From: Ron Hays [ron@oklahomafarmreport.ccsend.com] on behalf of Ron Hays [ron@oklahomafarmreport.com]
Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010 7:42 AM
To: Hays, Ron
Subject: Oklahoma's Farm News Update
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Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Friday May 21, 2010
A service of Johnston Enterprises, P & K Equipment/ P & K Wind Energy and American Farmers & Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company!
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-- Budget Deal Struck Between Governor and Legislative Leaders- ODAFF Faces 15% Budget Cut
-- Rural Lawmakers Justice and Sanders Offer Praise for the Survival of REAP
-- Steep Discounts This Wheat Harvest Could Slap Wheat Farmers in the Face
-- Beef Quality Assurance Efforts Have Done a World of Good for Beef Industry
-- Calm Down, Take a Deep Breath- and Guess What- Your Cattle Will, Too.
-- Cattle on Feed This Afternoon
-- Oklahoma Water Town Hall Kicks Off Sunday
-- Let's Check the Markets!

Howdy Neighbors!

Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. We are pleased to have American Farmers & Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company as a regular sponsor of our daily update- click here to go to their AFR web site to learn more about their efforts to serve rural America!

It is also great to have as an annual sponsor on our daily email Johnston Enterprises- proud to be serving agriculture across Oklahoma and around the world since 1893. For more on Johnston Enterprises- click here for their website!

And we are proud to have P & K Equipment/ P & K Wind Energy as one of our regular sponsors of our daily email update. P & K is the premiere John Deere dealer in Oklahoma, with nine locations to serve you, and the P & K team are excited about their new Wind Power program, as they offer Endurance Wind Power wind turbines. Click here for more from the P&K website.

If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here.


Budget Deal Struck Between Governor and Legislative Leaders- ODAFF Faces 15% Budget Cut
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Democratic Gov. Brad Henry and Republican leaders of the House and Senate reached an agreement on a state budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1, several Democratic lawmakers said Thursday. Lawmakers have to build a state budget for the upcoming fiscal year with about $1.2 billion less to spend than they had last year. By using the remainder of the state's federal stimulus funds and money from state cash reserves, the budget hole is still estimated to be about $600 million.

Under the FY 2011 agreement, $6.68 billion in general revenue will be appropriated to state agencies and programs, K-12 education and career technology education will receive targeted cuts of just 2.9 percent and higher education's budget will be reduced by 3.3 percent.
The Department of Public Safety will be cut by only 1 percent and the Department of Corrections will receive a 3 percent reduction.

The cut to the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture will be one of the steeper cuts made to a state agency, as the ODAFF faces a fifteen percent cut compared to the Fiscal Year 2010 allocation of $30.777 million dollars- the FY 2011 allocation for the Department is 26.307 million dollars.
Meanwhile, the Oklahoma Conservation Commission actually sees an increase of 9% compared to the FY 2010 budget at $9.845 million slated for this agency in the 12 month period starting July first.

One program that survives after being zeroed out by Governor Henry's budget proposal is the Rural Economic Action Plan- otherwise known as REAP. REAP takes a seven percent cut for the coming Fiscal Year with the deal calling for $12.4 million dollars for the program.


Rural Lawmakers Justice and Sanders Offer Praise for the Survival of REAP
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Senator Ron Justice of Chickasha is the Chairman of the Senate Rural Caucus- he offered the following comment after the budget deal was announced on Thursday.

"Rural Oklahoma has a tremendous impact on our state and nation. We are a state full of hardworking families who take pride in Oklahoma values.
"As a rural member of the Senate, I along with many of my fellow colleagues stood together in fighting for REAP funding. We knew that in order to protect rural Oklahoma and continue moving our state forward, REAP needed to be a vital aspect of the budget.
"The Governor, Pro Tempore and Speaker have worked tirelessly to craft a budget in a bipartisan fashion that meets the states needs and I commend them for their efforts."

