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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Monday June 30, 2008!
A
service of Farm Credit of East Central Oklahoma, KIS Futures &
Johnston Enterprises!
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-- A Sad Weekend for Oklahoma with the Death of State Representative
Terry Hyman
-- Ninety Percent Done! (Wheat Harvest Rapidly Winds Down)
-- Three Oklahomans Make the Final Ten- But Nebraska Auctioneer Calls
In the World Championship!
-- Beef Buzzing with Heather Buckmaster on New Look of BQA in
Oklahoma.
-- Drought in the Oklahoma Panhandle Has Made Fox News.
-- Pecan Growers Meeting This Week in Tulsa.
-- Pork Juggernaut Slowing Down- Eventually
-- Checking the Markets...
Howdy Neighbors! Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. We are proud to have KIS Futures as a regular sponsor of our daily E-Mail. KIS Futures provides Oklahoma Farmers & Ranchers with futures & options hedging services in the livestock and grain markets- Click here for their website or call them at 1-800-256-2555. We welcome as our newest regular sponsor on our daily email Johnston
Enterprises- proud to have served agriculture across Oklahoma and
around the world since 1893. Johnston Grain wishes our wheat producers a
safe and prosperous harvest this month- for more on Johnston Enterprises-
click
here for their website! If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here. | |
A Sad Weekend for Oklahoma with the Death of State Representative Terry Hyman ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ All of us know
that agriculture can be a very unforgiving and dangerous occupation,
especially when you are working with farm machinery. We were reminded of
that on Saturday as word came that second term Democratic lawmaker Terry
Hyman is dead because of a tractor accident on his farm in southern
Oklahoma. The Oklahoma Highway Patrol reported Saturday that State
Representative Terry Hyman, 56, was apparently standing beside his tractor
when it lunged forward and knocked him to the ground. A brush hog then
rolled over Hyman, who was discovered dead late Friday night at his farm
near Leon, the highway patrol said.
A former club rodeo coach at Oklahoma State University and Love County commissioner, Hyman was elected to the state House in 2004 with 60 percent of the vote and won reelection two years later with an even higher margin of 63 percent. In the just concluded legislative session, Hyman served as the Chairman of the Tourism and Recreation Subcommittee under the umbrella of the Natural Resources Full Committee that is chaired by Dale DeWitt of Braman. Hyman was unopposed in the upcoming Democratic Primary in his bid for a third term- while he had a Republican challenger for the general election come November. State law does allow the Democratic party to replace his name on the ballot upon death. We touched base with some of our agricultural leaders- Ray Wulf of
American Farmers & Ranchers told me that "Terry will certainly be
missed" adding that he was "very passionate about the things he cared
about" and that he was truly a good friend to farmers and ranchers across
the state. | |
Ninety Percent Done! (Wheat Harvest Rapidly Winds Down) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As we hit this
final day of June- we stand at 90% done as far as the Oklahoma wheat
harvest goes- that's the word from the Executive Director of the Oklahoma
Wheat Commission- Mark Hodges. Hodges says that the final acres to be cut
are primarily those farmers with larger acreage that had limited access to
combines here at the end of the harvest cycle- or those that have had to
go slow because of ground that was very soft after the heavy rains about a
week to ten days ago.
In recapping the 2008 harvest efforts- Hodges tells us that south of I-40 the two themes were high test weights and low protein levels. As we moved further north- we started getting some rain as we tried to cut the crop out- and that immediately started to bring down the test weights to more average levels. Protein did improve somewhat as we crossed into more northern counties in the wheat belt. Yields were better than expected in most areas of the state- except for
the Panhandle- where dry conditions in Beaver County and full blown
drought in Texas and Cimarron Counties added up to almost no dryland wheat
in 2008 (Although Beaver County had some decent dryland yields all the way
up to the low thirties per acre)- while the yields were extremely low to
about half normal yields for irrigated fields. We have Mark's full report
on our Wheat Harvest Webpage for 2008- which is linked below. Click here for the 2008 Wheat Harvest Webpage found on our website- WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com | |
Three Oklahomans Make the Final Ten- But Nebraska Auctioneer Calls In the World Championship! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Matt Lowery,
Burwell, Nebraska, won the Livestock Marketing Association's 45th annual
World Livestock Auctioneer Championship on Saturday. The Reserve World
Champion is Ted Odle of Brush, Colorado, and the Runner-Up World Champion
is Ty Thompson, out of Billings, Montana. Odle is a name you might
recognize- as he was one of the early parts of the Superior Livestock
Satellite Auction team.
The remaining seven finalists, in alphabetical order, were: Lance Cochran, Medford, Oklahoma; Charly Cummings, Yates Center, Kansas; Justin Dodson, Welch, Oklahoma; Tom Frey, Creston, Iowa; Brian Little, Wann, Oklahoma; Paul Ramirez, Tucson, Arizona., and Rick Shoemaker, Kearney, Nebraska. Over 5,000 head of livestock moved through the ring at the host market, Sioux Falls Regional Livestock, before a crowd estimated at 1,000 people. Some 500 persons logged on and watched the competition via the Internet. | |
Beef Buzzing with Heather Buckmaster on New Look of BQA in Oklahoma. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Today's Beef
Buzz helps us take a look at the new and improved Beef Quality Assurance
Program that has been developed specifically for Oklahoma cattle
producers. Oklahoma Beef Council Executive Director Heather Buckmaster
tells us that the industry has really come together to develop a program
that will allow producers to become certified in the practices that are
considered positive in how animals are treated- and helps in producing a
quality, wholesome product.
