A meatpacking plant in Denison will shut down and put workers on furlough for up to five weeks, citing a shortage of cattle to slaughter and soft demand for beef. Iowa’s other Tyson plants will not close, but Cherokee plant manager Jerry Menke says they all have seasonal slowdowns this time of year.Menke says there are “quite a few people” currently laid off from the local plant, a typical seasonal downturn in production, and some operations are offline for maintenance and repairs, construction work that always happens this time of year. The plant in Cherokee makes processed deli meats under the Tyson brand name. He says there’s a good workforce at the plant, and they just need a little more demand for their product, though he thinks that’s true industry-wide. “Hopefully a hot bowl of soup and a ham sandwich… and our business’ll pick up.” In addition to the Cherokee plant and the Denison beef-processing site that will begin a temporary shutdown on Monday, Tyson operates two beef and pork plants in Council Bluffs, ham-canning plants in Independence and Oelwein, and pork plants at Columbus Junction, Storm Lake, Waterloo and Perry.