Critical wheat pasture in question

One of the great money-making opportunities in the cattle business is late winter and early spring wheat pasture grazing in the Texas-Oklahoma-Kansas panhandle. It may well not be in 2009, due to drought, that unless its alleviated very shortly, will not only cut wheat grazing, but imperil the whole wheat crop.

With moisture, things can change overnight, and still may well. But as of today, those light calves bought in the southeast or the northern tier, will have to put on their highly profitable compensatory gain someplace else. It can be tricky to find a place to do this, if the wheat pasture outlook remains poor, and result in either low feedlot in-weights or delayed placements while calves fatten up someplace else.

This is somewhat distressing, because the fundamentals of the cattle business remain very favorable to the producer, if only all the other non-related economic factors would butt out. The latest USDA Cattle-on-Feed Report shows placements down again, which means beef supplies should stay manageable and prices profitable. We've been saying this all fall and into the present time, and the weak state of the U.S. economy continues to over ride the sound fundamentals of the cattle business. Producers are losing money and the domestic market for red meat shrinks, as financially-pressed consumers seek cheaper alternatives.

There's several weeks or months of winter left, if only they can be wet ones. In the high Rocky Mountains, the snowpack is above average, but the plains are behind. As you go south into Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, it gets drier and drier, so far.

It's time for that old bromide, Pray for Rain.