US Beef Herd Expansion

My son runs a cow-calf operation, and we raise a heritage Scottish White Park breed we cross with Corrientes so on behalf of all of Washington Cow-calf producers like us, I thought it would be beneficial to hear CattleFax Senior Analyst Kevin Good projection that the cattle inventory could grow by nearly 700,000 the end of the year. In an agri-pulse interview, he says favorable weather are part of the reason for expansion.

GOOD: From an expansion standpoint as a base in 2015 we expanded by 1 million head of beef cows, the dairy space has been flat, the heifer slaughter is down , cow slaughter is basically flat which is at an expansion rate. So if you continue that, you look at the good moisture conditions we have around the country it would suggest the beef cow herd could be up another six to seven hundred thousand head this year.

He anticipates strong cow-calf margins.

GOOD: From a cow-calf man standpoint, right in here, they've had a profitable go the last couple of years. We think they will be profitable again in 2016. Combination of still very good prices from a historical standpoint although then the last two years combined with good moisture conditions as well. So the margin should be there again in 16 to support expansion, like 2017 and 2018 it becomes more marginal.

Good says herd expansion is expected to slow and eventually stop all together by 2018.