Meanwhile, Rep Mike Sanders of Kingfisher also released some comments- expressing his pleasure in seeing both the REAP program perserved, as well as the tax credit for Rural Fire Fighters. "Obviously, in this down budget environment we have to make some tough choices, but I felt it was shortsighted to financially penalize rural firefighters who volunteer their time and risk their lives to protect their neighbors," Sanders said. "Preserving the firefighter tax credit was another important victory for rural Oklahoma."

Click here for our story on the Budget Deal- including a look at the FY2011 vs FY2010 comparisions for all agencies.


Steep Discounts This Wheat Harvest Could Slap Wheat Farmers in the Face
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Harvest draws closer- and with it, the reality that wheat prices are far less than they were in May of 2009. Cash prices were at or slightly above seven dollars per bushel at elevators across Oklahoma in the days leading up to Memorial Day last year. This year they are mostly at $4 or less per bushel. Dr. Kim Anderson, extension grain market economist at Oklahoma State University, says that he sees little opportunity for improvement- pointing out that recent days have seen erosion in wheat prices of ten to twenty five cents per bushel. He believes that most wheat prices that farmers will be receiving for wheat they sell at harvest will have a three in front of them.

Dr. Anderson says the biggest worry is that steep discounts have been circulated by subterminals as we approach harvest. There will be discounts for foreign material in your wheat- and these rains to this point, followed by sunny hot weather could trigger a late flush of weeds to have to work through as the combines roll in a few weeks. An even bigger discount could come if test weights fall on wheat delivered to the elevator. For wheat coming in with a test weight under 58 pounds per bushel, discounts will kick in. Dr. Anderson says that, for example, if you have a 56 pound test weight, that could result in a fifteen to sixteen cent per bushel discount.

We have the audio from Kim's conversation this week with Clinton Griffiths of SUNUP- you can get your day early preview of what he has to say about the wheat market by clicking on the link below and then listening to Kim and Clinton. We also have the lineup for this weekend's SUNUP on our webstory there as well. Go check it out.

Click here for more on the wheat market and possible discounts coming in 2010- PLUS the SUNUP lineup for this weekend.


Beef Quality Assurance Efforts Have Done a World of Good for Beef Industry
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Dr. Bob Smith helped kick off the International Symposium on Beef Cattle Welfare in Manhattan, Kansas on Wednesday evening- and the Stillwater, Oklahoma Veterinarian spoke about the Beef Industry's efforts to transfer standards of animal care developed by academia and others down to the producer level.
Dr. Smith says that a lot of this work got off the ground back in 2002, as beef cattle care guidelines were developed by a panel of animal well being experts like Dr. Temple Grandlin and others- in consultation with cattle producers around the country.

These guidelines have gone out to cattle producers around the country and have been a key part of the BQA efforts of the industry. We talked with Dr. Smith about these efforts- and how the industry has had to ramp up beef quality assurance training efforts since the HSUS release of the video from the packing plant in California. You can click on the link below to get to our story on the web- and that's where you will find our full conversation with Dr. Smith to take a listen to.

Dr. Bob Smith was a part of the faculty and extension efforts at Oklahoma State University for many years, but now is in private practice with five other veterinarians at Veterinary Research and Consulting Services, working with feedlot and stocker cattle clients across the high plains. His clients have a one time capacity of 1500 to 60,000 cattle.

Click here for more on Dr. Bob Smith's comments from the International Symposium for Beef Cattle Welfare.


Calm Down, Take a Deep Breath- and Guess What- Your Cattle Will, Too.
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The keynote speaker at the International Symposium for Beef Cattle Welfare, Dr. Temple Grandlin, joins us today on the Beef Buzz.

We talked with her about some of the key things that cattle producers and others that handle cattle can do to put less stress on the cattle and allow those animals to be moved or worked with greater ease. One of her big talking points at the Symposium this week is the idea that "calm people make for calm cattle."

Click on the link below to jump to today's Beef Buzz- and hear some of the ideas about working cattle that have helped make Temple Grandlin a legend in the Beef Cattle Well Being arena.

