Mark Gregory Says Southwestern Oklahoma Crops Need Rainfall, Moisture, and Precipitation 

Continuing a special look at crop conditions across the state, the Oklahoma Farm Report turns its attention to southwest Oklahoma. We recently spoke with OSU Extension Agronomist Mark Gregory at the inaugural meeting of the Oklahoma Wheat Growers and the Oklahoma Sorghum Association.

Based in Duncan, Gregory says dry conditions have had an impact on producers throughout the southwest, but with a few surprises.

"We've got some cattle out on pasture, believe it or not, and the wheat is up big enough. We got the growth on those few rains to give us the forage growth."

He says wheat pastures are scattered, but extend as far to the southwest as Altus and northward toward Clinton. The lack of continuing moisture, however, may put an end to that.

"It's going backwards now. Those big plants have used what little moisture they had and there may not be anything left for them."

"Even stuff that was coming up in Bermuda grass pastures that these guys were relying on is going backwards. So, we're having some real problems on green stuff that we could graze right now. "

Gregory says not only are grass pastures suffering, but the canola and wheat crops are struggling, too.

"Those things are having a tough time. We've lost some canola because those plants, especially with the late planting dates, we had some of those early freezes, and those things took them out. And what's left, the plants have gotten a little size on them, but they're struggling right now because they've used a lot of that moisture that was there in the soil and we haven't gotten anything else for them in most places."

Click here for more from Mark Gregory and to find a link to yesterday's report on northwest and north central Oklahoma.  

EWG to Lawmakers: Look to Farm Bill for $100 Billion in Budget Savings 

The following are excerpts of an opinion piece published by the Environmental Working Group.  You can read the whole editorial by clicking here.

Rather than pocketing the modest $23 billion to $35 billion in 10-year savings the current Senate and House versions of the farm bill would yield, Congress could easily make changes that would save $100 billion or more. That would be a meaningful contribution to the budget trimming that will be needed to address the federal deficit.

Here is how the math could work:

Eliminating the direct payments subsidies would save $49.58 billion over 10 years. Both the House and Senate versions of the farm bill would do this, but they both plow a large portion of the savings back into other subsidies - a cynical bait and switch. 

Both current versions of the new farm bill would actually increase spending on federal crop insurance, making it more generous and more highly subsidized for farmers. This program is ripe for reforms that could yield large savings. At a minimum, Congress could eliminate the subsidies that currently go to crop insurance companies and save $13.8 billion.

There are also large additional savings available in the very generous subsidies the government hands out to encourage farmers to buy crop insurance. On average, taxpayers pick up more than 60 percent of the tab for crop insurance premiums. By cutting these subsidies - particularly for the most gold-plated policies - taxpayers could save as much as $20-to-$30 billion.

October Pork Exports Set New Monthly Record; Beef Export Value also Strong

U.S. pork exports set new monthly records in October, according to statistics released by USDA and compiled by the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF), reaching 218,132 metric tons (mt) valued at $607 million. Export volume was 9 percent above last year and broke the previous monthly record of 217,080 mt set in November 2011. Export value exceeded $600 million for the first time, breaking the previous high ($597.85 million, also from November 2011) by 1.5 percent.

For January through October, U.S. pork exports were 3 percent ahead of last year's record pace in volume (1.875 million mt) and 6 percent higher in value ($5.24 billion).

Beef exports also posted solid results in October, with export value ($496 million) increasing 10 percent over last year despite a 4 percent decline in volume (101,447 mt). This was consistent with this year's January-October pattern, which has seen an 11 percent decline in volume (951,886 mt) compared to 2011 while export value ($4.6 billion) remained 2 percent ahead of last year's record pace.

You can read more by clicking here.

WSSA Offers New Fact Sheet on Weeds, the Bullies of the Plant World

Did you know that the invention of Velcro was inspired by prickly weed burs that stuck to the pants of a Swiss engineer during a walk with his dog? It's one of the many unique facts about weeds captured in a free brochure available from the Weed Science Society of America.

