Programming in Pasture-Finished Beef Production 2020-2021

Pasture Finished Beef Production continues to be another major programming area in my extension efforts.  I started finishing cattle on pasture on one of my personal farms eight years ago and have been working with farmers in Kentucky and throughout the eastern US with this niche but expanding enterprise.  I secured a $45K Risk Management Education grant and led a joint extension program with two other states.  Due to Covid-19, we had to abandon in-person meetings and instead had a three-day webinar in August 2020.  This collaborative webinar had a reach far beyond what we expected: We had a total of 628 participants from 45 states and provinces, and 11 countries.  The overall conference rating was an 8.9 out of 10.  Here are a few representative comments from the evaluations: “Very focused - best grass finished webinar I’ve done”; “This workshop was EXACTLY what we were looking for. Thank you for putting on a great workshop.”; “Not many Extension services are offering pasture based [finishing] classes. I REALLY appreciate that you are.”; “Several of my fellow producers felt that Halich's session gave them hope to finish small numbers of their cattle on their own grass based farms. It was their favorite part by far.”  Out of six presentations, my two presentations had the highest ratings of the webinar. 

A 40-page multi-disciplinary extension publication that I was the lead author on, “Producer’s Guide to Pasture-Based Beef Finishing”, continues to be one of the most popular publications by Agr-Comm, with over 5000 hard-copies now distributed, as well as an unknown amount of downloads ( http://www2.ca.uky.edu/agcomm/pubs/ID/ID224/ID224.pdf ).  Betsy Hodge, Cornell Cooperative Extension wrote in February 2020: “Your Producer's Guide to Pasture Based Beef Finishing is a super reference.  Your charts have all the info I was trying to put together last night at home.  Thanks for making this available to everyone and for all the work to get all that information into one place in a readable format”. 

Due to Covid-19, demand for locally produced and processed beef skyrocketed in the spring of 2020, which resulted in increased demand for extension programming.  I wrote on the subject in the department’s economic policy update as well as a two-part series in the online magazine On-Pasture in July-August 2020.  From Will Snell, Editor of the EPU: “I finally got around to editing/reviewing articles for the June bluesheet.  I really thought your article was outstanding with all your personal references, updated situation, and practical advice to those considering getting into the freezer beef market.”  Finally, I was part of a collaborative UK extension program focused on beginner freezer beef production that was delivered in late winter 2021.

Below are qualitative indication of program impact from the national webinar: 

“Most of the focus in this region seems to be on the commercial cattle business and not so much on grass-fed operations. I understand that, so I take from it what I can and apply what practices I believe I can use. That 3 day forage finish beef class was like a dump truck of information for me compared to the teaspoons of info I been getting here and there. I’m glad it is on YouTube so I can reference it over and over. Thank you!”

Kentucky Cattle Farmer, Terry Greer

“Thank you again for the excellent program and showing us how a virtual program is supposed to be done!”

Virginia NRCS Forage and Grassland Agronomist, J.B. Daniel

“I want to congratulate you and John Fike for putting together the Grass Finish Webinar.  It was well organized and presented.  It's good to see some young leader taking the leadership of forages and grazing”

Retired University of Illinois Forage Specialist, Ed Ballard