I gotta question

[jrsiajdranch]

I keep wondering why we don't get more action over here on cattle talk?  Now I am not on SF's Payroll or anything I just like the magazine and think they do a good job with this site.  I think this is a good format to get info from and to share ideas. I am just wondering what we need to be talking about here to getr a little more talkin going on. 

Would health issues be more of your concern or hows about feeding?  Cattle facilities in the past got a lot of dialogue.  It's fall harvest time and I know folks will get busy so trying to find things to talk about will be harder but I think with the folks that do come here we should be able to find things to discuss. 

I personally wopuld like to hear from folks outside of the midwest who are farming with different production issues than we have in the mid west. 

We should start chopping corn by the end of this week.  Waitng on some feed roll drive parts this week and then back at it. 

oh BTW here's another pic from this summer.

Well take some time to post your thoughts.  Do any of you hire your chopping done?  If so what do you figure the cost to be?  What do you think is the fairest way to be charged?  By the ton or by the hour?  We try to keep chopping cost to 5 ton per hour but that depends on a lot of things the most expensive we got last year was 7.50 per ton but we were hauling quite aways and the guy didn't want to spend money on trucks so the cost got out of hand. JR

[rightone]

same problem with agweb.

Folks USE sites that are fast and easy to load.

Many folks are still using machines with windows 98 etc.

Always interesting on the sites that sell alot of ads when simple management fails to see that MOST of their audience cannot access the site anyway ( thus never see the ads).  

OK deal perhaps, as long as the advertizers themselves never figure it out ( as long as there's a magazine in print...what's the diff? ).

BEST site out there for most of agri is newagtalk.

Fast, simple, easy to load....Non ad cluttered.

[jrsiajdranch]

I don know about that Mark guys go to tractor house and iron search the WSJ and all the other news outlets.  All of these have ads.  The slowest loading thing for me is the AMPI website cause they have a real small server.  I agree waiting at times for an ad to load can be frustrating but if you want to be on that site you wait for it.  And if your using a 12 year old program for your computer maybe time to upgrade?  Some of the smart phones have more power than some of the computers out there.

I am not discounting that people don't like the load time on the ads but they put up with them else where.

I also think it has something to do with how few livestock folks are out there. and the limited optimism most have.  THey feel like they have been trampled on so much they don't have the spunk to get back into it.

We had our annual meeting with banker out at the farm last week. things have been going ok he was just there to chat really nice guy you know.  He asked Dad how long it would take to get back equity lost in the last two years of milking cows.  I had thought about that before but was in the 5-7 year range. Dad said 10 years!  He thinks we are going to muddle through for a while and then next summer get creamed again. 

Dad talked to a fellow who jockeys holstien heifers he had two loads to go to Old Mexico in June they cancelled the order cause the Mexican processors said they can't handle any additional milk right now. 

The latest trade dispute really has nothing to do with the NA highway and everything to do with to much milk in Mexico. so they shut the border to oour product and are now able to bolster their domestic producers. 

Sorry kinda rambled off the original topic but thats the way it goes. JR

[rightone]

jr,

Actually the windows 98 statement is just a good example.

 ( 98 machines btw, run simple sites just fine  AND seldom does a 98 machine have a viral beakdown, sine 99.999% of all viruses are desigbed to affect the newer tech operating systems )

On the xp machines, some of em load this site fine....some do not too.  

Same story for agweb's site on the afore machines.

The point is, that farm/ranch machines are MOSTLY NOT the latest greatest "techie" gadgets needed to utilize these heavy "techie" load kinda sites.

In most views the money concentration for agri tech...is "Outside."

pickup, tractor, combine, gps units etc

Talked with a ranch wife last week....and we were talking agri sites...she said anything that does not load right up on her computers are sites clearly recognized as sites which are a PIA, thus she did NOT and never used such sites.  

Both this site and agweb were quoted as sites Never used for the afore reasons.

Her ranch btw, is a fair sized oufit.  They run 2,000 yearlings, 700 cows, seasonal logging etc.

I simply figure, since the afore type deals obviously buy plenty of inputs too, and they are not using sites which are heavy "tech" loaded, advertizers are certainly wasting money on something most potential customers never view.

Keep in mind most "simple" folks relate hard to load, hard for their computer to easily run sites as being "viral" problem sites anyway. 

Thus why waste more time yet cleaning computers after using said sites?

[behog]

JR.  I hire my chopping out.  The guy charges me 300 an hour for a 890 class. He charges me 65 an hour for the trucks.  chopping price seems fair because this guys machine really eats the crops up.  But at 300 an hour it get expensive in small fields.

I think the truck price is a little high for the size of his trucks.  Wish he would get bigger trucks.

I have had him cut stuff that was close , in big fields with good yeild and it was less then 4 bucks a ton for everything.  This year we cut some corn that was a couple miles up the road and the yeild was low.  Have not got a bill yet but I bet it will be over 6 bucks a ton.  we had 5 trucks running and it was all they could do to keep him moving.

[k-289]

GLAD TO HEAR SOME COMM. ON THIS SITE!!!! Have enough grass for 200 plus cows ---the real question it being a venture for my children??? Cattle numbers on cow /calf side should be positive for a long while---the biggest obstacle like in all ag is the wild ride of marketing---does one have the fortitude to be involved in this??? $ 75 cattle with 5% unemployment & $100 fats with 10% employment numbers. Makes one wounder about all of this reporting suff---to many cooks in the kitchen???