleagues, Melissa Ronk, is here once again. Welcome back. Melissa.
00;00;27;05 - 00;00;28;20
Melissa
Thanks for having me, Emily.
00;00;28;23 - 00;00;50;17
Emily
So it's my understanding that, this episode was born out of a text message between, Bradley and Melissa. And I think our plan. And we were kind of already talking about a lot of it before we started recording, is to just talk about some stuff with beef, right? Of course, Melissa is one of our beef educators, and extension.
00;00;50;20 - 00;01;15;21
Emily
So we wanted to talk a little bit about some of your selection stuff. You know, as we think about what's happening in the markets, what might be coming down the road with the markets, you know, and again, like Bradley and I always talk it's it's management. Right. And sire selection is a really important management decision. And you know, being a mindful producer and watching what's happening is, is all a part of that.
00;01;15;21 - 00;01;21;28
Emily
So, Bradley, Melissa, was that a good enough introduction to what we're trying to do here today?
00;01;22;00 - 00;01;24;02
Melissa
That was a very good introduction.
00;01;24;04 - 00;01;50;01
Brad
Well, it really stemmed from Brad was driving blood for preg checking to Melrose, and I heard market reports on, probably lender Farm Network or something like that, and learn that beef on Terry Cross cows and calves were going really high. And I didn't realize that it was that had shot up that crazy. You know, the market changes so fast with those calves, it's hard to keep up.
00;01;50;03 - 00;02;17;28
Brad
But then I had to go back and look and figure out that if we think Holstein calves are now going for 1000 to $1300 and beef cross calves or beef calves 1300 to $1700 a piece, these are baby calves maybe a week of aged less than two weeks of age, and they're top in the market at $1,700. Yeah, I, I don't know what to think.
00;02;17;28 - 00;02;35;17
Emily
About that, and I right. I have to say the thing I think we all say when we talk about these crazy calf prices, remember when people would put them at the end of their driveways for free? Yeah. Right. Right. And and now we get where we know value. Yeah, yeah. And I remember buying calves you know like or we would sell our bull calves.
00;02;35;17 - 00;02;38;29
Emily
Right. 100 bucks and now.
00;02;39;01 - 00;02;42;02
Melissa
Yeah I just can't get enough of them. Right.
00;02;42;04 - 00;03;05;17
Brad
But I don't know how you can make money if you buy a calf at $1,700. That's almost what you get back. That's you're going to get back close to four grand at market time. But still, you know, you've put $2,000 worth of feed in it. You maybe make 50, 50 bucks ahead. Maybe, I don't know, right there.
00;03;05;24 - 00;03;26;29
Melissa
A lot of optimistic people right now is all I can say. I yeah, I, I don't have my crystal ball. I, I'm glad for our producers that they are so incredibly valuable. But I think that just shows a lot of optimism in our, in our markets when these cattle are finally going to go, you know, in any year plus, they're going to go to market.
00;03;26;29 - 00;03;28;07
Melissa
It's just like, wow.
00;03;28;10 - 00;03;50;05
Brad
I'm optimistic and I'm hoping that I can get that money for our beef and dairy crosses when they start. Cavin here in about six weeks. So if we can make an extra 60,000 or more, hey, that's wonderful. Especially when milk prices are low right now, I know that be Fun Dairy Market is sort of helping some dairy farms stay afloat.
00;03;50;07 - 00;04;10;19
Emily
Yeah, it's it's a nice way to get a quick injection of cash, for sure, with these really expensive calves. So. Yeah, for, for the people that have them, I think it's really great. But I agree with you, Bradley. Like, what's what's the long term strategy here. You know, how how will you make money or you know what.
00;04;10;20 - 00;04;17;06
Emily
What are you going to do to ensure you see a return on investment? Or are you just taking the gamble?
00;04;17;08 - 00;04;39;21
Brad
Let's talk about the cattle on feed report just came out. Maybe last week shows cattle inventory numbers are down in the US quite considerably, maybe a few hundred thousand head in one month. But wait, what did we learn from the report, Melissa? Any any fine gleanings on cattle on feed here and in the US. So.
