buford - 3/16/2020 19:22

Been a while since I have read and posted on here, kind of wondered what was being said last couple days and see what the fear meter was saying. I was in high school during the price freeze. It turned into a wreck. We were selling backgrounded 550 to 600 lb calves for 65 to 67 cents and doing pretty good. I had AIed about 70 head of nice black cows to Maine Anjou and we sold the 600 pound beautiful heifers (all black) for a buck a pound. One of the few times my dad ever gave me a compliment as I had chosen what to breed that bunch to and had suggested we advertise those replacements in the paper. I felt like we were on top of the world. We were strictly cow/calf people and backgrounders with most of the calves being gone by March 1 because of a tax on personal property back then. We weren’t feeders but had neighbors that were. One neighbor fed his so long that we had trouble getting them up the portable chute. Another neighbor took his up to fat and then let them go backwards and then back up to fat and sold them at a lower price than he would have gotten the first time. Another neighbor had pretty good facilities made of wood of course. The loading chute went up and then had a flat part at the top with a sharp turn into the truck. The steers were huge. When one of them made the turn into the truck the bottom fell out and the big old steer sat on his but with just his head sticking above the boards that had broken. We ended up pulling the truck out and taking a chain saw and cut the boards to get him out of there. I would like to think and hope none of you are planning on slowing the cattle up as tempting as it may be. This led to damn tough years being 74 75 and 76. Might be different this time maybe, not making any predictions. The FED is going to pump so damn much money into this economy anything could happen. It reminds me of a druggie that is almost dead and the doctor shoots enough drugs in him that he just barely makes it and lives to see another day. The board is following the stock market and if they revive the stock market it will be one wild ride back up. But I digress. Please don’t “slow em up “ even if it sounds like the logical thing to do. Take your lumps and replace them on the same market if possible. Good luck to everybody.