May Dairy Cow Slaughter Way Down
May dairy cow slaughter was down 39,000 head compared to May 2013, the United States Department of Agriculture reported this afternoon. That’s a 16% drop in culling.
But May 2014 only had 21 business days compared to 22 in May 2013. As a result, culling per business day was only down 12%.
Some 21,000 fewer cows were also culled in May 2014 compared to April 2014, a 9% decline. But on a cull per day basis, again because May had one less business day, culling was actually down 4.8%.
Note that in yesterday’s milk production report, USDA also reported 10,000 more cows in U.S. dairy herds in May than in April.
You can read the full livestock slaughter report here.