We invite you to
listen to us on great radio stations across the region on the Radio
Oklahoma Network weekdays- if you missed this morning's Farm News - or
you are in an area where you can't hear it- click here for this
morning's Farm news from Ron Hays on RON.
Let's Check the Markets!
Today's
First Look:
Ron on RON Markets as
heard on K101
mornings with cash
and futures reviewed- includes where the Cash Cattle market stands, the
latest Feeder Cattle Markets Etc.
We have a new market
feature on a daily basis- each afternoon we are posting a recap
of that day's markets as analyzed by Justin Lewis of KIS futures-
click here for the
report posted yesterday afternoon around 3:30 PM.
Okla
Cash Grain:
Daily Oklahoma Cash Grain
Prices- as reported by the Oklahoma Dept. of Agriculture.
Canola
Prices:
Cash price for
canola was $9.22 per bushel- based on delivery to the Northern AG
elevator in El Reno Friday. The full listing of cash canola bids at
country points in Oklahoma can now be found in the daily Oklahoma Cash
Grain report- linked above.
Futures
Wrap:
Our Daily Market Wrapup
from the Radio Oklahoma Network with Jim Apel and Tom Leffler-
analyzing the Futures Markets from the previous Day.
Feeder
Cattle Recap:
The National Daily Feeder
& Stocker Cattle Summary- as prepared by USDA.
Slaughter
Cattle Recap:
The National Daily
Slaughter Cattle Summary- as prepared by the USDA.
TCFA
Feedlot Recap:
Finally, here is
the Daily Volume and
Price Summary from the Texas Cattle Feeders Association.
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Oklahoma's Latest Farm and
Ranch News
Presented by
Your Update from Ron Hays of
RON
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Here is your daily Oklahoma farm and ranch news
update.
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Michael Kelsey with OCA is
Upbeat on Eventually Getting Vetoed Checkoff Bill Signed- Check out
our Audio and Video Reports
In the final
days of the 2014 Oklahoma State Legislative session, Oklahoma
Cattlemen's Association Executive Vice President Michael Kelsey
says it's been a tough several months. We talked with Kelsey on
Friday about the session and our full audio and video conversations
with him about the session as well as federal issues like the Waters
of the US proposal of the EPA can be accessed by using the link below
to jump over to our website.
"We've had a good session in the sense of, its been a great
opportunity for me personally to get to know the legislature,"
Kelsey said.
In coming in new to OCA, Kelsey feels it has been important to take
time to get to know everyone, because it's been all based
relationships.
There have been several key legislative issues that OCA has been
working on. The biggest one is the checkoff bill.
"This is a general commodity checkoff, which is not specific to
beef," Kelsey said. "We were successful with working with
LMA, which was a great partner".
Kelsey said the Livestock Marketing Association worked with OCA to
draft some of the key language in the bill.
"We moved the House and Senate and got the bill to the
governor's desk and the governor vetoed it," Kelsey said.
"But I think it gave us an opportunity to step back and even
work with the governor to refine the bill."
Click here for more of
this story and a chance to see the video and hear the audio from
our time with Kelsey.
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Sponsor Spotlight
We are also pleased to have American Farmers &
Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company as a regular
sponsor of our daily update. On both the state and national levels,
full-time staff members serve as a "watchdog" for family
agriculture producers, mutual insurance company members and life
company members. Click here to go to
their AFR website to learn more about their efforts to
serve rural America!
We are proud to
have KIS
Futures as a regular sponsor of our daily email
update. KIS Futures provides Oklahoma farmers & ranchers with
futures & options hedging services in the livestock and grain
markets- click here for the
free market quote page they provide us for our website or
call them at 1-800-256-2555- and their iPhone App, which
provides all electronic futures quotes is available at the App Store-
click here for the KIS
Futures App for your iPhone.
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ASA
Hails WRRDA Conference Report, Calls for Quick House, Senate
Passage
The leaders of
the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee and Senate
Environment & Public Works Committee released the conference
report for the Water Resources Reform and Development Act (WRRDA)
Friday. The conference report includes multiple soybean industry
priorities including provisions that will free up significant funding
within the Inland Waterways Trust Fund for additional waterways
infrastructure projects; increasing the level of Harbor Maintenance
Trust Fund dollars that will be spent on port maintenance and
dredging; streamlining the Army Corps of Engineers' project review
process; increasing Corps flexibility to maintain navigation during
low water events; and promoting the use of alternative financing and
public-private partnerships to fund waterways infrastructure.
"This is a huge step forward to ensure the continued success of
the soybean supply chain, and leaders in both the House and Senate
deserve a great deal of credit for shepherding this bill through a
challenging policymaking climate," said American Soybean Association
President and Iowa farmer Ray
Gaesser.
To read more
of this story, click here.
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United
States Cattle on Feed Numbers Continue Fall, Down 1 Percent in Latest
Report
Cattle and
calves on feed for slaughter market in the United States for feedlots
with capacity of 1,000 or more head totaled 10.6 million head on May
1, 2014. The inventory was 1 percent below May 1, 2013.
Placements in
feedlots during April totaled 1.64 million, 5 percent below 2013. Net
placements were 1.55 million head. During April, placements of cattle
and calves weighing less than 600 pounds were 385,000, 600-699 pounds
were 255,000, 700-799 pounds were 396,000, and 800 pounds and greater
were 600,000.
Marketings of
fed cattle during April totaled 1.78 million, 2 percent below 2013.