Buckmaster says that this program will position Oklahoma cattle producers in being able to participate in value added programs that pass along assurances down the beef pipeline that beef from animals has been produced in a humane and sanitary manner. While today, that's still optional- she sees the day where it will be more of the baseline- or what you might call table stakes to be involved in value added beef production. The Oklahoma Beef Council has dedicated a part of their website to the
new look BQA- Click
here to take a look at more information on the Beef Quality Assurance
Program here in Oklahoma. Click here to go Beef Buzzing with Ron and Heather Buckmaster talking BQA. | |
Drought in the Oklahoma Panhandle Has Made Fox News. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We got an
interesting email from Dee Ann Littlefield of the Natural Resource
Conservation Service (NRCS) who tells that the two westernmost counties in
the state are ground zero for extreme drought in the middle of the US- and
she reports to us that Fox News has even reported on conditions in Texas
and Cimarron Counties. "There is severe drought in south Texas and north
eastern New Mexico, in addition to the OK Panhandle drought - however the
Panhandle drought is receiving the attention of the media thanks to the
Conservation District and NRCS' involvement and desire to get whatever
help possible by the farmers and ranchers being so severely impacted."
Dee Ann also mentions contact that she has had with one of our key weather watchers in the state- "Yesterday I talked to Gary McManus, assistant state climatologist with the Oklahoma Climatological Survey, who advises the national drought monitor. He went out to Cimarron County on Tuesday to meet with Cherrie Brown and get a tour of the devastating conditions out there. He is from Buffalo and he told me "it was really demoralizing to see the country in such sad shape." He said everything was grey and dead and it was just "sad." He said the lake he used to fish in as a kid (Lake Etling) is dried up and that was such a shock." This daily email was the original source for this story seeing the light of day for Gary and others in his office as Cherrie Brown described for us back in the spring the extreme conditions that unfortunately have not gotten any better. However, it is good to see attention being paid by the general media to this situation- as we all know that is one of the keys to getting help from high places in these types of situations. We have linked below the Fox News coverage from the Panhandle- take a look. Click here to see the full article- including a link for some video that is very telling. | |
Pecan Growers Meeting This Week in Tulsa. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ One of the few
meetings officially on the calendar for this week is the 78th annual
meeting of the Oklahoma Pecan Growers Association- it actually was
starting up Sunday afternoon and runs through Tuesday in Tulsa. On the
national scene- the big event happens at USDA this morning with the June
30 Crop Acreage report to be released- We have a preview now to share with
you- and this same link will take you to an audio review of the report
later this morning after it is released- that update should be available
by around 9 AM. CLICK
HERE FOR THAT ACREAGE/PREVIEW THAT WILL TURN INTO A REVIEW.
Next week- a bunch of meetings crank up and we see the calendar stay busy the balance of the month of July into August. For example, next week, we have meetings that will look at the positive virtues of the Eastern Red Cedar, a Grant County No Till Field Day and an Organic Agriculture Workshop and Field Day in Lane, Oklahoma. We have details of all of these events on our calendar page- linked below and found on our website- www.OklahomaFarmReport.Com. As we have mentioned to you- we are in the process of updating and hopefully making our website easier for you to use- and that will include the look and feel of the calendar page. We hope to have the new website up and running as early as next Monday- so stay tuned for the Grand Opening that will be in just a few more days. In the meantime- here is our current calendar page at WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com | |
Pork Juggernaut Slowing Down- Eventually ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ That's the
word from OSU Extension Livestock Market Economist Dr. Derrell Peel in
response to the latest Hogs and Pigs Report out on Friday afternoon from
USDA. Dr. Peel writes:
"The latest USDA Quarterly Hogs and Pigs Report is kind of a good news, bad news story. The bad news is that the current inventory of market hogs is 7 percent above last year. The hog industry has ridden a tremendous amount of momentum since the fall of 2007 when an expanding breeding herd combined with disease control that has resulted in double digit pork production increases for several months. Today's report confirms that pork production will continue at large levels in the second half of 2008. "However, there is a glimmer of hope that pork production will
eventually moderate. The latest report indicates a slight reduction in the
breeding herd and farrowing intentions down two to four percent for the
rest of the year. The other good news is that strong pork exports have
continued to move much of the increased production of recent months
offshore, moderating the impact on domestic meat markets." Click here to view the full USDA Hog and Pigs Report as Released by USDA Friday. | |
Our thanks to Johnston Enterprises, KIS Futures and Farm Credit of East Central Oklahomafor their support of our daily Farm News Update. For your convenience, we have our sponsors' websites linked at the top of the email- check them out and let these folks know you appreciate the support of this daily email, as their sponsorship helps us keep this arriving in your inbox on a regular basis! We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe. | |
Checking the Markets... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here are some links we will leave in place on an ongoing basis- Click
on the name of the report to go to that link: | |
God Bless! You can reach us at the following: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
email: ron@oklahomafarmreport.com
phone: 405-473-6144
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