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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Monday November 26,
2007! A
service of National Livestock Credit Corporation, American Farmers and
Ranchers & Midwest Farm Shows
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-- This week- the Oklahoma Ag Expo!
-- More on the Jhett Skaggs Benefit Auction This Wednesday Evening in
Lawton.
-- Advance Foods Rolling Out Two Beef Items Perfect for the Appetizer
Category.
-- Beef Quality Assurance Program for Mama Cow Operators
-- 2007 Oklahoma Cotton Crop Looking Mighty Fine!
-- Terry Stokes of NCBA- gotta keep pushing to get Asian Beef Markets
Opened Wider for US Beef.
Howdy Neighbors! Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. American Farmers and Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company is a regular sponsor of our daily update- click here to go to their NEW AFR web site to learn more about their efforts to serve rural America!!! We are proud to also welcome National Livestock Credit Corporation as a regular sponsor of our daily email update. National Livestock Credit Corporation works diligently to provide unsurpassed service to their customers in the area of livestock financing. Check out the National Livestock Family of Services website by clicking here. And our email this morning is also a service of Midwest Farm Shows, producer of the Tulsa Farm Show coming up December 6-8, 2007, as well as the Southern Plains Farm Show in Oklahoma City next spring. Check out details of both of these exciting shows at the official website of Midwest Farm Shows by clicking here. 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. | |
This week- the Oklahoma Ag Expo! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is the
annual meeting of the Oklahoma Agribusiness Retailers Association- and
will feature a whole series of presentations that will offer CEU credits
for those agribusiness professionals. A Trade Show is also planned for the
Expo, being held at the Clarion Hotel Convention Center at Meridian and
I-40 on the west side of Oklahoma City.
Among the speakers coming in for their CEU sessions- Dr. Randy Taylor of OSU talking new technology for pesticide application; Dr. JC Banks from Altus on Roundup Ready Flex programs for cotton; Lou Klaver of the Oklahoma Water Resources Board with a presentation on Oklahoma Water Rights and even a session on the new developments to improve southern plains grown Sesame- Danny Peeper, Agronomist with Wheeler Brothers handling that presentation. We have the full schedule of the 2007 Ag Expo linked from their website on our calendar page- and we have that link for you below for this event that has some preliminaries on Tuesday, with the bulk of the program happening on Wednesday and Thursday. Click here for the Schedule of the Oklahoma Ag Expo happening this week. | |
More on the Jhett Skaggs Benefit Auction This Wednesday Evening in Lawton. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We told you
Friday about the Skaggs Family of Lexington, Oklahoma. Brian Skaggs and
his wife Audra need our help- and a lot of friends are busy getting that
accomplished. Their young son, Jhett, is ten months old and needs a heart
transplant. The miracle is that we live in a day and age that this
technology is possible- but that technology is not cheap and that's where
you come in. Friends of young Jhett and his family are organizing a huge
Benefit Auction this coming Wednesday evening, November 28 in Lawton at
the Comanche County Fairgrounds. There will be cattle for sell, as well as
boots, jewelry, hunting trips and a whole lot more.
We have a couple of things on our calendar page of our website that you might want to check out. We have an interview that we have done with Ken Holloway about how this benefit has come together. In addition, we have the website for the auction linked- and later today, they may have a listing of the items to be sold. The link below is to our WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com calendar page- you will see in the November listings the Skaggs Benefit Auction with a link to both the audio interview and the auction website. Note that you will not have to travel to Lawton to participate in this auction- it will be available via the internet as well! | |
Advance Foods Rolling Out Two Beef Items Perfect for the Appetizer Category. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Enid, Oklahoma
based Advance Food Co. is offering two new smaller-sized products for
foodservice: the Tenderbroil Mini Beef Steak Burger and the Advance Mini
Charbroil Beef Pattie.
The fully cooked Tenderbroil Mini Beef Steak Burger is made of 100 percent beef steak, while the seasoned Advance Mini Charbroil Beef Pattie is available in round and square shapes with or without a sweet mini white bun. Because of their small size, Advance says, both items would work well as appetizers or kids meals. | |
Beef Quality Assurance Program for Mama Cow Operators ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ OSU Beef
Cattle Specialist Dr. Glenn Selk tells us that there is a lot to gain to
see cow calf operators step up their efforts to utilize many of the
practices that are considered best management practices for the cattle
industry. Dr. Selk writes "While great strides have been made with fed
cattle, cow operators have a ways to go. In feedlots a few people are
handling large numbers of cattle, and feedback from the processor is
fairly simple. In cow country, many more people are handling smaller
numbers of cattle, and the feedback, while real, is not so obvious.
Injection site lesions in the sirloin are one measure of the care with
which cattle are processed and medicated. From 1995 to 1999 the feedlot
industry reduced these lesions from 12% of fed carcasses to less than 2%.
