“It’s a great opportunity to interact with and ask questions of some of the region’s top experts in the field about new research findings that target improvements relative to beef-cow efficiency and profitability in intensive and semi-confined production systems,” said Dave Lalman, Oklahoma State University Cooperative Extension beef cattle specialist.
Research conducted through grants provided by the Dr. Kenneth & Caroline McDonald Eng Foundation will be a particular focus.
The two-day event is being hosted by OSU, Texas A&M University and the University of Nebraska. The symposium will begin at 1 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 17 and conclude at approximately noontime on Friday, Sept. 18.
Cost is $125 per participant if pre-registering and $150 at the door. University graduate students are eligible to register at the discount price of $50. Online registration is available through the symposium website at http://www.mcdonaldengsymposium.org.
The symposium will take place at the Skirvin Hilton Hotel’s Centennial Ballroom, 1 Park Ave. in downtown Oklahoma City. For those wishing to stay at the hotel, a block of rooms has been reserved for Sept. 15 through Sept. 18. Hotel reservation information is available online via the symposium registration site.
“The special room rate for symposium participants will be available until Aug. 26 or until the block of rooms is sold out,” Lalman said. “We ask participants to pre-register if at all possible as it greatly aids in our planning for conference materials, refreshment breaks and the like.”
Denver’s Don Close of Rabobank will lead the symposium’s first session about confined cow-calf production being a viable model for rebuilding the U.S. cow herd.
OSU alumnus Rick Rasby, University of Nebraska Cooperative Extension beef cattle specialist, will provide insights about the economics of alternative cow-calf production systems.
Ryan Reuter, OSU associate professor of range beef cattle nutrition, will share how ranchland ecosystem services can be enhanced with semi-confinement systems.
Andy Herring, the holder of Texas A&M’s John K. Riggs ’41 Beef Cattle Professorship, will lead a session detailing non-typical genetic effects and their implications for intensive beef cow production systems.
Jason Sawyer, Texas A&M associate professor of beef cattle science and superintendent of the university’s McGregor Research Center, will share strategies to enhance cow efficiency in intensive systems.
University of Nebraska researcher Jason Warner will share study findings about optimizing the use of corn residues relative to grazing and harvest.
OSU veterinarian Dr. Jared Taylor will provide insights about the health management of neonatal calves born in confinement systems.
In addition, Kenneth Eng will moderate a round-table-panel discussion featuring “hands-on intensive cow-calf producers” from both northern and southern Great Plains states.
The Dr. Kenneth & Caroline McDonald Eng Foundation was established in 2011 by Eng in memory of and as a legacy to his wife, Caroline, who loved life, cattle and cattle producers, and to provide research money to universities to study cow-calf efficiency with the ultimate goal of enhancing the long-term economic sustainability of the U.S. beef industry’s cow-calf sector.
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