The Beef Cattle Research Council (BCRC) has a survey out to ensure their research priorities and extension efforts are in the right place for cattle producers.
The beef survey has been open since January and the deadline to participate is this Sunday (March 31).
BCRC Science Director Dr. Reynold Bergen says the survey asks producers to share insight into their on-farm management practices and production methods, from feed testing to winter feeding practices to calving management to name a few.
“All those answers will come in; all the data will get crunched and we’ll that into something called an Adoption Rates Report,” said Bergen. “And we will use that information to look at regional differences in how different production practices are adopted across the country and we’ll use that to focus our extension efforts in particular.”
He adds the more producers who do the survey, the stronger interpretations they can make from the responses, the better resources they can develop, and the better they can focus their communication efforts to what producers need.
Bergen noted this is the first nation-wide survey, as in previous years a survey was done specific to each region from Atlantic Canada, to Western Canada, and sometimes in individual provinces such as Quebec, Ontario, and Alberta.
The survey is on the Beef Cattle Research Council website. Bergen expects the next Adoption Rates Report will be released sometime in the summer. Results will also be available at BeefResearch.ca.