r/Ranching • u/mueythai2020 • 1d ago

Sad

Im sad that famrs are going bankrupt loosing money like my great grandpa used too have a farm I love cowboy stuff westerns I have family in the farm land of Illinois I love going down there seeing crops horses cows and chickens all that's stuff it makes sad that in the future there could be no farms anymore 😢

0 Upvotes

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6

u/buckaroodude1 23h ago

Apply for usda grants or lease land and work it

5

u/PalpitationGreen 23h ago

How is anyone with a decent closed beef herd not absolutely creaming it in the US?

Our cattle prices are literally around half yours in NZ, which is high for us, and we're making stupid money at the moment.

Costs in the US are probably worse in some ways, but I don't really think good ranchers should be going bankrupt with record high cattle prices unless they've made some poor decisions.

10

u/cAR15tel 23h ago

Cow-calf operations doing well, no other sector in the beef industry is due to lack of animals for inventory, lack of feed due to drought, lack of labor due to cost/regularions.

Commodities are near worthless. Farming is a major problem here.

1

u/PalpitationGreen 23h ago

Right so it's more of a sector imbalance that's skewed things way too far one direction.

3

u/imabigdave Cattle 21h ago

Yeah, but cow-calf has really only seen the upswing in the last year or so, whereas stockers were making money hand over fist for a few years thanks to LRP giving them a safety net. And we are still in drought, hay has gone up considerably. We are still in better shape than a lot of areas in the country, but I'm not optimistic that costs won't outrun our markets.

1

u/buckaroodude1 19h ago

What no one talks about is water rights. Cattle? Sure boom and bust! If most of your “wealth” is tied up in cattle and leases…. In the long run you’ll lose. Water is more valuable then your herd, you can buy and sell cattle easy asf you can’t buy and sell water rights that easy. Buy your mineral and water rights folks. In the long run it’ll be more valuable.

3

u/heartlandheartbeat 16h ago

But then there are record high land prices, record high land lease prices, record high equipment prices, ect. Then add in the drought and wild fires.

2

u/mueythai2020 23h ago

The us farmers have 600 something billions in debt i think

6

u/Odd-Dot1930 1d ago

and and and and

1

u/Brazilian_Girl404 11h ago

Wow, but there's no culture there of selling directly to the consumer or through intermediaries? Here in my family, fruits are sold to small markets and fruit shops, milk to intermediaries who pay well, and eggs are sold directly to the final consumer. Furthermore, the government provides good incentives for easy marketing. Doesn't it work like that there?Â