Agriculture report

The 2014 Crop and Livestock Report for Inyo and Mono Counties has been released. As expected, the drought has dried some of the numbers. The number of “feeder” cows in the area has dropped a total of 84 percent since 2011, as pastures brown in the drought. Feeder stock are transient bovine that may pasture in Mono for a season but are not year-round residents. There was also a huge decline in overall livestock production, from $23.6 million in 2013 to $14.3 million in 2014. Beef prices have been up, but are no longer high enough to make up for the decrease in production. The total production for both Inyo and Mono Counties totaled $58 million, a 21 percent decrease from 2013. There are some new items included in the Ag Report, such as wool and miscellaneous nut crops, not reported in the past. Inyo-Mono Agricultural Commissioner Nathan Reade stated in the report, “This year does not look to be the end of this downward trend as we enter another year with even lower runoff projections.”