He fears that this year will finish off yet more of the small to mid-sized operators. Usually, when you get in these things, you can look out over the hill and think the next year is going to be okay. It didn't work that way this year. He blames the erratic and poor market in large part on consolidation and lack of competition. It's not like that today.
Today there's no trading involved.
The minute he gets hit in the head, you're out. There's no bargaining when they tell you what they're going to pay for them after they're dead and hanging. Wheat says he's been seeing this trend of consolidation and the shift to bigger corporate control for quite some time, basically ever since they closed the terminal markets in Kansas City and Chicago and the packers were allowed to come out in the open market. I thought at one time I was a pretty big operator. Now the guy with 10,000 to 15,000 head, well that's just peanuts, and the guy who has 500 or so head, well he's out.