Feeder steer margins of profit.....

[Pat]

Know the truth and it will set you free. If that doesn't work try prunes!

I would be thrilled to make money with cattle but realistically for year round grazing without running up a horrendous feed/hay bill my place is so poor productivity wise that it will keep about 20 cow calf pairs. This labels me as a small operation at best and true to Cowboydocs comments regarding scale, we will never be a real money maker. We can show enough activity to keep the IRS at bay and not be "OFFICIALLY" designated a hobby farm. I'm not sure how much longer it will be worth it to me.

My strident commentary should not in any way be construed as finding fault with wanting to live a dream. There is a big difference in recognizing the truth and feeling compelled to act on it in some logical manner.

As Cowboydoc pointed out, plenty of folks invest more in their toys with no hope of monetary return than some of us do "playing at" ranching/farming where there is at least a hope of profit or partial subsidy from generated revenues.

Still the best way to get thousands of dollars out of the small ranch or farm is to invest many more thousands of dollars.

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Pat]

Cowboydoc, I didn't mean to sound negative just call a spade a spade. If in your hreart of hearts you know that you will not make it big with a small operation and just want to do it because you want to do it, then do it!

I do feel sorry for the folks who actually are in a desperate spiral where they only lose a little on each trip around the spiral so they hurry real fast to try to make it up with extra trips around it. This is especially so when they try to employ management techinques that are based on some combination of wishful thinking, superstition, ignorance, and historical methods that are known to be sub-optimal. If I had a dollar for every time I have seen folks discard/discount ideas because it AIN"T THE WAY DADDY DID IT even though the ideas have tested well at agricultural research stations and have been found to work in multiple commercial operations, I'd be able to hire my chores done.

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

All true Pat, all true!!!

[egon]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
If that doesn't work try prunes!

[/ QUOTE ]

If the prunes fail a slide rule can always work it out. [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Egon

[daveshanks]

Wow! Good advice and philosophy also.

cowboydoc, it's in Hickory county, NE of Springfield about 45 miles. This is not "good" pasture in the sense it is unimproved, brushy. and not cross fenced.

I come from a rural childhood that was poverty level, but we always had plenty, if that makes sense. I have dabbled in small cow/calf deals and got up to 650 mother ewes at one time.

We are going to return to the country. I can get this place for $1500 a year, long term. That will locate me in an area I want to buy a small place so I can look around to find it while living there.

I think I'd be better off to watch their cattle on a percentage of gain basis than invest my own $ till I get some experience in the buying and selling of that class of cattle.

I think I will cross fence with some electric fence and put some hogs in on the brushy areas, then seed some grass as it gets cleared. Build up the carrying capacity of the place as I go. Years ago, it carried twice as much as it does now. I feel if I get a steer to butcher, grow my garden, and cut some firewood I can have a good life. With no winter feeding so I can go see the grankids.
There is some derelict machinery there to tinker on.

Outside of losing money, I should be good. LOL

Do stocker pasture deal go on percentage of gain or $ per head?

Thanks,
Dave

Almost always we do it by the head or by the acre. % of gain is usually much too difficult to mess with.

[wingnut]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
I come from a rural childhood that was poverty level, but we always had plenty, if that makes sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

In my jaundiced view, you hit the nail right on the head. Back when we were kids, farming was still a lifestyle choice wherein hard work made sure you didn't starve .... but it was no way to get rich.
But we don't live in those days anymore .... few are anxious to live on what a small farm could produce. Heck, if you tried to raise kinds in that sort of economic condition, they'd probably charge you with child abuse!

In this day-and-age of the US poverty line being higher than the income of wealthy people in other countries ... the death of family farms is already overdue (not that I think that's a good thing ... just an inevitable thing).

pete

[Pat]

Egon, You reveal your engineering proclivities with the slide rule comment. A mathmatician would use a pencil. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]

Pat

[egon]

Pat:

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
A mathmatician would use a pencil.

[/ QUOTE ]

A Mathmetician would most likely cross the Styx firmly grassping his chauk stick while striving to develop a theronem that would encompass all aspects of the solution required. [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Mathmaticians never use pencils as they require a mundane process called sharpening which may be beyond a theroretical activity.

Egon [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[icandoanything]

I love this thread. Learned a boatload of new words too.

Dick