00;04;39;23 - 00;05;15;11
Melissa
Yeah. So some of the, you know, economists that I, I follow pretty religiously how it relates to, I guess, both, both dairy and the beef world. Yeah. Cattle on feed. That came out last week, Friday. 11 points, 4 or 5 million head. We are down 3.2%, from year over year. And one of the big take home pieces that I have, gleaned from that information is that kind of the big question on both the, the beef side and the dairy side, that really pertains to them is what what is our market outlook looking like?
00;05;15;14 - 00;05;36;10
Melissa
In terms of how many of these of these cattle that are on feed, first of all, like, what's that number, that placement number? And then what percentage of that are actually heifers? Because, the huge like the million dollar question is everybody wants to know our producer, our beef producers actually starting to keep back some of these heifers given where the current stands is at the market.
00;05;36;12 - 00;06;01;10
Melissa
Are we seeing people that are willing to hold on to these females? And maybe, you know, given up some of these immediate, income like we just talked about from the price of those calves or even cow. Cow prices are so high. And what we are the take home piece from that cattle and feed report is that, the percent of feedlot inventories and steers versus heifers is actually down or.
00;06;01;10 - 00;06;28;21
Melissa
Sorry. Excuse me, the heifers. Let me say that again. The percent of the, feedlot inventories, heifers versus steers, the percent of heifers, actually increased to roughly 38, 39%, meaning that we we're still not holding on to those heifers to keep back as replacements. This is actually the highest level of, percent of heifers on feed in 2025.
00;06;28;24 - 00;06;42;06
Melissa
So that's just, just telling us right there that, yeah, people are still really apprehensive about keeping these females and keeping them around as replacements when they can immediately sell them. And they have that, that, that cash in hand.
00;06;42;06 - 00;07;00;18
Brad
Well, yeah, I think it all comes down to economics on the farm. Right. Just trying to make it, whether we had crop prices, droughts, all kinds of different things. I think economics is probably playing the bigger role in all of this. And if the farms need income, cash flow, they're going to sell the heifers no matter what.
00;07;00;18 - 00;07;12;02
Brad
So I think that's maybe what's playing I don't know, I don't know if that's all of it, but that's certainly at least this is my take is is trying to remain cash flow. And so you're getting rid of the heifers to.
00;07;12;04 - 00;07;34;12
Melissa
Exactly. And one of my favorite quotes, you know what. What are the three P's to, beef that are related to beef cowherd expansion, profit, pasture and patience? We're seeing that, you know, like you said, people just need money. It's just trying to cash flow everything. Our pastures. We're kind of rejuvenating them. We've got, you know, saw some timely rains this past summer.
00;07;34;14 - 00;07;56;10
Melissa
Feeds. You know, we may not have great feed, but we have a lot of it. And people are just kind of trying to wait this out. We know that with the big market adjustment and, won't get into that, but what happened back in October, you know, cash prices took a really, you know, I mean, just kind of fell out of bed there for a couple of weeks, and then they've just been going back up again.
00;07;56;12 - 00;08;13;14
Melissa
But yeah, we just haven't. People are just really, like I said, apprehensive to hold on to these females. We know that the USDA has come out with some different programs. They want to try to expand, you know, grazing acres. But just so people need that kind of distance, they need that that cash, they need that, that income.
00;08;13;14 - 00;08;21;22
Melissa
Right now, we're still trying to recover from kind of the last cattle cycle. And so I do understand people just not wanting to hold on to these females at this point.
00;08;21;25 - 00;08;40;24
Brad
Yeah. It seems like we're on a downhill slide again. If the new report shows anything, we may be moving towards a lower inventory this year as well. I don't know that for sure, but it'll be interesting to see. I you know, if you look at the top states, will Texas had the biggest drop in cattle on feed of of any of the states this year.
00;08;40;24 - 00;08;53;25
Brad
So you know less cattle on in feedlots in Texas and in some of the other states are pretty neutral or the same. But I notice that Texas is probably the big one that's lost quite a few,
00;08;53;28 - 00;09;19;18
Melissa
Had and they just said something last week that I thought was really interesting and one of the largest cattle theaters in the US, just there in Nebraska, they are they are not at capacity. And so in order to make use of their facilities and their their staff, of course, they're trying to offer some incentives to be doing some heifer growing programs for people just because those lots are not filled up with cattle on feed, you know, going to market.
