Master Best of Heres Info Cattle In The Mud a

program number 86 three two one here's info presents a three-part series this week cattle in the mud and in the freezing rains from Texas to Canada in the miserable spring of 1983 the struggle of animals to survive the rough winters of the western plains and the Upper Midwest are legendary but this spring of 1983 is worse than in recent memory we'll hear from jack crews of here's info and Jim Flannery of the Omaha world-herald today it screws with Norval Hulk Adams County Iowa cow calf operator who also feeds a thousand cattle for market I'm standing very close to mud to two dead animals covered with mud Norville how long has it been since you've seen a year similar to this one I've never seen one like it we've lost 20 percent as of this morning but some of these big huge tractors have mud clear to the top of them well Jack we've got every piece of equipment than anybody could want we've got a bulldozer to bulldoze the mud after but it can only be done so much we've got two all-terrain vehicles like I'm setting on here that we can get out to the cows and calves and we've got as much know-how as anybody has and you just can't get things are going on at snows and rains every other day our cost to gain in a feed lots of the cattle we have on feed has jumped tremendously this one or we've got cattle just the last month hasn't gained a pound and they just stand out there and we we take the bulldozer and we try to get as good a place as we can but it's just muddy all the way down and the cost of gain is terrible and the meat is just not going to be there that normally would have been and just as I was leaving he told me that last week they had cattle on a hillside about a mile south of here I can see it from where I'm standing there was no way to get feed to the livestock they hired a helicopter to drop hay from the air to those cattle that were more or less marooned and mud they controlled him and they know that he holds the highest car he'll take chances keep on gam for one more year down on daddies and keep on gambling the words and music are by Jenny wine Gardner with Bob Johnson music teacher for the Corning Elementary School's singing with her own guitar accompaniment tomorrow in the second program in this three-part series we'll hear Jim Flannery Prize winning reporter for the Omaha world-herald as we move west of the wide Missouri number 87 three two one here's info presents the second program in the series cattle in the mud and the freezing rains from Texas to Canada in the miserable spring of 1983 it isn't just the economics of cattle losses in the wet and freezing and soggy spring of 83 it's the profoundly human story of the ranchers and the farmers in their unrelenting struggle to keep living things alive when we saw the prize-winning reporter James Allen Flannery's byline stories in the Omaha world-herald about cattle losses we asked him to tell us by phone not the profit and loss disaster told in his reports but the compassionate side I think the best way you can gauge that is to go to a rendering plant and it is a pitiful sight to see not only dead calves but dead cows brought in and numbers that the operator of that plant has not seen before they are encrusted in mud I saw one cow that still had hay in its mouth especially the calves are damped to the bone they they can't dry out and the calves are reluctant to nurse on many cows because the cows themselves have utters that are soaked or coated in mud and the cows themselves are sick the kind of a bacterial problem when the cow's udder is coated with mud isn't it right it is in the estimation of veterinarians and longtime livestock producers in the area that this is one of the worst situations facing the industry I can't tell you the number of veterinarians who told me that how they are they and Cowboys that's still a term used in the business right are living around the clock with these calves just trying to save their lives the bankers on here they control here and they know that he holds the highest car he'll take chances keep on gambling for one more year down on Daddy's fall but he'll keep on gambling the words and music are by Jenny Wayne Gardner with Bob at Johnson music teacher for the Corning elementary school singing with her own guitar accompaniment tomorrow in the third program in this series we'll hear from Jack Cruz again with reports from muddy feedlots number 88 three two one here's info presents the third program in a series cattle in the mud and the freezing rains from Texas to Canada in the miserable spring of 1983 in this third program we go to Jack Cruz again he interviewed two feeders one who is combating the mud in the old-fashioned way and one who points out that the feed value of last year's corn is just not there and now - Jack Cruz at the farm of luster Anderson at Stanton Iowa Lester feeds 800 cattle would you kind of tell us some of the problems you've had in the last six weeks or so with this month it's continuous mud all the time a lot of them are belly deep we have a good team of Belgian horses that we drive when tractors gets stuck are your cattle putting on the weight that you know I don't think they're even holding their own the packers don't care to buy any of these cattle with all the mud on them how many pounds of mud would you say each critter had on it those that aren't too bad probably had 2530 pounds but some of them are worse than that I've heard him say they had 80 pounds the other muddy seen Jack crews visited is on the rave wolves farm near Malvern they stood by a truck unloading corn we're standing right next to a feedlot that's got mud the about hip-deep in it would you say the conditions are of this spring compared to normal right well I don't know as I've ever seen anything quite this bad this one lot no they're probably six weeks to two months behind on where they should be at the time I mean they just don't seem to be gaining or they're right well it's it's the mud and then I think it's a little bit the corn to the corn quality last year was what isn't there water usually some of them were changing their feed ration to give them more energy there again that's another expense to the cattle feeder bankers own him they control him and they know that he holds the highest car he'll take chances keep on gamblin for one more you down on Daddy's bomb but he'll keep on gambling the words and music by Jenny wine Gardner with Bob at Johnson music teacher for the Corning elementary school singing with her own guitar accompaniment this was a three-part series on cattle losses in the muddy wet and miserable spring of 1983 Phil Allen for here's info and that for today is something to think about he's the only one and the old is carry on his daddy's dream