Created by the organization's Public Awareness Committee with contributions from WSSA members, the document illustrates a few of the many unique characteristics of weeds and how they touch our lives. Examples include:  

• Weeds on the Move. Tiny seeds from horseweed (Conyza canadensis) have been known to travel 300 miles by air. Specially equipped model airplanes have tracked horseweed seed in the earth's planetary boundary layer.   
• Weeds Reproducing for Long-Term Survival. Each acre of U.S. cropland contains 50 million to 300 million buried weed seeds. Five to 10 percent of them germinate and emerge each year.
• Odd Facts about Weeds. Cows that graze on garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) or other mustard weeds produce milk with a garlic flavor. Similarly, wild garlic (Allium vineale) can "flavor" wheat crops and reduce their market value. It's NOT the best way to make garlic bread!

Beef Buzz: BQA Refocuses Producers from Marketing Beef to Satisfying Consumers

John Maas, veterinarian and beef producer from California and member of the industry's Beef Quality Assurance (BQA) advisory committee, explains why the reinvented BQA program, funded in part by producer's checkoff dollars, continues to be valuable to beef and dairy producers.

"It's important not only in my capacity as an educator but it's important in the way we run our ranch. The significance of the Beef Quality Assurance program is that it's alive - and by that I mean that it's changing, and it changes relative to the opportunities and challenges that we see with our production systems here in the United States. To begin with, the Beef Quality Assurance program focused on a problem that we had with drug residues in our finished cattle. And quickly by scientific observations and the Beef Quality Audits and those types of tools, we found that we had other problems. And so we addressed them, and we've been addressing problems as we find them throughout the whole life of the BQA program. And we've ticked off a whole bunch of successes but that's not where we're stopping. We keep this whole program alive by continually doing the audits, taking the information from the audits and challenging ourselves to fix those problems as they come up."

Maas says the basic principles of the national program are tailored down to the on-farm level.

Click here to listen to the latest Beef Buzz with John Maas.

 

Alltech's Global 500 Establishes the Next Steps for Dairy and Beef Industries

Alltech's Global 500 closed recently after welcoming dairy and beef producers from 40 countries to Lexington, Ky. Dr. Pearse Lyons, president and founder of Alltech, closed Global with seven take-home messages, a few of which were:

1. Closing the gap - There are two gaps that need to close. First, we must close the communication gap between ourselves and the consumer. Second, we must close the nutrition gap. Nutrition has not kept pace with genetics; the world is moving on and we need to catch up.

2. We learned about the perfect steak. It's nothing artificial; it's simply about feeding the animal properly.

3. Branding is our way of getting our ideas out. Brand beef and milk to set it apart. We heard about the eight rules of branding, but nothing starts until you take the first step. Be relentless, be consistent, be the first.

You can read the rest of Dr. Lyons' messages as well as find links to the recorded Alltech presentations by clicking here.

 

This N That- The Farm Bill Quagmire- and McAlester's End of the Year Stock Cow Sale 

The word of the day is "Quagmire" and has been thoughtfully provided by the top Democrat on the House Ag Committee, Collin Peterson, who has used it in describing the mess over the Commodity Title as House and Senate Ag Committee leaders search for common ground in the final minutes of the old year year in hopes that an Obama-Boehner Fiscal Cliff deal might still emerge before December 31st.

David Rogers with Politico has been following the negotiations and our friend Keith Good, the writer of the Farm Policy blog, has captured the essence of that article as well as several other angles (like Dairy) that provide an excellent insight into how messy this whole process continues to be. Click here for the blog entry from Keith pulls this all together.

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The McAlester Union Stockyards Special Cow and Bull Sale is scheduled for this coming Saturday, December 15th at McAlester, Oklahoma.

The sale begins at noon selling 850 head of bred cows, bred heifers, open heifers, pairs and bulls- click here for details that we have in our auction listing on our website. You can also call the folks at McAlester for more information as well- that number is 918-423-2834.