00;09;19;20 - 00;09;30;02
Melissa
Just trying to incentivize producers. Hey, if you need us to, to take care of these, try to grow these heifers for a year. We got the space. We got plenty of feed. We'll do that for you. So that was really interesting to me.
00;09;30;04 - 00;09;54;28
Brad
One thing that I think is interesting from the report, I didn't realize that Washington State has a lot of cattle on feed. Is that along the Idaho border? It seems like when you think of Washington, you're thinking Seattle. You know, the ocean, all that fun stuff. But there's a lot of cattle in Washington. I'm surprised they want more cattle and in Washington than, well, South Dakota and almost Arizona.
00;09;54;28 - 00;09;56;13
Brad
So it's, interesting.
00;09;56;14 - 00;09;58;07
Melissa
Not one that we often think of.
00;09;58;09 - 00;10;26;16
Brad
Well, it'll be interesting to see how this plays out in the market. And I'm certainly doing my part to keep everything cash flowing, I'll tell you that. But we're trying to generate some, I think maybe I've shared I don't know, you know, I'm we're implanting embryos and heifers and cows here to generate some Angus calves. Sorry, I'm not going to keep those around to as beef replacements, but, we're going to do some research with them and compare them to beef and dairy crosses and see what happens.
00;10;26;16 - 00;10;50;28
Brad
See see where we go sort of leads us into our next discussion. Next point. So what? And I know Melissa has spoken about some of this stuff. It's some of our beef and dairy workshops. What are we looking for? If we think about selecting sire selection for dairy animals, what what do we think about bulls and how we should be selecting sires for breeding in our operations?
00;10;51;02 - 00;11;19;26
Melissa
That is a really good question, Brad. I think it really comes down to, some of this something that I that is stuck out to me is that, you know, pay attention to the three C's conception, cavities and cost. I my, my own personal take on this is that, if we kind of narrow that down just a little bit more, I really think we need to be paying attention to having these factors, growth of those calves and then carcass if it pertains to us.
00;11;19;26 - 00;11;52;24
Melissa
And we can kind of get into that. I'm not saying that it's not writing it off and saying that it's not important, but I do think that in certain instances, carcass may not be one of those things that you absolutely have to focus on, if just based on how you're marketing those camps. I know there's got a whole list of different things, but, my take home piece to producers who are either considering or, you know, trying to maybe veer off and kind of start selecting for some of their, you know, some different bulls that maybe not, how do I say this?
00;11;52;27 - 00;12;17;05
Melissa
The, the, the full proof bulls, you know, they're asking like, well, what do I need to be looking for? And we can have a whole long list of different things, you know, calving ease, homozygous black, homozygous pulled, growth, EPS, high marbling, you know, high carcass, high yielding feed efficiency. Then we, you know, we want to have a carcass that isn't too big, but we want to have, you know, that we're not being discount on those heavy carcasses.
00;12;17;05 - 00;12;44;10
Melissa
So my my take away piece to them is that don't go looking for that unicorn bull, okay? We can't have this magical bull who checks every single box. So really break it down to or how are you actually marketing those calves? And I'm not picking on any particular breed, but based on how you're marketing those calves, the standard answer breed them to an Angus sire may not be the most beneficial for you.
00;12;44;15 - 00;13;07;29
Melissa
And I know Brad, you've got a got data on that for looking at the different breeds, but, you know, are you how are you selling those calves? You know, young calves like a week, two weeks old. Are you backgrounding them? And I would say based on some of those data that we, you know, the three of us looked at before this conversation, you kind of look and see that there are a number of people who are backgrounding these calves, taking them up, taking some of that risk out.
00;13;08;01 - 00;13;27;07
Melissa
And then we also the people who are deciding that, you know, this market, maybe I hold on to them, and just feed them out myself. So that's kind of how I break it down. And, you know, kind of those three different marketing, end points and then break it down from there. What do I really need to be, focusing on?
00;13;27;09 - 00;13;52;17
Melissa
And, like I said, carrying these, you know, that one of those, those huge factors that we got to get a live calf. Okay, on the beef side, you know, we got to look at that. Cavani's direct birth weight and gestation length. And this was, you know, in a conversation you and I had earlier last spring, Brad, I didn't even realize, like, how much of a difference there was between dairy and beef as far as how much longer?