Click here for today's Beef Buzz with Dr. Temple Grandlin of Colorado State as she offers a few tips on handling cattle in a less stressful way.


Cattle on Feed This Afternoon
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Uncle Sam will offer the latest Cattle on Feed numbers after the markets close for the week at 2 PM central time. Joe Victor with Allendale gives us his company's best ideas on these numbers and what they may tell us we head for the start of the grilling season.

Allendale believes that the placements will be significantly higher than in 2009. "April Placements are expected to be 5.0% larger than last year. Cash cattle prices in April averaged $4 higher than March levels. At the same time corn prices averaged 15 cents lower. Cattle placed in April will be marketed from late August through late November."

"Allendale anticipates a Marketing total 1.1% smaller than April of 2009. There is no calendar adjustment this month. Cattle feeders have worked off those higher placements made from July through October and are now marketing the smaller winter placements."

Overall, the total number of cattle on feed as of May first is still expected to be less than a year ago. "Total Cattle on Feed as of May 1 will be 2.8% smaller than last year. Our estimate is the lowest May 1 Cattle on Feed in six years."

Check out our website later this afteroon(Friday afternoon) for a look at the actual numbers from USDA- we plan on having Tom Leffler joining us and giving us his thoughts on what USDA comes up with.


Oklahoma Water Town Hall Kicks Off Sunday
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A lot of key agricultural leaders will be out of pocket from Sunday afternoon through midday Wednesday as one of the final water events in the multi year process of developing a Statewide Water Plan will be happening in Norman.

We will be previewing what may be happening in this last round of meetings regarding the water plan and agriculture on this Saturday's In the Field as we have invited one of the participants in this process, Terry Detrick, President of the American Farmers & Ranchers, to be our Saturday morning guest. In the Field is seen on KWTV, News9 in the Oklahoma City viewing area around 6:40 AM.

We also will have comments with Detrick on our website- check out his thoughts on the process later today at www.OklahomaFarmReport.Com.

Click here after lunch on Friday as we will preview the Oklahoma Water Town Hall Meeting with Terry Detrick of AFR- look for this preview as our Top Agricultural Story.


Our thanks to Midwest Farms Shows, PCOM, P & K Equipment/ P & K Wind Energy, Johnston Enterprises, American Farmers & Ranchers, KIS Futuresand Big Iron Online Auctions for their support of our daily Farm News Update. For your convenience, we have our sponsors' websites linked here- just click on their name to jump to their website- check their sites out and let these folks know you appreciate the support of this daily email, as their sponsorship helps us keep this arriving in your inbox on a regular basis- FREE!

We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe.

Click here to check out WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com


Let's Check the Markets!
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We've had requests to include Canola prices for your convenience here- and we will be doing so on a regular basis. Current cash price for Canola is $7.15 per bushel, while the 2010 New Crop contracts for Canola are now available are $7.15 per bushel- delivered to local participating elevators that are working with PCOM.

Here are some links we will leave in place on an ongoing basis- Click on the name of the report to go to that link:
Our Daily Market Wrapup from the Radio Oklahoma Network with Ed Richards and Tom Leffler- analyzing the Futures Markets from the previous Day-
Ron on RON Markets as heard on K101 mornings with cash and futures reviewed- includes where the Cash Cattle market stands, the latest Feeder Cattle Markets Etc.
Previous Day's Wheat Market Recap- Two Pager From The Kansas City Board of Trade looks at all three US Wheat Futures Exchanges with extra info on Hard Red Winter Wheat and the why of that day's market.
Daily Oklahoma Cash Grain Prices- As Reported by the Oklahoma Dept. of Agriculture. <
The National Daily Feeder & Stocker Cattle Summary- as prepared by USDA.
The National Daily Slaughter Cattle Summary- as prepared by USDA.
Finally, Here is the Daily Volume and Price Summary from the Texas Cattle Feeders Association.



God Bless! You can reach us at the following:
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phone: 405-473-6144
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