ASHLAND — As the heat and humidity that lingered through Monday night rose to unbearable levels Tuesday, the 140 heifers that Lloyd Vogler and sons Les and Loren were tending in a dirt lot started to go crazy.
One butted Loren in the stomach. A few minutes later, it lay dead.
Another normally docile creature charged so aggressively that Loren had to scurry over a fence.
Despite measures as extreme as summoning volunteer firefighters from Greenwood and Ashland to hose down animals, the Voglers lost 14 of their pregnant heifers by the end of the day.
By Friday, there were 16 carcasses in a nearby trench.
Multiple these numbers by hundreds — perhaps thousands — and you have a sense of what a heat wave has done to beef producers in Nebraska in the last full week of June.
As is often the case at times of big death losses, it’s hard to arrive at even a rough estimate of how many died, because many producers don’t want to talk about it and it takes time to pull numbers together.
But Lloyd Vogler wants the news to get out — including the part about how hard his family and others work to try to relieve the suffering they see.
“Somebody has got to come across that we’re not bad people out here,” he said as he stood in his yard 25 miles east of Lincoln. “We do try to take care of our livestock.”
Loren won’t soon forget the job of lining up all the black-hided carcasses in the trench as they started to swell with the heat.
“You don’t sleep too good for a few days after you do that,” he said.
Officials with the Nebraska Cattlemen and the state office of the Nebraska Farm Service Agency are trying to get a handle on how many cattle died in what seems to be commonly regarded as the worst weather-related episode of its kind in years.
Just in their area between Lincoln and Omaha, the Voglers know of other producers who lost 30 here, 60 there, 150 somewhere else.
A Kearney TV station reported 600 just in the Hamilton County area between Lincoln and Grand Island.
What Cattlemen executive Michael Kelsey knew for sure at noon Friday is that high temperatures, high humidity and a complete absence of a breeze can’t always be overcome — even by pouring water directly on cattle.
“We are in the process of trying to accumulate as much data as we can,” Kelsey said. “We’re talking to our members about both individual death loss, as well as collectively. And then we’re working to understand what assistance is out there.”
By early indications, “it does look like it’s fairly spotty, fairly localized,” he said. “It’s not in one specific region of the state or even within regions of the state. It’s not even universal there.”
One measuring stick is the overloaded status of rendering companies trying to respond to producer calls.
Les Vogler said there are delays of three to four days.
Reached at the corporate offices of Darling International in Irving, Texas, Friday, rendering company spokesman Ross Hamilton wasn’t willing to confirm or deny that estimate.
“I do know our operations are running as hard as they can,” Hamilton said.
He said what’s happened in Nebraska reminds him of “huge losses” in California a few years ago, mostly among dairy cattle.
“Lots of times, cattle, as with any animal, can survive better if it cools off at night. And where you generally run into losses like these, it gets hot and it stays hot. They just can’t cool off.”
Rich Barta and Deb Oppliger, based in Lincoln with the Nebraska Farm Service Agency, are among those trying to reach conclusions about numbers and about how much the federal government might be able to help.
This is more difficult than assessing hail damage, Barta said, “because, if a hailstorm comes through, you can drive around and make an assessment. When it comes to cattle death loss, you can’t just drive around and figure out what’s going on.”
Oppliger said uncertainty also extends into the government response because the rules for a new compensation program included in last year’s farm bill aren’t in place yet.
“It’s a livestock indemnity program,” she explained, “and it will be available, we’re expecting, sometime in mid-July. And it will be for eligible livestock producers who have incurred livestock death losses in excess of normal mortality.”
But she was unable to say if it might offer 50 percent compensation, for example, or something more or less.
“I don’t have specifics,” she said.
Until this week, the Voglers said, they have never lost even one animal to heat stress in more than 30 years in business.
“I’m 72 years old,” Lloyd Vogler said, “and I’ve never seen anything like that.”
One butted Loren in the stomach. A few minutes later, it lay dead.
Another normally docile creature charged so aggressively that Loren had to scurry over a fence.
Despite measures as extreme as summoning volunteer firefighters from Greenwood and Ashland to hose down animals, the Voglers lost 14 of their pregnant heifers by the end of the day.
By Friday, there were 16 carcasses in a nearby trench.
Multiple these numbers by hundreds — perhaps thousands — and you have a sense of what a heat wave has done to beef producers in Nebraska in the last full week of June.
As is often the case at times of big death losses, it’s hard to arrive at even a rough estimate of how many died, because many producers don’t want to talk about it and it takes time to pull numbers together.
But Lloyd Vogler wants the news to get out — including the part about how hard his family and others work to try to relieve the suffering they see.
“Somebody has got to come across that we’re not bad people out here,” he said as he stood in his yard 25 miles east of Lincoln. “We do try to take care of our livestock.”
Loren won’t soon forget the job of lining up all the black-hided carcasses in the trench as they started to swell with the heat.
“You don’t sleep too good for a few days after you do that,” he said.
Officials with the Nebraska Cattlemen and the state office of the Nebraska Farm Service Agency are trying to get a handle on how many cattle died in what seems to be commonly regarded as the worst weather-related episode of its kind in years.
Just in their area between Lincoln and Omaha, the Voglers know of other producers who lost 30 here, 60 there, 150 somewhere else.
A Kearney TV station reported 600 just in the Hamilton County area between Lincoln and Grand Island.
What Cattlemen executive Michael Kelsey knew for sure at noon Friday is that high temperatures, high humidity and a complete absence of a breeze can’t always be overcome — even by pouring water directly on cattle.
“We are in the process of trying to accumulate as much data as we can,” Kelsey said. “We’re talking to our members about both individual death loss, as well as collectively. And then we’re working to understand what assistance is out there.”
By early indications, “it does look like it’s fairly spotty, fairly localized,” he said. “It’s not in one specific region of the state or even within regions of the state. It’s not even universal there.”
One measuring stick is the overloaded status of rendering companies trying to respond to producer calls.
Les Vogler said there are delays of three to four days.
Reached at the corporate offices of Darling International in Irving, Texas, Friday, rendering company spokesman Ross Hamilton wasn’t willing to confirm or deny that estimate.
“I do know our operations are running as hard as they can,” Hamilton said.
He said what’s happened in Nebraska reminds him of “huge losses” in California a few years ago, mostly among dairy cattle.
“Lots of times, cattle, as with any animal, can survive better if it cools off at night. And where you generally run into losses like these, it gets hot and it stays hot. They just can’t cool off.”
Rich Barta and Deb Oppliger, based in Lincoln with the Nebraska Farm Service Agency, are among those trying to reach conclusions about numbers and about how much the federal government might be able to help.
This is more difficult than assessing hail damage, Barta said, “because, if a hailstorm comes through, you can drive around and make an assessment. When it comes to cattle death loss, you can’t just drive around and figure out what’s going on.”
Oppliger said uncertainty also extends into the government response because the rules for a new compensation program included in last year’s farm bill aren’t in place yet.
“It’s a livestock indemnity program,” she explained, “and it will be available, we’re expecting, sometime in mid-July. And it will be for eligible livestock producers who have incurred livestock death losses in excess of normal mortality.”
But she was unable to say if it might offer 50 percent compensation, for example, or something more or less.
“I don’t have specifics,” she said.
Until this week, the Voglers said, they have never lost even one animal to heat stress in more than 30 years in business.
“I’m 72 years old,” Lloyd Vogler said, “and I’ve never seen anything like that.”