00;13;52;20 - 00;14;09;27
Melissa
The gestation length is of beef. So something to keep, you know, to, to be mindful of. And then, you know, looking at that, that growth, of course, you know, looking at our growth EPS as far as weaning weight, yearling weight, they're very important for that.
00;14;09;28 - 00;14;30;26
Brad
Well, one question I've always had is, you know, and I've looked at sires and trying to figure out bulls that I can use on our dairy cows. You know, I look at Angus Bull say, Angus bulls, do I really look at calving ease? No. Yes and no. I try to, but I also look at the some of the carcass traits.
00;14;30;26 - 00;14;53;10
Brad
And so how can we get maybe farmers to maybe pay a little more attention. And what what's maybe the couple carcass traits that they should looking for from an EPD standpoint when they're selecting bulls or if if the eye breeder is just selecting bulls for them to use because you don't want to use crappy bulls because then you're just going to have not very good steaks at the end.
00;14;53;10 - 00;15;16;26
Brad
So, you know, trying to get dairy producers to think about the end product. Two years from now. Yep. They they they're not going to think about because they're just going to sell it at ten days of age. But maybe we should start thinking a little bit about it and trying to think about the end product. So what are some of those things that we might look for from a carcass standpoint, and some of those sire speeds to see if we can help improve things.
00;15;16;29 - 00;15;39;02
Melissa
Right. And so some of the carcass traits that the dairy producers should be looking at, and you can make this as simple or as complex as you want. You know, we have the we have the EPS. Okay. And then we actually we have the indexes, which basically tells us that, the association, the breed association or maybe our genetics company has tried to simplify it, you know, keep it simple.
00;15;39;08 - 00;16;03;11
Melissa
But, they really try to combine everything together for us. And so just, you know, a simple, simple tool to use if you want to actually, you know, the carcass traits, though, that go into those, those indexes or the angles economic indexes, what's going to make us money are things like marbling. Okay. Of course we want to have that intra muscular fat within that ribeye area.
00;16;03;13 - 00;16;21;14
Melissa
Carcass weight. How big is that actual. You know, how many how many pounds of total carcass are we is going to be hanging on that rail once we pull off. You know, the awful you know, like all their, their, their intestines, things like that, that we don't actually consume what's left hanging on that rail rib eye area.
00;16;21;17 - 00;16;50;27
Melissa
Okay. This is measuring square inches. So the big difference, big advantage of our native or our true beef sired K or beef born calves is that it has this big, beautiful, you know, big ribeye. Okay. The problem with purebred dairy is that we get this smaller triangular shape by the advantage of doing this beef and dairy process is that we essentially, kind of blow that up, that ribeye up just a little bit, and it gives us this really ideal nice round shape to it.
00;16;51;00 - 00;17;10;26
Melissa
So we want to have a bigger ribeye area and then fat. And we're talking about fat. We're we're measuring the fat that is essentially mostly on the outside of the carcass. You know in between the height and the actual red meat yield. And that's the stuff that essentially goes to waste. We can't consume that. So we want to have that be a lower number.
00;17;10;28 - 00;17;34;03
Melissa
Now when we go to our indexes, this is going to look at, you know if we these are just some examples okay I'm just looking at the Angus speeds. But things like a feedlot value a grid value okay. So if you are a feedlot value, if you're just growing those calves out like backgrounding them, they've already combined all those economically important empties and then they've given us this number.
00;17;34;03 - 00;17;53;04
Melissa
We want a high number for that grid value would be another one. If we're selling those cattle on the grid, like we're getting paid for that carcass, okay. That would be an important $1 beef dollars CHB. You know, that's certified Hereford beef dollars. You know, certified Angus beef. Like I said, they've already taken all the work out of it.
00;17;53;07 - 00;18;14;12
Melissa
But we really want to be focusing on things like marbling, carcass weight, ribeye area and fat. Those are those EPs that like you said, Brad, we need to. It all begins. We're making those genetic decisions. And even if we're not retaining interest in those cows and getting paid for it, it's still something that we need to be mindful of because that should be a driver.
00;18;14;18 - 00;18;23;12
Melissa
And if I've got some really heavy muscled carcass or really heavy muscled calves with good carcass traits, that should be a selling point that should be worth more.
