Ben Beckman, Nebraska Extension Educator With many producers utilizing annual forage/cover crops and prevent plant acres, the amount of “non-traditional” forage options on the market have increased this past year. As long as we keep an eye out for potential nitrate issues, sorghum/sudangrass, milo, or small grains like oats, rye, and wheat can all make great forage options as hay or silage. Whether you are looking to buy or sell these products, answering…
Aaron Berger, Nebraska Extension Beef Educator For producers weighing opportunities to reduce unit cost of production, evaluate the potential ripple effects of the proposed change to the whole cow-calf production system. Photo credit Troy Walz. Unit cost of production is a ratio where costs in the numerator are divided by the units produced in the denominator. There are five ways to reduce unit costs of production in a cow-calf enterprise. Decrease costs while…
Karla H. Wilke, UNL Cow/Calf Systems and Stocker Management Much like cows, bull body condition needs to be evaluated as fat cover over the front ribs, brisket, and tail head making sure that gut fill does not impact the score given. Photo credit Troy Walz. Although the breeding season for many herds is still a few months away, it is time to be evaluating bull body condition. Body condition is just as important…
Six decades after pouring water into its livestock production, the United States is investing relative drops in the bucket to produce its meat, milk and eggs, says a recent analysis from Nebraska’s Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute. Relying on data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other sources, the team analyzed the annual U.S. outputs of beef, pork, poultry and milk from 1960 to 2016. The researchers also estimated the yearly…
Ben Beckman, Nebraska Extension Educator Knowing the moisture content of our feedstuffs and how to adjust our feeding plans accordingly is important. Photo credit Troy Walz. The past few months, we’ve been focusing quite a bit on the issues that can arise when hay gets a bit too wet: combustion, mold, and Maillard reactions. One often overlooked issue that can arise from wet hay is just the moisture itself. Whenever we provide part…
As winter progresses, winter nutrition and increased environmental stress on cows may concern many cow-calf producers. Winter nutritional management affects not only the profitability of a beef cowherd, but also the future performance of the cow and her offspring. With that in mind, building a nutritional program for a cow-calf system requires understanding nutritional requirements, knowing the “stress periods” that can happen, and knowing the quality and quantity of your forage resources. One…
Leslie Johnson, UNL Animal Manure Management Project Coordinator Which field benefits the most from manure? Participants combine personal experiences and management principles to identify preferred fields for receiving manure. Livestock producers with livestock waste control facility permits received or renewed since April 1998 must be certified, and farms must complete an approved training every five years. The Nebraska Extension Animal Manure Management Team holds Land Application Training events annually to fulfill this requirement.…
Randy Saner, Nebraska Extension EducatorMatt Stockton, Nebraska Extension Ag Economics Specialist While the selection of replacement animals in a herd of beef cattle may differ from ranch to ranch, there are three factors seen by the authors as critically important that affect their value as replacements. Photo credit Troy Walz. What is a respectable value of a beef replacement heifer for the coming 2019-2020 production season? This can be a complicated choice, but…
Ben Beckman, Nebraska Extension Educator Testing forage quality of your hay, whether it’s your own or purchased, is a critical first step to optimizing hay use. Photo credit Troy Walz. Hay put up too wet can lead to a number of issues, most notably mold and heat. Moisture keeps otherwise dormant microbes and fungi active, decreasing forage quality and creating heat. Too much heat can actually create a risk of combustion. However, even…
Good production with cost control differentiated the most profitable producers from those that were the least profitable. Photo credit Troy Walz. Listen to a discussion of the content in this article on this episode of the BeefWatch podcast. You can subscribe to new episodes in iTunes or paste http://feeds.feedburner.com/unlbeefwatch into your podcast app. This study by Whitney Bowman, Dustin L. Pendell Ph.D. and Kevin L. Herbel can be found at the Kansas State…