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Why Buy It When You Can Graze It? Plant Wheat Early To Utilize Pasture For Foraging This Fall

Aug 26, 2016

By Dr. Derrell Peel Livestock Market Economist

Wheat planting season is just around the corner, and cattle producers are already thinking ahead as they consider how potential wheat pasture will fit into their fall forage plan. Extension Livestock Market Economist Dr. Derrell Peel of Oklahoma State University informed Farm Director Ron Hays that producers really have some opportunities here to take advantage of some current market situations.

“Because of the price of wheat, certainly many producers are interested in grazing,” Peel said. “That may be their best opportunity for some returns on their wheat land and they may be actually thinking about graze out now.”

Currently, Peel affirms there is a growing supply of heavy range cattle being bought up by feedlots. As a result, he says, lighter cattle are being undervalued relative to what a feedlot could actually pay for them. Peels claims this is the market’s way of telling producers, it would like for them to put that weight on cattle before moving them off to the feedlot. He explains this could spell out a good opportunity for stocker and backgrounding production.

“At this point and time, there’s actually a pretty strong signal in the marketplace and feeder cattle prices for that added gain that you would do in a stocker or backgrounding program,” Peel said. “I think that’s likely to persist through the fall and into the winter.”

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