Our local auction starts at 12 and normaly last to at least 6pm. Today it was over in 45 minutes. The auction normaly runs between 200 to 300 cows and today had 20. Most of these looked like culls, either older cow that had recently calved and where being sold without there calf. Or some really old steers. The auctioner had been there for 15 years said he had never not sold cattle. No black angus where sold. What did sell brought between 60 to 85 cents a pound. The 3 or 4 cows that sold at 85 where 500 to 600 lbs steers. Most of it was bones with hamburger meat attached to it. Diffently not what was there a week ago.and diffently not good beef cows. Let us know what your local auctions are doing. Looks like here everyone is holding what they have for know. Arnold
When it hit in Alberta, they totally closed our auction houses down for several weeks and from week to week, the variances depended on news reports. At one point in time, cows were selling for 15 cents/lb and dairy cattle were giveaways :waa:
This seems to be the story everywhere from the actual auction reports I have read. There are also many cancellations of up-coming sales. My feed guy also owns the sale barn. He said lots of folks have been calling him asking what to do. He doesn't know what to tell them. Sale is Thursday and I will be there to watch, like everyone else. The sale barn guy won't be able to stay in business very long with nothing to sell, so I expect cancellations if things continue like this. We've had our sale barn close before and it was awful. I'd rather have him go to one sale a month than go broke. There are rumors from people who talked to someone who knew someone who went to an auction where prices were good, but nothing that can be substantiated. Jena
I can hear the supermarkets now. Yup, cattle prices are down, but supply is down also, so we have to raise our prices. Ken S. in WC TN
JENA Would you happen to be around Paris Ill by any chance? I have cattle on my mothers place north west of Danville.I am off to Shelbyville this morning to see if I should jump out of the window
Hang in there guys, your markets will stabilize. It's going to be crazy for a while but they do actually firm up. This period of time is really hard for you all and I understand your fear and frustration.
From what our buyer has said is that the beef prices have only dropped by about 10 cents or so a pound but dairy is way down. Holstein heifers are going for the price of bull calves..Boy if I only had some extra money right now and a little more space in the barn.. We have 2 soon to be year old heifers and also 2 bulls and about 18 about 6 months and younger. We were planning on selling this spring but now I'm not sure what to do.. :waa: Hopefully everything will spring back before too long.
Wanda-Mike....hehehe I can't open them either. "Problem with the database" it says. Ok...I'll just go ahead and let the whole world in on my little secret...I live in Paris. I actually live in town and have one farm just south on Route one and the other (my husband's) is southwest off route 16. I read that they closed the Shelbyville sale. Did they? If not, how'd it go? We are on here for tomorrow. There are always hogs if nothing else. Jena
JENA I went to the sale yesterday and the sign indicated that they were only closed because of the holiday.They are a I P L barn and they were still buying fat hogs acrost the lot at there buying station! If they close the doors it would be a very bad thing. Theclosest good market for Fat cattle is at congerville which is at Congerville located between Bloomington and Peoria My sister lives just north of you at Woodyard Station that should give you a clue that Ijust didn't make a wild guess about your location Mr Wanda
You may see some auction houses close down for a while, it's not permanent. Ours gave the reason that they didn't want long term customers to just end up giving away cattle. I would rather think that it was more a matter of stopping the movement of cattle for a certain time during the investigation. I have a friend in the brand inspection office and he told me that his time was not idle, the brand inspectors and auction houses were tracing cattle through paperwork. If it does happen, just don't panic.
The sale barn guys have to pay the expenses of the sale too. If nothing is moving, or they aren't making enough money, they can't pay the expenses. I'd rather have him save the money by closing for a while or limiting sales instead of trying to stay open all the time and going broke for good. Jena
At our local sale we droped from 1200-1400 hundred head to 850. The price droped about .10 across the board. Go to this web site and look up any auction that reports there sale. www.ams.usda.gov/LSMNpubs/CSAuction.htm
