Valley farmer says no conspiracy played a role in mass cattle deaths in Kansas

HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV) – Hundreds of cattle died in excessive warmth and excessive humidity in southwest Kansas final weekend.

Normally, cattle can face up to excessive temperatures, however now farmers are reporting a number of thousand are lifeless. It rained simply days earlier than the mass casualties, making the pens muddy and the air particularly humid. On prime of that, there was little to no breeze, and the temperature spiked over 100 levels.

Photographs and movies of the 1000’s of lifeless cattle gained traction on-line, and a few imagine there’s a much bigger story.

“We’ve seen the tales which have circulated particularly on social media with some movies and footage from that space. They’ve taken what’s a really robust state of affairs for these farmers and actually tried to show it into one thing it’s not and switch it right into a conspiracy principle,” stated Augusta County Farm Bureau Federation President Bradley Dunsmore.

He stated the state of affairs in Kansas, whereas tragic, isn’t inconceivable.

“We’re not simply speaking cows like we’d see right here within the Shenandoah Valley. Western Kansas is a feedlot space, the place calves are despatched for ending and harvesting. These are the cattle we’re speaking about, cattle which can be within the feedlot. Numerous these cattle had been both market-ready or almost market-ready. These cattle don’t deal with stress or warmth or antagonistic state of affairs,” he stated.

Dunsmore addressed misinformation on-line, saying passing alongside misinformation makes farmers should defend the business.

“I’ve seen folks speaking about ‘properly, there’s a whole lot of cattle in Texas, and it’s hotter down there than in Kansas.’ Positive it’s. It completely is. It’s the mixture of warmth, no wind, and humidity. When these three issues are coupled collectively, which they had been in Kansas final week, it turns into a really, very lethal state of affairs.”

For farmers affected by the deaths, it is going to be critical financially. Nevertheless, folks within the Valley possible gained’t see any change from our common meat provide. Studies of lifeless cattle vary from 2,000 to greater than 10,000, however that’s solely a small variety of the cattle harvested in at some point.

“We usually harvest 650,000 head of cattle in a single week in the USA. That’s roughly 110,000 a day, six days per week. If we misplaced 10,000 heads, that’s lower than 10% of the harvest for at some point,” stated Dunsmore.

Excessive warmth is anticipated to proceed in Kansas, however the humidity is forecasted to be decrease, and winds will decide up.

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