Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays is talking with the Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association’s Executive Vice President, Michael Kelsey, about the recently wrapped up CattleCon 2025.
Coverage of CattleCon 2025 is powered by Farm Data Services of Stillwater, Oklahoma.
According to Kelsey, this year’s conference was a huge success, garnering around 8,500 cattlemen and women from across the country, including a large number of Oklahomans.
“Our own president is the new vice chair of the Cattle Health and Wellbeing Committee (Dr. Troy Shelby) and a lot of our leadership and membership came in,” Kelsey detailed. “Shannon Ferrel from OSU was one of the speakers. By the way, the three general sessions were the best general sessions I have heard as a whole in a long time at a convention. They were fantastic!”
Lieutenant Colonel Dan Rooney led the opening general session titled “Flying Into the Wind,” which was sponsored by Zoetis. OSU’s Dr. Shannon Ferrell led General Session II named “Building a Resilient Future for Ag” and sponsored by the National Corn Growers Association. Lastly, General Session III was a U.S. & Global Protein & Grain Outlook Seminar led by CattleFax’s Randy Blach and sponsored by Purina Animal Nutrition, LLC & Zoetis.
Kelsey appreciated that there wasn’t anything controversial from a policy standpoint, but that they were filled with cattle market optimism regarding record-high prices and consumer demand for beef.
“There was a lot of really positive momentum with an air of caution in where we go from here,” Kelsey described.
The reopening of the U.S./Mexico border the week of CattleCon 2025 became another success story. “We need to keep trade as normal as possible so that we keep the flow of cattle and beef going,” Kelsey said. “The New World Screwworm is another topic that is vitally important to our industry. How do we maintain that critter WAY south of us? We do not want that thing coming up into the United States, let alone Oklahoma.”
During CattleCon 2025, the commitment to funding sterile fly breeding facilities “beefed up.” The breeding and release of sterile flies into existing screwworm fly populations has been the most effective method of controlling them thus far.
“It’s nice that we can come together and talk about that and be proactive and address that up front with great leadership like Dr. Burke Healey and his team at APHIS,” Kelsey concluded. Dr. Healey is another cattle industry leader with an Oklahoma connection. His family ranches in southern Oklahoma and are prominent Hereford cattle producers.
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