April 18,1996

President Clinton signed the new farm bill recently. Sheep and goat herders' fates were already sealed three years ago by the mysterious crusade of a New England congressman who was dead bent on ending the wool and mohair incentive payments.

"The President," the media reported, "made sure the huge food stamp program administered by the Department of Agriculture was intact." No mention was made of whether Congress or the administration checked to see who was going to raise the food to validate those stamps.

The bill provided a seven-year gradual ending of all supports. After having experienced the speed the three years passed phasing out the wool and mohair payment, farmers better take crash courses in career changes this spring. Like 180-day roll-overs on notes, financial assistance dissolves at the same speed ice cream turns soft at a Fourth of July picnic.

Funding was left out also for drouth feed programs. No note was made how shelled corn for bitterweed sheep and feeder calves had risen 70 percent over the past nine months. However, I wasn't too concerned about the cost of corn for my sheep. So many ewes died in the early part of the winter from renegade coyotes and poison weeds, our feed bill was lower than expected.

Dust was too bad most of the time to tell how the cattle wintered. Except for an old cow's bag, looks don't matter. Unless families having county agents or vocational ag teachers for sons are the case, it is very unlikely range cattle are going to be judged, other than the loan committee down at the bank deciding whether to renew the note the old sisters are backing.

A good cow husbandry tip is to inbreed the herd until growth is stunted, then base the amount of feed on body weight. Reduced to simpler terms, if a two pound coffee can of cubes per cow every other day starts the calves scouring, cut her feed in half and scatter it over more ground. Steers should be weaned at 350 pounds, before the curl in their tail straightens. Seems like an old calf sort of wilts standing by his mother's side past one year. Timing to take the heifers from the herd depends on how sensitive an outfit is to calving out young cattle under pickup headlights, jacking a calf puller in an icy rain. The safest calving practice, I think, is to pregnancy test the heifers at weaning and sell the bred end to your in-laws.

Safety, however, has never been the byword of the cattle and sheepmen. We should have known we were losing out on the Potomac when our game failed to become "ranchism" or "the ranchist movement." I no longer try to reach the city folks to tell them our country needs a domestic supply of food, governed by our health laws. Enough styrofoam containers and pasteboard pizza wrappers strew the sidewalks to show the depth of their thinking.

Hard to believe a farm block once existed, but we have good evidence that no such thing remains today...