I don't have an answer to your question 1 - 5, mainly because I have not seen very many bred cattle or replacement cattle sales yet. But I will give you my take on what you call the "bubble".
This is just my opinion and that doesn't count for a whole lot because we all have one so take it for what it's worth which is nothing. I expect that the american cattle industry will continue to see these high prices for several years to come (7 to 10) maybe more. We are at a time that we have never seen before, the consumer demand for beef is at an all time high and the american cattle herd is at an all time low. This by in large is do to drought , the southern tier and especially west of the Mississippi has sold off a large percentage of their herd and they were not purchased by other producers and kept in production, they went to slaughter and are gone.
That being said with all of the cattle that are still in the north with calf prices being at an all time high there are a tremendous amount of heifers going into feed lots and being fed for beef. I'm not sure how much of Texas is really ready to restock and that doesn't include the the ability for producers in any other state and how the drought and environment is effecting them. I also think there are several folks that had to sell out and may never get back in, rather they just decide to stay out because of their age or have moved on and are making a living doing something else. The reason I bring up Texas is that I am more familiar with the cattle numbers there compared to herd numbers in say Oklahoma, New Mexico or Louisiana, from what I have read and I am sure there are many folks on here that will tell me I am wrong but I believe in 2002 Texas had approximately 14 million head of beef cattle and in 2012 they had around 6 million.
So it will take many years to produce enough breeding livestock to bring just Texas back to pre-drought levels and thats if we don't have another major drought, considering we are truly coming out of the present drought. I would say that if you are able to stay in the business or enlarge your operation there is no better time in our history to do it.