00;18;23;12 - 00;18;45;05
Brad
Well, I look at the couple bulls that I am using right now. Couple Angus bulls one $1 B is 258, the other one is 212. But they're very different. You know, one is the $258 B is has an EPD for calving ease of six, and the other one which is a little bit lower for dollar B as a calving ease of three.
00;18;45;05 - 00;19;12;03
Brad
So I sort of select a few things based on calving ease, or at least I try to anyways, to improve that. I think that it's interesting as I look at these index values and in these two bulls that I particular got are from genetics. They also have a dollar a times Holstein index and a dollar a times Jersey J, which I assume is Jersey.
00;19;12;03 - 00;19;37;14
Brad
So that's interesting. I had never seen that before. And as far as once it's going to make more money based on, whether we breed them to a Holstein or to a Jersey. So, you know, I it's well, how else do I select? You know, I may be a little bit different, when selecting bulls, selecting some of these bulls, but I also pay attention to fertility in my dairy animals.
00;19;37;14 - 00;19;57;14
Brad
And that's maybe one thing that gets lost in all of this. So I've some of these bulls I've used a couple times in our breeding seasons because I know they get cows pregnant. There is a couple bulls. I think last summer I threw away 30 units of one Angus bull because he was terrible for fertility and getting cows pregnant.
00;19;57;14 - 00;20;30;12
Brad
So it happens in the beef world as well. If we can't keep goats pregnant, that's, kind of a disaster. And so I think maybe at least Brad's philosophy don't jump in with the whole bunch. I'm using five Angus bulls right now. You know, 1 or 2 is maybe not enough. I think we should use, a multiple of those different bulls just to make sure that we cover all of our bases with low calving ease and, you know, good fertility in our dairy cattle.
00;20;30;13 - 00;20;49;03
Emily
I think that, you know, that. You you answered the question I was about to ask, which was about how many bulls should we have? Right. Yeah. How do we put all of our eggs in one basket? And it sounds like the answer is no. Better, better to. Yeah. Kind of get a sampling from several bulls and then find what works.
00;20;49;06 - 00;21;16;27
Melissa
That's a really good point to Brett on the fertility. That and I think the genetics companies, just because they can report what they want and don't have to go to like, you know, the, the breed association, they're kind of limited. But in terms of, sometimes they will have a, you know, desire, better females settle better to this, sire, when using an AI program or of course, we can look at, you know, squirrel circumference and some of those indicator traits to measure fertility.
00;21;16;27 - 00;21;36;16
Melissa
But that would be something that I would consider to, like you said, I mean, just of course trying it out, but what are some of those things that you can be looking at ahead of time that, oh, maybe this, you know, some sires just really, you know, they've got good growth speeds and everything else. But maybe they just maybe females just don't settle well to them in a synchronized or, or some sort of an AI program.
00;21;36;16 - 00;21;36;20
Melissa
Yeah.
00;21;36;20 - 00;22;12;10
Brad
It's always a tough one, you know. And some, some animals may do. Well, I've, I've had some Kevin's issues with some bulls that we've used in the past. Not necessarily Angus bulls but, Limousin bulls. There's been some cavernous, differences that I've seen and trying to mitigate those effects. You know, you don't sometimes the bull proof doesn't always show what happens, especially when we were early on in the beef on dairy, on world and, and trying to get some of these, trying to pick the right bulls is is always a challenge, I should say.
00;22;12;17 - 00;22;31;04
Melissa
And even the beef world, we of course, is the 200 standards Angus 283 day gestation length. But, like you mentioned, Brad, not only I mean, you know, some of those calving these issues, like what? What is the actual size of the calf that's being born and then how many days to a, you know, like I said, we use 283 is our standard gestation length.
00;22;31;11 - 00;22;53;27
Melissa
How many more days in gestation are those? Do those calves go. So, you know, like the Charlie, the Limousin much longer. They're up to like 291 days gestation length. So we got a bigger calf and we got one that was cooked a little bit longer. So things to be mindful of when you're selecting, you know, maybe some of these beef breeds of or sires of other breeds.
00;22;53;29 - 00;23;18;14
Brad
Yeah. And I'm still here and some farmers are still using Charlie and other people are starting or recommending Charlie as well. And we, we sort of saw that this past summer when we were having our beef and dairy meetings that people were suggesting the use of Charlie. And, you know, it's always a tough one. Yes. There is only one breed you should use for this.
