The winter drought may be finishing off the latest US cattle herd expansion as the daily average cow slaughter floats well above last year and the 2012-2016 average. Already slowing down, US cattle producers appear to be weeding out their older cows more aggressively.  The Federally Inspected daily average cow slaughter on a monthly basis … Read More

Many cow/calf producers now have calves on the ground, so it’s a good time to discuss prices and to update marketing plans for the new-crop, said the Livestock Marketing Information Center in a letter to Extension staff. Calf prices can be expected to behave in certain ways within a calendar year because of the seasonal … Read More

Total red meat supplies in cold storage on March 31 were up 1% from Feb. 28 and were up 7% from last year, the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service said Monday in its monthly Cold Storage report. Total pounds of beef in US freezers were up 1% from February but down slightly from March 31, … Read More

The US pork industry will face challenges in coming months, but will have trade opportunities at the same time as uncertainty in global markets opens and closes doors. That was a key part of the latest “Pork Quarterly report from RaboResearch, a division of Rabobank.  The US/China trade dispute was expected to distort markets and … Read More

Large commodity investment funds, called Managed Money, continued to reduce their net long live cattle position in the week ended Tuesday while producers kept trimming their collective net short position. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission said in its weekly Commitments of Traders report Friday that managed money’s new live cattle futures position Tuesday was 22,656 … Read More

US beef demand is holding up pretty well so far this year, but it has to with more beef being produced and more to come. Derrell Peel, Oklahoma State University Extension Livestock Marketing Specialist, said in the Extension Service newsletter that the ratio of the retail beef price to pork and broilers continues to hold … Read More

The USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service and Economic Research Service expect US total per capita red meat and poultry consumption this year to be about 218.11 pounds with year-on-year gains in all major meat categories. The data was gathered from the two agencies and compiled by the Livestock Marketing Information Center.  It showed that USDA … Read More