In 1999 however, over 40% of all cow and bull carcasses had lesions in the
sirloin. Too often cow operators see the cow as a calf production unit
rather than a part of the food chain. The fact is, about ¼ of the beef
consumed in our country comes from cull cows and bulls and it is not all
hamburger. Today, the better cuts such as the round, sirloin, loin, and
ribeye allow the packers to pay better cow prices than we have seen in
years past. Culls represent about ¼ of the gross income for most cow
operators. If we, as an industry, could reduce the annual carcass losses
due to bruising, injection lesions, excess fat trim, and condemnation due
to drug residues, what would be your part of the extra ½ billion dollars
on the table? Cow buyers are aware of what this waste costs, and they know
what herds, areas, and sales most of the problems come from. When your
culls come through the ring you need as many hands in the air as possible.
"Proper techniques when handling and processing cattle can go a long way. Use the smallest needle that will do the job and change it at least every 10 head. Dull needles cause more lesions, and a needle that fatigues and breaks off is a serious problem. While injection site lesions are trimmed away when found, they make the whole cut of meat tougher due to extra connective tissue deposited in the muscle. Be sure to give all injections in front of the shoulder, and when you have a choice, give injections subcutaneously. Reduce bruising by eliminating overcrowding and make sure loading facilities are safe and cattle flow through them easily. Market culls before lameness and eye problems get severe, or barren cows get overly fat. "Proper drug and vaccine usage can be summed up with 5 words, "Read the label," and "Keep records." Drug residue problems result when dosage, course of treatment, or route of administration are not according to the label, or withdrawal time before slaughter are not adhered to. According to law, all violations are the responsibility of the producer, so if you have a problem not only are the future prices you receive affected, but you will be subject to possible fines and/or quarantine. If you do have a violation, if you can produce proper treatment records officials are likely to work with you to help identify and solve the problem. Without records, they may well resort to sterner measures." | |
2007 Oklahoma Cotton Crop Looking Mighty Fine! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Top cotton
yields continue to be reported for the 2007 harvest season here in
Oklahoma. "We are just getting started with our ginning season," reports
Rodney Sawatzky, manager of the Midwest Farmers Inc.cooperative at
Clinton, Ok., "We have just ginned 600 bales to date. All of the cotton we
receive comes from dryland fields and we are seeing bale and a half yields
per acre. We received our first bale Nov. 11. Our farmers have 1,900 acres
of cotton this year and we are expecting 2,500 bales."
"We are just now finding out how this year's crop is grading, but it
looks like one of the best varieties planted for us this year was Fibermax
9063. Everybody is really tickled about how their cotton is yielding this
year. The 2007 crop got started late around here. In fact, it wasn't until
July 15 that our cotton started to look promising. The rains we received
last spring that continued into the summer gave us plenty of moisture, but
it continued to be a problem for the cotton to grow until we started
getting warmer, dry weather. The increased heat units (longer, warmer
days) with cooler nights really helped our cotton to put on more bolls and
mature well." Approximately two thirds of the cotton grown in the Southern Plains (Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas) has been harvested this year, according to the weekly National Cotton Council report. As of Nov. 18, 2007, 65 percent of the Kansas cotton has been harvested. Sixty-three percent of the Oklahoma crop is complete and Texas reports 60 percent of its crop is out of the field. We have linked below the website of NTOK- the website dedicated to giving you regular information important to the cotton industry from north Texas across Oklahoma into southern Kansas. | |
Terry Stokes of NCBA- gotta keep pushing to get Asian Beef Markets Opened Wider for US Beef. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ On today's
Beef Buzz- our daily beef news radio update from the Radio Oklahoma
Network- we have as our guest Terry Stokes, the CEO of the National
Cattlemen's Beef Association. Stokes is just back from Asia- and made
stops in several countries that we need fully reopened for our cattle
producers to be able to take full advantage of the export marketplace.
Stokes expresses optimism that we will see progress in both South Korea and Japan in opening up those markets for US beef. He claims that while we are currently facing a suspension of trade with South Korea- that the leaders they met with are aware of the importance of going to the International Health Agency's standards for BSE. In fact, that was the discussion in Korea, Japan and China. They are saying that they are willing to buy into the OIE guidelines for diseases like BSE- but we have had zero visible movement since this past spring when the US was declared a "minimal risk" country for BSE- with the OIE saying that all beef from the US- bone in or boneless from animals of any age is safe from BSE as long as the OIE list of specified risk materials are removed. You can listen to our daily Beef Buzz on radio stations around the state on the Radio Oklahoma Network- as well as on our website on our Beef Buzz page. I have linked today's report for you below- take a listen! | |
Our thanks to Midwest Farm Shows, American Farmers and Ranchers Mutual Insurance and National Livestock Credit Corporationfor their support of our daily Farm News Update. For your convenience, we have our sponsors' websites linked at the top of the email- check them 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! 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. | |
God Bless! You can reach us at the following: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
email: ron@oklahomafarmreport.com
phone: 405-473-6144
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