00;23;18;14 - 00;23;21;13
Brad
What is that breed? Emily?
00;23;21;16 - 00;23;22;26
Emily
Jersey.
00;23;22;29 - 00;23;23;29
Brad
Wrong.
00;23;24;01 - 00;23;26;28
Emily
Oh, Hereford. We're we're talking turkey.
00;23;27;00 - 00;23;51;19
Brad
Yeah, I'm just kidding. I think there's multiple breeds that we can use. I don't, I don't I think it depends on the management situation of the farm and where we're going to go. They all produce wonderful carcasses. From what we found. They all have great tasting steaks, I'll tell you that. There is no doubt about it. I'm enjoying the Angus steaks, as well as the Simmental ones and the Charlotte ones, and the Hereford steaks as well.
00;23;51;19 - 00;24;14;09
Brad
So, in our little taste panel. So it's been, kind of interesting to see where that goes. And I've kind of gone back all to Angus now for reasons of research projects, to try and figure out the Angus thing and having purebred Angus embryos side by side. So I don't know, it'll be interesting to see, what's going to happen in the future.
00;24;14;09 - 00;24;20;24
Emily
Yeah, definitely feels like this is not the last we'll be talking about this, right?
00;24;20;26 - 00;24;50;04
Melissa
I just I thought it was really interesting this the summer, Brad, when you and I were doing the Beef and Dairy Insights program at, different locations and just hearing what? Yes. What I what are people's thoughts on using some of these beef sires of different breeds? And I think that was just it was really insightful to see just the pictures that you had because people like, well, I've heard about using some Charlie, you know, Charlie genetics or even, let's go crazy, let's do some Herefords on there.
00;24;50;10 - 00;25;12;09
Melissa
And to me they look like a black and white Hereford. They really didn't stand out as far as like, oh gosh, that one's got, you know, dairy genetics in it. So it was really interesting for me and kind of insightful to hear what people's perspectives and their willingness to try something new if they hadn't, was a lot of them just needed convincing that they should be using a beef sire rather than, a dairy sire.
00;25;12;11 - 00;25;32;00
Brad
That's right. In. Who knows, maybe we'll I'll go back to feeding Holstein steers one day to, at $1,000 per, calf. I it I'd love to do some more Holstein steer research and compare those to the beef and dairy ones and and see how that's going to go. But Brad can only do so many things.
00;25;32;01 - 00;25;36;23
Emily
No, I think, Brad, you could add at least a couple more things related to this especially.
00;25;37;00 - 00;25;39;11
Brad
Oh, I would love to. I would love to. I don't know if.
00;25;39;11 - 00;25;41;01
Emily
I can only the answers.
00;25;41;03 - 00;26;00;10
Brad
That's right. I don't know if we have the space to do all of this. This is the problem. We have 300 milking cows and trying to add 75 steers, which I'm going to do this fall. Will be taxed, with our facilities there. So I don't know, but I'm sure I could find I could figure out something.
00;26;00;10 - 00;26;01;22
Brad
Don't worry. I always do.
00;26;01;27 - 00;26;28;18
Emily
So that's actually something I had a question about. And that was facilities. You know, we talk about management, environment, epigenetics, all of those things. And I think we know in, in Minnesota especially and I think across the upper Midwest, we have a wide variety of facilities used, you know, for, for our beef producers. And everybody system is just a little different, you know, my own family, right.
00;26;28;18 - 00;26;53;07
Emily
Where my brother's just running, a small herd of of pairs, and then also some feeder steers in, in all dairy facilities. Right. So do do we know anything about how that might impact what decisions we're making or, you know, because we think on the dairy side, right. Like, oh, our facilities are really going to impact how big we want our animals to be.
00;26;53;09 - 00;27;16;26
Emily
You know, so are there any considerations related to that of just knowing, you know, we have cattle being fed in Minnesota on true feedlots. We have cattle being fed, you know, dairy facilities. You know, we have, you know, variety of, of cow calf pair operation styles. So any any comments on that? You know, I think a lot about facilities.
00;27;16;26 - 00;27;23;09
Emily
So curious if that has played a role or should play a role or am I just blowing smoke?
