2011 Tough Year For The Cattle Industry
By Hank Wilson
Now here’s something I bet you didn’t know. 2011 was one of the worse years ever for the cattle industry. Especially here in Central Texas, there are a lot of ranchers and livestock operations that have had to either drastically reduce operations or cease them all together. Now there are some producers around the county who did OK. In fact, I bet that some even made money, but if you were one of the producers in Texas or Oklahoma the odds are that 2011 wasn’t the best year you ever had.
Combine the overall lousy state of the economy, a drought that has ensnared a significant portion of the cattle belt, and the reduction in the amount of feed available; no rain = no hay and corn growers who are turning a significant portion of their crops into ethanol (now that was one of the dumbest ideas Washington has ever had, a perfect example of the law of unintended consequences), and (read the complete article here)
