Features
Cattleman: Turnaround inevitable for beef, dairy industries
<i>Originally published in the September 4, 2009, print edition.</i>
There isn’t much excitement in the beef markets these days, but an exception might be bull sales for Wabasha County cattleman Don Heise.
“I think ranchers appreciate value, especially in the young bulls they buy,” Heise said. “Most sell their bulls every two years so they’re not breeding their offspring heifers. So maybe this was the year when they were selling off their bulls, and looking for something different. I don’t know the reason but my bull sales have been good.”
Though not known as the “beef center” of Minnesota, ranchers, wherever they operate, stay tuned to good genetic sources. Heise sells mostly into Minnesota and Wisconsin but has also sold bulls in North Dakota and South Dakota.
Formerly running as many as 45 Shorthorn cows, he’s down to just 10 cows currently, primarily because of the economy. Like most beef men, he indicated that feeding costs — unless you grow most of your own feed — have pretty much wiped out black ink, at least for the time being.
He sees a turnaround as inevitable both in the beef industry and the dairy industry. More jobs, more people getting back to work, and getting interest rates down so borrowed money isn’t so expensive and the livestock business will start a rebound, Heise said.
The big question is when, and he doesn’t want to make that prediction. Heise is a board member of the Wabasha County Cattlemen’s Association.
Melissa Dohrn, a recent University of Minnesota graduate in Animal Science now helping at her parents’ Wabasha County 150-head beef cow operation — which also used to be a 150-cow diary operation — isn’t excited about a quick turnaround in the livestock markets, either.
“If there’s a saving factor out there it could be that it looks like $3 corn, maybe even less, is a reality this fall. But right now the livestock industry is really struggling. It looks like a slow recovery,” she said.
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