This past week I gave 2 presentations that included a discussion of management for summer heat relief to different groups in Iowa and Illinois. At both locations, comments following the presentation reaffirmed what I’ve known for some time – producers … Continue reading
State governments around the US are in the process of finalizing their budgets for the coming year(s). In all but 1 or 2 states, all recipients of state government funding are being told to do make do with less. This … Continue reading
I had an interesting inquiry this morning asking how producers are reacting to the lack of profit and higher feed ingredient costs. Specifically, are they lowering diet quality to conserve cash? This is interesting because many of you have … Continue reading
The most common question asked by every vendor and producer at the World Pork Expo was – ‘when will the pain end?’. It’s not fun being in the pork business right now, and the prospects don’t look promising for some … Continue reading
On Sunday, May 17 I flew from Minneapolis to Kansas City wearing a PQA+ and Pork Checkoff polo shirt. At both airports I had an individual come up to me and comment that they ate pork and considered it to … Continue reading
I started the week thinking this weeks writing would be about management of finishing facilities for summer heat. One item often overlooked in management for summer heat is modification of grow-finish diets to reduce the heat increment of the diet. … Continue reading
The combined March 1 and April 1 breeding herd inventory for US and Canadian producers stood at 7.394 million pigs, 96.3% of the 2008 number for the same period. Because so much of our profitability is now tied to … Continue reading
Hysteria is the best word I can think of for what happened to hog prices this week when consumers around the world mistakenly associated pork production with the Type A-H1N1 virus. This morning there was a report from Los Angles … Continue reading
Yesterday, April 28, USDA and Statistics Canada released the April 1 Canadian inventories of hogs and pigs, and the combined March 1 US and April 1 Canadian herd numbers. On April 1, there were 1,359,200 head in the Canadian … Continue reading
As I write this week’s blog, the air temperature is 42 F with wind gusts from the NW up to 30 mph. However, by this weekend temperatures in the Mankato, MN area are predicted to be in the upper 70’s. … Continue reading