The first snows have fallen on pasture land across the southeast and ranchers are busy preparing for winter and taking stock of their cattle.
The first snows have fallen on pasture land across the southeast and ranchers are busy preparing for winter and taking stock of their cattle.
"This time of year, you put your attention to getting ready for winter," said Murray McGillivray, who ranches near Radville and was busy mending fences recently. Other prep work includes servicing water bowls, corral work and more. "The time of low temperatures is for making things more convenient for yourself in the winter."
McGillivray has also started vaccinating some of his cattle and giving pregnancy tests to many of the females, though he still has some to do.
"If 95 per cent of your cows are with calf, you're doing very well," said McGillivray, who explained that the national average is around 91 or 92 per cent. "There's so many things that can affect it. With good management, you can beat that by a bit."
McGillivray, like every rancher, hopes all his cows are pregnant, but will cull those who haven't produced a calf in three cycles.
Garry Moore, west of Weyburn, has also been checking his cows to see which are pregnant and culling the old cows.
"The cows are in the best shape ever," said Moore. "I bought pretty much a whole new herd in the spring."
"We had a big scare with that snow earlier," said Moore, who was concerned an early winter would throw off their schedule and force some calves into early weaning. He isn't planning to wean until the end of November because he wants to make sure the temperatures have stabilized so calves don't get pneumonia.
Moore sold some cattle earlier in October and said the prices are good. He averaged $810 for each of his steers and $650 for each of his heifers. He also sold some young cows under the 400-pound mark for $2.05 a pound.
Ryan Thompson was processing some of his calves on his farm near Minton on Oct. 25 and was getting ready to wean them. He hadn't started pregnancy checks yet.
"We'll do that in a couple of weeks," said Thompson. "We're just trying to get ready before the snow flies."
Thompson said he is focused on building and repairing fences, hauling hay, inoculating and weaning calves and other pre-winter work for now. In July, August and September, Thompson sold his yearlings.
"The prices seemed pretty good," he said, but added that it could change quickly, with the implementation of country-of-origin labelling now required. "It's the single biggest issue in our industry now."
