Drought and wildfires made 2023 a difficult year for ranchers across British Columbia

BC Cattlemens Association General Manager Kevin Boon says 2023 has been full of challenges, right at the forefront for ranchers.

He says these include issues with wildfires and the ongoing drought that started in June 2022.

“Because of the drought, we ended up with feed shortages, which we have gone through for over a year, so we had feed shortages last year, so reserves were taken so that was a challenge, and then we had water shut downs throughout the province which again created challenges.”

With that, Boone says they have seen good prices for cattle this fall, which he explains is due to the drought.

“In a normal year, we will see people replace about 10 per cent of their herd and sell it out, and replace them, but this year we are probably closer to 25 per cent throughout the year, so we are going to be down on our numbers,”

He says it raises uncertainty about what next spring will look like

“It will depend how long it will take us to recover and where are we going to get those cattle to recover from,” he said.

Boone says they aren’t too sure what next spring will look like as they had to utilize all their pasture and feed and drought conditions are still ongoing.