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Proponents of State Question 777 are starting the process of organizing a "Yes" vote campaign for the constitutional amendment that has been called the "Right to Farm." At the 63rd Annual Convention of the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Association, a panel was featured that examined the state question and what the ag industry within Oklahoma faces in getting a "YES' vote in November 2016.


We moderated what turned out to be an interactive conversation with the three panel members. State Representative Scott Biggs was one of the principle authors of HJR1017- the vehicle that carried the proposal through the State Legislature in 2015- and Hays began with State Rep Biggs to offer a description of the legislative journey. Hays brought in the next panel member, Roy Lee Lindsey, Executive Director of the Oklahoma Pork Council, who explained the role of the ag groups that meet regularly on Mondays at the State Department of Agriculture on issues that are of importance to the farming and ranching community. Lindsey explained how the groups resolved concerns they had with one another and with the language of the proposal even as lawmakers worked to refine the measure.


Once passed in the spring of 2015- Lindsey told the cattle producers present that there was no room for error in coming together and getting a yes vote in 2016. At that point, the third member of the panel joined the discussion as former Oklahoma Senate President Glenn Coffee has agreed to work with the ag groups wanting a yes vote to help organize the effort, build the coalition and put into motion the plan to achieve a yes vote.  

Senator Coffee told the audience that he understands that it appears we are starting early- but that getting people to volunteer now to participate in the grassroots effort and to start to raise money are two keys that must go forward now in order to have the greatest chance for success.  

We have the full panel discussion up on our website- as well as on our App- and you can click here to jump over to our Top Ag Story this morning to read more as well as listen to the comments of these three key players in the 777 conversation that lies ahead.

In our story- we also have a link to the Oklahoma Right to Farm website that is now live on the world wide web.  

U.S. Cattle Inventory and July Cattle on Feed Both Up 2 Percent, Leffler Finds Nothing Friendly 

Herd expansion continues to show progress for the U.S. cattle industry. The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Friday also showed the number of cattle on feed is also higher than year ago and beef supplies are growing in the United States. On Friday, Radio Oklahoma Network's Leslie Smith interviewed Tom Leffler of Leffler Commodities about USDA's semiannual cattle inventory report, the July cattle on feed numbers, along with providing analysis on the cold storage report released earlier in the week. Leffler said overall the reports were did not have any friendly news to bring strength to the cattle complex.


"I don't think we saw any large surprises, but we did not get anything friendly out there," Leffler said.


The latest cattle on feed report showed cattle and calves on feed for the slaughter market in the U.S. totaled 10.23 million head on July 1, 2015. That was up two percent from last year. The inventory included 6.91 million steers and steer calves, up seven percent from the previous year. This group accounted for 67 percent of the total inventory. Heifers and heifer calves accounted for 3.33 million head, down seven percent from 2014. The July 1, 2015 heifers and heifer calves inventory is the lowest percent of total July inventory since the series began in 1996.


Leffler said the only negative part of the cattle on feed report was the placements number, as those figures came in higher than trade expectations. Placements in feedlots during June totaled 1.48 million, one percent above 2014. Net placements were 1.41 million head. During June, placements of cattle and calves weighing less than 600 pounds were 350,000, 600-699 pounds were 250,000, 700-799 pounds were 336,000, and 800 pounds and greater were 545,000. The heavy weight category was up 11.2 percent versus a year ago. Leffler said heavy weight placements were higher than year ago levels for the tenth month of the past 11 months.


"This is the lowest monthly placement number of the past 12 months, it is the fifth lowest June placement of the past 20 years," Leffler said.
 

USDA also release the semiannual cattle inventory and the the June cold report.  Click here to read more or to listen to the full interview with Tom Leffler.  

USDA, Microsoft to Launch "Innovation Challenge" to Address Food Resiliency

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is partnering with Microsoft to launch the "Innovation Challenge," a contest designed to explore how climate change will impact the United States' food system with the intent of achieving better food resiliency. The challenge invites entrants to develop and publish new applications and tools that can analyze multiple sources of information about the nation's food supply, including key USDA data sets that are now hosted on Microsoft Azure, Microsoft's cloud-computing platform.


"For more than 100 years, USDA has compiled data from economic reports and farm production surveys, and more recently from satellite imagery and remote sensors that can provide information on the health of crops around the country," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "Through this partnership with Microsoft, we are now putting that data into the hands of people who can help us derive new insights to address factors that threaten our ability to feed a growing global population. This offers very exciting possibilities, and I look forward to seeing the new tools that contest participants develop."


For the first time, key USDA datasets are being made available in the cloud where they can be accessed and blended with other data to give novel insights or used in new types of end-user applications. Combining these USDA data with cloud-computing resources allows even very high fidelity and complex models to be processed in a timely manner and enables results to be delivered to remote users on their laptops, tablets or mobile phones.


