CALF_News_February_March_2021

22 CALF News • February | March 2021 • www.calfnews.net By Patti Wilson Contributing Editor I t’s hard to imagine where agriculture would be without trucks and truck drivers. The sensible conclusion would be, literally, nowhere. I had originally intended this article to focus on the availability of distiller’s co-products during the pandemic. After sitting down with the co-products con- tractor/trucker, I found his business more encompassing than I had imagined. Standage Trucking Mark Standage of Ravenna, Neb., knows the farm and livestock business from the ground up. After attending college, he returned home where he took up farming until the mid-1990s. Standage was experienced in trucking, as many farmers are, and ambi- tious enough to step into a new business hauling grain. He purchased his first trac- tor and trailer in 1997 and established his own trucking company. Eventually, trucking took center stage and the farming operation was phased out completely. More trailers were added in 1998 when cattle were included in Standage’s hauling resume. Eventually, distiller’s grains became a major part of the equation as the fleet grew to nine trucks, nine fulltime employees and five owner-operators who lease Standage trailers. In all, there are 16 people working at the firm. Heidi, Mark’s wife, is the fulltime bookkeeper and Mark, of course, is the boss. “Every year is different, and every day is a challenge,” he says. Ethanol Co-Products Standage has been hauling distiller’s grains for more than 10 years. He was originally coerced into helping two truck- ing friends who were booked up and falling behind hauling loads from local ethanol plants. They needed assistance. It wasn’t long before Standage liked the work and flexibility it afforded. He pur- chased a wet distiller’s grains trailer and began hauling in earnest. After a time, he struck out and began contracting and hauling co-products on his own. Origi- nally delivering 20 to 30 loads per month, Standage Trucking benefitted from word- of-mouth, increasing business to 200 loads. Standage trucks can be found on the road from Nebraska’s northern border into Kansas, and extending across central Nebraska from Brewster and Broken Bow to Clay Center. Co-products are generally contracted three months at a time, to assure product availability and stabilize prices for his customers. Fall is a great time to con- tract; prices routinely go up after Jan. 1. Distiller’s grains prices are always tied closely to the price of corn. Standage does business with several ethanol plants and says that each plant’s product will test dif- ferently. Be sure to know where your feed is coming from. Distiller’s Dilemma Those of us who feed ethanol co- products to our cattle learned a year ago that what takes place in distant states can affect us on a daily basis. We ran out of wet distiller’s grains to mix with our ground cornstalks.  Mark Standage Keeping the Wheels of Agriculture Turning PRODUCER PROFILE Standage Trucking owns a fleet of seven tractors, 14 trailers and employs 16 people. They haul ethanol co-products across most of Nebraska and into Kansas. Mark Standage with his son, Ethan.