00;27;23;09 - 00;27;47;01
Melissa
I think I can go ahead and talk a little bit about that. But Emily, you were like, spot on. And actually that leads me into a really good point. We are having a panel discussion at our, Dairy Beef short course event ahead of the Central Plains Dairy Expo. In March. That is actually, we're going to bring in some producers to talk about just what you talked about, about facilities.
00;27;47;03 - 00;28;12;12
Melissa
So the main thing with these beef and dairy crosses is we know that they, they require more days on feed. They're not as efficient as a straight purebred beef animal. Okay. So we're going to be feeding them out longer. What does that mean though, in terms of, you know, hoof abscesses of lesions, things like that. And what impact does that play on their feet efficiency and their growth and their outward.
00;28;12;14 - 00;28;34;11
Melissa
So we're going to have some people that are going to come in and talk about, they're going to talk about, you know, raising them. And, I would call that your bed pack, essentially kind of your typical traditional, you know, feedlots, raising them outside, essentially, raising them on a slatted floor and then also raising them and then raising them.
00;28;34;13 - 00;28;52;14
Melissa
With, just on concrete, you know, like an, a Monticello type of facility. So we're going to have some producers come in and talk about the good, the bad and the ugly, to my knowledge. And maybe, Brad, you can correct me on this. I have not seen a lot of data yet. Maybe other like kind of looks at the difference in performance.
00;28;52;16 - 00;29;19;13
Melissa
I've seen some I've seen data out there, but maybe a little bit, you know, when they're, they're conducting their own types of research, when they're selling you facilities, take it with a grain of salt. But actually comparing them with in Minnesota and what just, you know, our our weather and you know, the see these cattle, they get their genetics, you know, maybe not quite as tough or as, as hardy as our straight bred beef animals.
00;29;19;20 - 00;29;33;01
Melissa
How well do they do outside and then do that in a side by side comparison with similar type genetics? I haven't seen that data, but I'm not saying that it isn't out there isn't in the process. But, kind of kind of some preliminary stuff going on.
00;29;33;03 - 00;29;55;16
Brad
Yeah. I think the, you know, facilities are certainly important in all of this. I think it depends on each farm. We by no means here have the Taj Mahal of facilities, and we grow great steers and they do very well. So I think it all comes down to management and how it can make work on the farms that you have.
00;29;55;16 - 00;30;07;12
Brad
I know that's important and I'm facilities are important, but I think you can grow great steers if you have the perfect management or you don't need perfect management, but you need good management.
00;30;07;13 - 00;30;26;10
Melissa
I would second that. And just from some kinds of conversations that I have, I've been a part of, somebody who has through the years has grown their operation and, but still kept some of the all that, you know, they're the original facilities. They still go back to the you know, it may not be the most efficient to have them outside on a bed pack.
00;30;26;13 - 00;30;44;12
Melissa
But their, their theory is that the cattle are just so much more comfortable doing that. But it really comes down to keeping them clean and keeping them dry. And sometimes if you are short on on help, it's short on time and just can't get it all done. That's where we tend to start to see performance suffer a little bit.
00;30;44;15 - 00;31;08;29
Emily
All right. So facilities important consideration. And of course I agree with Bradley 100%. It's also how you manage in your facilities if you have the nicest newest thing. But aren't managing to it, that's not going to be good for your cattle. So yeah. All right. Good. Good to know. Right. Well, I think we talked about a lot of good things in this episode.
00;31;08;29 - 00;31;28;05
Emily
I know I learned a lot, you know, as as not a beef expert. So this was a great conversation to, to be a part of and listen in on. And for those of you listening, if you do have any questions, comments or scathing rebuttals about today's episode, you can email those to the Moos room at Umkc. Edu.
00;31;28;08 - 00;31;54;28
Emily
You can find, us on the web, including a whole slew of upcoming beef events like cow calf days, BKA trainings, etc. UN extension, edu click on courses and events at the top. Thank you again so much Melissa for joining us today. It is always great to have you on, and I'm sure we will have you back in the near future and we will wrap it there for today.
00;31;54;28 - 00;31;59;17
Emily
So thank you everybody for listening and we will catch you next time on the Moose Room.
00;31;59;19 - 00;32;00;26
Brad
Bye bye bye.