The challenge offers $60,000 in prizes, including a top prize of $25,000, for applications that make use of the USDA data and provide actionable insights to farmers, agriculture businesses, scientists or consumers. In addition, Microsoft is granting cloud-computing awards to aid university researchers and students who wish to take part in the challenge. The deadline for entries is November 20, 2015, giving challenge participants three months to create their applications. Winners will be announced in December 2015.  Click here to read more or watch a video on the  "Innovation Challenge". 

2015 Southern Plains Beef Symposium Set for Ardmore This August

Leland McDaniel, Carter County OSU Extension Director and Agriculture Educator, writes in the latest Cow/Calf Corner newsletter.


Mid-summer is upon us, the Oklahoma heat has set in and, although some will still be baling hay, much of the abundant hay crop is "in the barn". That means that it is time, once again, for the Southern Plains Beef Symposium. This will be the 25th Anniversary of the Southern Plains Beef Symposium held on August 8 and The Ardmore Convention Center, and it is recognized as the preeminent one-day beef producer meeting in the country.


There is an old adage, during times of abnormally high cattle markets, that "there is more room at the bottom than there is at the top". The drought, and its consequential sell-down of cows, recreational land ownership, development, and the loss of grazing acres to corn and other crops has stood that adage on its ears for the last few years. So, what does the future hold? Can we or will we rebuild our national cowherd numbers? How much downward pressure will the expected increase in cowherd inventory have on cattle markets? Will beef, in the next 25 years, continue to be a staple food or will it become a luxury item, such as lobster or crab? These and other related questions are the foundation for the theme of this year's Southern Plains Beef Symposium.


For the program agenda, we have assembled a diverse and well-respected group of speakers to address the questions posed above, and much more.  Click here to read more about the lineup of speakers and how to register for the Southern Plains Beef Symposium. 

Award winning broadcast journalist Jerry Bohnen has spent years learning and understanding how to cover the energy business here in the southern plains- Click here to subscribe to his daily update of top Energy News.

This N That- Superior Selling Cattle Today, Beef Cow Number Observations and Congrats to Charlie Swanson!

It's a busy week for Superior Livestock Market- as they have equivalent of a regular every other week auction today coming out of Ft. Worth starting at 8:00 AM Central time.  Expect 36,000 head to sell today from the Southeast and here in the South Central regions of the country.  

Superior then takes a travel day- and then starts their Video Royale sale from Winnemucca, Nevada on Wednesday- which runs through Friday.

Click here for more details- some great cattle on offer for you to check out all of this week.

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We have the story earlier here in the email about the midyear Cattle Inventory Report from USDA- Tom Leffler reviewed the numbers for us- but I wanted to weigh in with a couple of observations about the report, which is significant in that it gets us back above thirty million beef cows in this country for the first time since July 2012.   

In that report- we were headed south in a hurry because of rapidly expanding drought- and the fall of 2012 was brutal because of the drought and herd liquidation that happened- especially in both Oklahoma and Texas.

By January 2013- we were down to 29.3 million beef cows- some of the smallest numbers of mama cows since the 1940s- and by January first of 2014- we had slipped even further to the bottom- which was 29 million beef cows.

We saw rebuilding by last July and also in January of this year- up to 29.75 million head- and now 30.5 million beef cows as of July first- up 800,000 head in the last year. 

With the breaking of the drought- we will likely see a few more cows added to that number by the January 2016 report- getting us back close to 31 million beef cows by that point.  That will mean we have recovered almost all of the cows lost because of the drought that really ramped up in 2012.   

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We'll have more on the awards from the weekend at the OCA tomorrow- and details on the new officer team for the organization in the coming year as well- but this morning, wanted to say Congratulations to Charlie Swanson, the new President of the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Association.  

Register Now to Attend July 28 Cattle Trails Wheat and Stocker Conference in Lawton

Cattle producers looking to pick up the latest information about maximizing livestock and wheat resources under variable and sometimes volatile weather and market conditions should register now to attend the July 28 Cattle Trails Wheat and Stocker Conference in Lawton.


The annual conference is a joint effort between the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service and Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, with the intent of helping producers drive their operations toward profit.


Marty New, Oklahoma State University Cooperative Extension area livestock specialist, said wheat and stocker operators should look upon the conference as "one-stop shopping."


"The most up-to-date information about key subjects will be presented," he said, "plus participants will have the opportunity to ask questions of and interact with some of the region's premier cattle-management experts, as well as other producers who are in positions similar to them."


The July 28 conference - which alternates between Oklahoma and Texas each year - will take place from 8 a.m. to a little after 2 p.m. at the Comanche County Fairgrounds' Great Plains Coliseum, located at 920 SW Sheridan Rd. in Lawton.


Registration is $25 per participant and covers the cost of a noon meal, break refreshments and conference materials. Registration materials are available through OSU Cooperative Extension and Texas A&M AgriLife Extension county offices.  Click here to read more information about the conference.