In a typical year, Bagley Livestock Exchange only has limited sales activity during the summer months. Billy Bushelle, who co-owns the auction market, says the drought brought more cattle to barn this summer. “We sold a lot of feeder calves already as cow/calf units and a lot of the yearlings that were on pasture were also sold earlier than normal.” Because of the hay shortage, cattle that normally market during the winter may be sold in October, November and December. The feeder cattle market is stronger than one year ago. That’s not the case for the cow market. “The slaughter cow market is crashing; they’ve probably dropped 20 percent in the last two weeks just because of the oversupply with the dry conditions.”
