In a Farmer’s World: Talking Does Help
By Larry Wegner, MFGA CHAIR
In today’s fast-moving world and social-media influenced times, simple talk can be cheap. But to Manitoba and Prairie farmers, ranchers and producers struggling to cope with hard fields, hard times and harder decisions, simple talk can be so rich and meaningful.
“How are you doing?”
It is only four little words but that is all it takes to start a conversation. If you are a family operation talk to your family, you do not have to carry everything on yourself. I cannot count the number of times my wife Rosemary and sons Max and Herbert have had a different view to mine and the discussion opened up new options to the problem. Sometimes just a good laugh can help release tension. Your family is part of the farm too, directly or indirectly listen to them give them the chance to give input. The Manitoba government and producer-led and focused agriculture groups like Manitoba Forage and Grassland Association (MFGA) are here to help producers. First, though, we as farmers, ranchers and producers have to watch out for ourselves, our neighbours and our community.
On our cattle and sheep operation near Virden, MB, we have had several discussions on what is the best plan going forward and, as with any family operation, there are feelings left on the table. Rosemary, Max, Herbert and I often regroup on talks around conditions and challenges and how we can best address them.
This is our fourth year of drought. In the last three years we have increased water capture and storage. We did not count on zero run off at all this spring. Last fall with no late season moisture, we knew we would be facing a challenging year of less forage and we made the call to not custom graze 150 pairs - essentially cutting our herd in half. In hindsight, this call was right and as of today we are harvesting half of the forage we did last year. Our math predicts we should have the pasture to graze till late November. Since 65 per cent of our herd is first and second calvers, we have decided to wean 110-150 day-old calves early to give the younger cows a chance to gain condition before the colder months arrive.
We are also talking of doing a 45-day breeding season; this is still table talk though. A short breeding season would let nature sort the early calvers from the later calvers. We plan to preg-check in early October and market open and culls on the next market day. We believe it is better to sell a few head at a lower price than to use up valuable feed supplies. The small calves will need a lot of care and good feed, we have successfully done this before and it works well. We are hoping to market our cattle when there are fewer cattle on the market.
I am amazed even in this drought at the amount of regrowth we have seen this year. We are moving the herd every one to three days to new pasture. The daily paddock move is twice the distance of what we are used to doing. The impact of the dry conditions is evident as we are watching our cattle walking two or three times farther than normal for water.
In the first six months of 2021, we saw record lows in February and record highs in June and July. The record high temperatures were not edged by a half or one degree Celsius, but were blown away by five or more heat degrees. How do we do plan for that future with so many variable things underway?
The drought is digging in hard. I urge you to remember all droughts end with a rain and with each passing dry day we are closer to getting that rain. Still, we are now past the summer solstice, the time for rapid grass growth is over, and our forages are trying to go to seed for survival of the plant. We can get some growth yet if we have a few bountiful rains. But most of the rain we get from now on will set up next year’s growth and yield.
In the meantime, another thing I strongly recommend is to do a forage yield to see what you have for potential feed on the pastures and what does your herd demand until winter feeding. Manitoba Agriculture and Resource Development (MARD) representatives can help you get an answer to forage yield questions. Forage yield is a simple, tried and tested calculation of how much forage is available now minus how much you want to leave behind for ground cover and multiply by the number of acres available to graze until the start of winter feed. Next calculate the number of days until you want to start feeding and multiply by the number of pounds of feed you need fed per head and multiply this number by number of animals you have or want to carry. The last step is to match the feed to the herd if these two numbers are the same you are fine. If not what can you do make it work out?
Recently, in response to these dry conditions, MARD distributed a “Beef and Forage Technical Bulletin” via Manitoba Beef Producers’ CATTLE COUNTRY publication. The MARD bulletin is full of helpful options around activities such as creep feeding, early weening and water quality. This type of information can form the baseline when talking to your marketing rep. Keep an open dialog with your MARD rep and the Manitoba Agricultural Services Corporation (MASC) office to know exactly what you can and cannot do with your fields. If you carry insurance you have to give the MASC office or the provider you work with time to process your claim. This is very important that you are in contact with MASC during this process as to what you can and can’t do.
You can also graze annual crops - again with consultation via MASC - and you can start feeding earlier than planned, buy and bring in feed, or market some of the herd. A cut back of the herd by 10 per cent early in the season will make a big difference in feed requirements. The later in the season you wait to cut, the more likely the cut will need to be bigger to balance the feed-to-usage ratio. The same thing should be done with your herd’s water requirements and water inventory. If you are short of feed and water you must take action now for the health of the herd. If marketing is one of your options, reach out to your local marketing representative and ask for advice on how to best handle the situation. If your marketing rep is doing their job well, they should be able to help get you the best returns for your livestock. Proactive producers will have the lead on a faster recovery of their forage crop when the rains return. Now is not the time to hesitate on your decision. Battering your pastures will have negative consequences for years to come.
Even in these tough times, the biggest asset we are working on to improve is ourselves: on the way we think, work and how we see the world around us. In my world, the best investment is how we can make things better for ourselves and our herds and, in my mind, that should be where we spend our time and priority including those four simple, kind words when crossing paths within our producer fraternity.
“How are you doing?”
Do not let the dryness get you down.
