2014 Bred Heifer Prices

[clayrwilliams]

What do you think bred heifers will bring this winter?

[kato]

Based on market prices, I would think they should be good, assuming there is someone out there who can afford to outbid the packer buyers. We were doing some math on the price of open 8 to 9 weights last night, and they alone cost more than bred cows were this time last year.

[grassfarmer]

The packer buyers are pretty keen - saw a cull cow sell yesterday weighing 1645lbs @$1.3675 for $2250.

[perfecho]

Would think they would be relatively strong, some younger people are looking into cattle for investment.
A year or two more of these decent prices and then even grain farmers should be looking.....then it will be strong..;-) IMHO
Do you have any Gelbvieh's up for bid?

[clayrwilliams]

I'm going to have a pen of 70 bred heifers for sale this fall/winter. I'm trying to decide how many i'm going to keep based on price.

If your interested check them out on my website: www.whiskeycreekranches.com on the cattle tab

[greybeard]

Top cut heifers on the feeder market will probably bring $1600 for 850 to 9 wts.
If you can get them across the line, a lot more.
Add bulls,opens,preg checking, deads, health, marketing, and trucking.
$2100 to call it a nice hobby.
For every $100 extra you get about$5000 a load.
I've sold breds at fair premiums for years but I always wonder if It's more than a hobby.

[15444]

They should be high, but there is more breds coming this fall to town than I think we have ever seen. So many going to cut in half or get out all together. I can't see enough people crazy enough to buy breds nowadays. 20 cows are an easy 40k. Buy a decent house in a small town, or buy 100 cows....decisions, decisions.

None of old timers want to be the dumb bunny that held on till everything crashes.

[grassfarmer]

Some interesting arithmetic you guys are throwing out. greybeard I'm thinking the additional production cost of selling bred heifers in the fall versus selling feeder heifers would be closer to $100 than $500. Really your only extra costs are the bulls, breeding shots if you give them and the preg checking.

15444, the choice in AB is a little different - buy an average house in Calgary or buy 275 of the $2000 cows.

The ecision for me is an easy one - you couldn't pay me to live in Calgary, lol.

[15444]

I had no idea Calgary was a small town.