Marketings for April are the lowest for the month since the series
began in 1996.
Other
disappearance totaled 83,000 during April, 20 percent above 2013.
To read the
full story and for comments from Tom Leffler of Leffler
Commodities Click Here.
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Food Safety
Scientists Double Up on Ground Beef Testing This Summer
As grilling
season heats up, the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service is
enhancing our food safety testing program for ground beef. While FSIS
has a range of safeguards to reduce E. coli in ground beef, this
summer we will begin new testing to improve the safeguards against
Salmonella as well. Salmonella is commonly found in ground beef and,
in fact, caused an illness outbreak in January 2013 in six states.
Salmonella is an especially difficult bacteria for food safety
experts to address because it is so prevalent in almost all food
sources.
Recognizing
that we need more information about the prevalence of Salmonella in
ground beef to better prevent food-borne illness, FSIS is
"super-sizing" our pathogen testing program to include
Salmonella every time our laboratories test for E. coli in samples of
ground beef and ground beef sources. Because the samples taken for E.
coli testing are much larger than those we have taken in the past for
Salmonella, there is higher likelihood that we will be able to detect
the bacteria if it is present.
Click Here to
learn more about food safety efforts.
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Advanced
Biofuel Producers Anticipate Great Impact from Proposed Changes to
the RFS
Thursday, 33
advanced biofuel companies, led by the Advanced Ethanol Council and
Biotechnology Industry Organization, sent a letter to President
Barack Obama to express the industry's concern about the proposed
rule for the 2014 Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).
"The RFS
is necessary because the highly consolidated, vertically integrated
oil industry is not otherwise going to allow market access for
renewable fuels," the groups wrote.
"To
reduce the 2014 blending requirements and volumes in future years,
EPA is proposing to use its general waiver authority based on
'inadequate domestic supply.' But EPA is putting forward a novel
interpretation of the word 'supply' to mean the ability of current
infrastructure to deliver renewable fuel blends to consumers, instead
of the available supply of renewable fuel to obligated parties. We
believe that this new interpretation is inconsistent with the plain
meaning of the statute and its legislative history. But the bigger
issue is that this interpretation has the practical effect of handing
the future trajectory of the RFS to the oil industry by virtue of the
fact that the oil industry itself controls the distribution of fuel
to consumers," the letter says.
To read more Click Here.
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Governor
Mary Fallin, House and Senate Leaders Reach Budget Deal
Governor Mary Fallin,
Senate President Pro Tem Brian
Bingman and House Speaker Jeff Hickman
today announced an appropriated state budget agreement for Fiscal
Year 2015.
The agreement
increases funding for K-12 education by $80 million and uses targeted
spending cuts and a reconciliation of several state agency accounts
to close a $188 million shortfall in funds certified for
appropriations. It avoids cuts to priority areas like public safety,
higher education and mental health while making necessary spending
reductions in other areas of state government.
The $80
million increase to common education funding for FY 15 adds to the
$74 million in additional K-12 funding added in FY 14, bringing a
total of new common education funding to $154 million in the past two
fiscal years.
"We have
gone to extraordinary lengths - even with a sluggish revenue year -
to add substantial new resources to common education in
Oklahoma," Fallin said.
The agreement
would set a FY 15 appropriated budget of $7,121,723,873, which is
$102.1 million, or 1.4 percent, less than the FY 2014 appropriated
budget, which is $7,223,824,517 with supplemental funding included.
Click Here for
more.
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HSUS Made the Clown as
Ringling Brothers Wins Big Settlement Over the Animal Rights Activist
Group
The Humane Society of the United
States (HSUS), along with their co-defendants, have
paid Feld Entertainment, Inc., the parent company of Ringling Bros.
and Barnum & Bailey® Circus, $15.75 million to settle cases
stemming from a lawsuit they brought against Ringling
Bros.® over the care of its Asian elephants. This historic
settlement payment to Feld Entertainment ends nearly 14 years of
litigation between the parties.
"We hope
this settlement payment, and the various court decisions that found
against these animal rights activists and their attorneys, will deter
individuals and organizations from bringing frivolous litigation like
this in the future," said
Kenneth Feld, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of
Feld Entertainment.
"This
settlement is a significant milestone for our family-owned business
and all the dedicated men and women who care for the Ringling
Bros. herd of 42 Asian elephants. We look forward to continuing
to set the standard for providing world-class care for all our
animals and producing high quality, family entertainment."
HSUS and
animal rights groups the Fund for Animals, Animal Welfare Institute,
Born Free USA (formerly the Animal Protection Institute), the
Wildlife Advocacy Project, the law firm of Meyer, Glitzenstein &
Crystal, and several current and former attorneys of that firm, paid
the settlement for their involvement in the case brought under the
Endangered Species Act (ESA) that the U.S. District Court ruled was
"frivolous," "vexatious," and "groundless
and unreasonable from its inception."
Today's
settlement also covers the related Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt
Organizations Act (RICO) case that Feld Entertainment filed against
the groups after discovering they had paid a plaintiff for his
participation in the original lawsuit and then attempted to conceal
those payments.
It's a real hit to the pocketbook but also the
prestige of the HSUS- click here
to read more from the Feld Entertainment website.
For their part in the court battle, Wayne Pacelle, CEO of the HSUS,
was unrepentant for their part in legal harassment- saying no donor
money was lost but rather it is their insurance company will write
the check. He called on Feld Entertainment to take their proceeds and
spend it all on protecting elephants from humans.
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