The drought has sure carried over to other segments of the livestock industry. I went to a well established horse sale today featuring the weanlings of a group of breeders, plus yearlings and riding horses. It’s a highly advertised sale, very attractive catalog, nice location and strong reputation, I’ve gone to it many times and last year was a great sale with a ready market for weanlings and the others as well. Last year it was green and had rained every time it was needed. There was hay absolutely running out of the stack yards. The horse market was hot and weanlings sold like hotcakes as people looked toward the future the colts and fillies represented. This year it’s dry. Not just dry, but no grass, no hay, no water, no telling when it will change, dry. If today’s sale was an indication, interest in a horse that is several years away from doing anything but eat and drink has sure dried up for now too. A few weanlings brought what they were worth and then some, but most barely paid for the mare’s upkeep for the year. Most sold anyway as it’s a good sale and all, but also because of the lack of feed at the ranch they came from. If you’re having to buy every stem of hay your horses will eat until maybe next summer, you sure don’t want more mouths to feed, I get it. I’d have had to have done the same thing if I was still raising horses. The yearlings did some better because by next year, they could be getting some riding. The two-, three- and four-year-old started horses seemed to be selling about where they would have last year, which was good. The demand for rideable horses with a solid pedigree, good looks and started right, was high as it has been over all the horse industry. This drought has spread like a stain over most of the west and south through the central plains. Hard decisions will be made by ranchers and farmers with their cow herds, bands of mares, and bands of sheep. Culling happens in these situations, which probably, in the long run, improves the overall bunch, but it sure cuts down on future income of what would be produced when it rains and snows again. I’ve watched the roller coaster of livestock markets for decades. Whatever else is happening in the world that can influence prices in ag production, nothing can compare to a lingering or worsening drought. There’s not one thing anyone in the industry can do to make it rain and snow on demand. The helpless feeling can become overwhelming and mental health suffers along with the land and livestock. One thing I do know, every drought has ended. Dry winters have been replaced with snow so deep that there’s nowhere left to put it when you have to dig out haystacks and corrals. Rains have come in such abundance that fences are wiped out, bridges are gone and dams are washed out that were dry hours before. The country heals along with the tough people who live there. Hay supplies are renewed and rebuilding can begin. Back to the horse sale today. It’s a good thing I didn’t have any excess money or I’d have bought a bunch of those good weanlings and had them standing in my kids’ corrals by nightfall. Then I’d have had to have spent money on hay and feed to get them grown up big enough to go to work with my kids and grandkids on the ranch. Yep. It’s a good thing. But it is fun to think about. “Hello Darcy? Can you bring the big trailer over? I may have bought a colt. Or two.”
Jan was raised on a ranch in far western South Dakota. She grew up horseback working all descriptions of cattle, plus sheep and horses. After leaving home she pursued a post-graduate study of cowboying and dayworking in Nebraska, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota....
