12/28/06 Barley for livestock feed

It turns out that the demand for ethanol has helped drive up the price of corn and that in turn has some livestock producers looking for alternatives. In the Midwest a lot of cattlemen have turned to barley for livestock feed. Steve Edwardson is with the North Dakota Barley Council. EDWARDSON "May be an opportunity to bring barley back and to ration it a profitable level and keep that ration cost effective." Edwardson says there's been a big change in feed barley prices and that has to be good news for farmers in his part of the country. EDWARDSON "Mid summer probably around $1.40 to $1.50 per bushel and now we're in the three dollar a bushel neighborhood. So the bins are emptying out and I think it's indicative of the situation of the supply right now, that there's just not a lot out there and any carryover stocks are being marketed." Barley acreage in Idaho and nationwide are at historically low levels. On the other hand Idaho grower Evan Hayes, the president of the National Barley Growers Association has never seen barley prices this high. But he says you have to look at both sides of the ledger. Hayes says a 75 cent per hundredweight increase in his malting barley contract may be eaten up by his higher input costs. He has to deal with big increases in energy costs and even though diesel fuel prices are a big concern he feels the fertilizer costs are even more significant. Voice of Idaho Agriculture Bill Scott