|
Dick in Ore.
12-26-2003 21:36:20
|
|
Re: Re: OT-cattle prices today? in reply to Small farmer in Oklahoma, 12-26-2003 18:51:55
|
|
|
One point to remember: "The Bigger you are, the harder you fall". This dairyman in Mabton Washington, with his 4000 head is about to loose is herd. I've heard numerous times in the last day that his entire herd will have to be slaughtered. This will be devistating. Like my grandfather used to say: If I were to loose my small herd of 15 dairy cows, I could still survive, but for the dairyman with several hundred, he would loose his farm. This goes to show that bigger isn't always better. Several years ago, a person could make a living milking 15 to 20 cows. Bulk trucks would come and pickup the milk. Then as dairies started to grow bigger and bigger, the trucks wouldn't stop unless you milked at least 50 cows. Now it's probably in the hundreds. I haven't heard if the USDA will pay this dairyman when they slaughter his large herd. I could see this happening, but, if it were a small farmer with 5 or 10 head that had to be destroyed, he would probably have to suffer the losses..
I can see the requirment in the near future, that a dairyman or rancher will have to keep individual records on every animal they own, from birth to slaughter, and then several years even afer they are gone. Just as though they were registered. For a dairyman with 4000 head this will be a full time job. When he buys a springer at a sale, he will also have to know this animals history to enter into his records. I think we will see many changes in the near future coming out of the recent outbreak.
As for using dairy cattle for meat.. Without culled dairy cows, where would McDonalds and others get their hamburger? It's a proven fact that a culled Holstein cows does make the best ground beef. If they didn't use them for hamburger, what would they do with them??Good luck to all,
Dick
|
|
|
