Winter Storm Uri’s Impact on Livestock Agriculture in Texas

Mar 10, 2021

By David P. Anderson

Economic impacts of winter storm Uri are still being pulled together. It appears that cattle death losses in feedyards and dairies were light. It helped that the storm front did not drop a lot of moisture ahead of the cold. Cow losses have been reported and it’s likely that newborn calves were hit hard during the storm. Data from USDA indicates about 15 percent of calves are born in the western region of the US in February. Additional feed costs and lost efficiency will likely be a large source of economic losses. The animal used their feed energy to stay warm rather than gain weight. The well-publicized electric grid problems forced reduced steam flaking and more reliance on dry ground corn. Steer live weights in the Texas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico region dropped from 1,361 pounds for the week before the storm to 1,251 pounds per head for the week of the storm. Milk production was reduced and there were reports of limited milk dumping.

South Texas sustained some large losses in the citrus industry due to freezing temperatures extending into the Rio Grande Valley. The severity of freeze damage to the trees won’t be clear for some time but, certainly will include losses to this year’s crop and part of next year’s, as well.

Source : osu.edu

Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

JOIN THE BARN TALK NEWSLETTER AND GET LIVE EVENT ACCESS: We're on a mission to hit 10,000 subscribers, and when we do, we're hosting a live event at the barn. Sign up for exclusive access to tickets and details.