One thing I believe a lot of people do not realize is that when you raise beef cattle for a living, you get paid once a year, for the most part. You might sale an old cow or an old bull at different times, through out the year, but your biggest pay check comes once a year, when you sell your calves. The calves have been raised and it's time to sell. The crazy thing is, is that we take them to an auction and just hope we get a good price. I wish we could state how much we want for them, but it does not work that way. I would like to be able to say "well, it cost us this much to raise them, we need to make a little profit, so this is how much we are charging". You know, like a grocery store would do. However, that is not how it works in the Ag world. You put a lot of effort into raising your crops and then when it is time to sell, you pretty much ask "what will you pay me for it?" So if the market is up and people are paying good money for our commodity, life on the farm is good. But, when the market is down and people are not paying a lot of money for our commodity, life on the farm can get very tough.
This quote from John F. Kennedy, pretty much sums it up.
"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways."
My Farmer has been watching the market for the last few weeks and he has decided this is the week to sale. So we loaded up the calves and they are off. That made it sound easy, which of course it was not. When it is below zero outside and there is a foot or more of snow, it is a lot of work just getting things ready to ship. You have to get the truck ready, which doesn't like to run in the cold, shovel out all the gates to and in the coral, and then load the animals. And sometimes, just the actual loading of the animals can be an adventure. I was really looking forward to this, because I needed something new to blog about. However, it went very smoothly and was very uneventful. I believe My Farmer is purposely making sure things go smoothly, so I can't blog about him. (I just don't get it)(hehe).
So the yearlings (that's what we call the calves that are around 1 year old) are at the sale yard and our job of raising them is done. We take a lot of pride in raising our cattle, and hopefully someone sees that and is willing to pay a good price. In the meantime, I will be waiting for that check in the mail, hoping that it will pay all my bills. I'm sure it will. It has too. Cuz I sure do like Livin' the farm life, and I don't want to have to get a real job.......(smiles).
This quote from John F. Kennedy, pretty much sums it up.
"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways."
My Farmer has been watching the market for the last few weeks and he has decided this is the week to sale. So we loaded up the calves and they are off. That made it sound easy, which of course it was not. When it is below zero outside and there is a foot or more of snow, it is a lot of work just getting things ready to ship. You have to get the truck ready, which doesn't like to run in the cold, shovel out all the gates to and in the coral, and then load the animals. And sometimes, just the actual loading of the animals can be an adventure. I was really looking forward to this, because I needed something new to blog about. However, it went very smoothly and was very uneventful. I believe My Farmer is purposely making sure things go smoothly, so I can't blog about him. (I just don't get it)(hehe).
So the yearlings (that's what we call the calves that are around 1 year old) are at the sale yard and our job of raising them is done. We take a lot of pride in raising our cattle, and hopefully someone sees that and is willing to pay a good price. In the meantime, I will be waiting for that check in the mail, hoping that it will pay all my bills. I'm sure it will. It has too. Cuz I sure do like Livin' the farm life, and I don't want to have to get a real job.......(smiles).
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