Commodity Corner
Views on commodities and energy
Crop scouts bond over corn yields, long car trips
Pro Farmer promises nothing to scouts on its annual Midwest Crop Tour but hard work, long days and the chance to get really dirty. For most, it does not sound like the best way to spend a week in mid-August.
But the tour attracts a group of regulars who come back every year to gauge the potential of corn and soybeans around the region as well as reconnect with people they met on previous tours.
“I am still interested in what the crops are doing and we learn a lot,” said Rodney Frick, an Illinois farmer on his fourth crop tour. “But it is also about the friendships we form.”
Crop Tour-How We Do It
There is no one magic formula for unlocking the secrets of a corn field’s yield potential. There are lots of them.
“There are about as many yield formulas as there are ways of doing anything,” said Roger Bernard, the leader of the eastern leg of the Pro Farmer Midwest crop tour.
The basic equation involves multiplying the total corn area by the plant population and dividing by the number of rows.
The Pro Farmer method is a little more involved. It requires a 30-foot length of rope with a hook on it, a tape measure, calculator and basic algebra. Not to mention all the personal supplies tour scouts need.
Stocking up for the Crop Tour
If you’re planning on coming on next year’s Pro Farmer Midwest Crop Tour, better start stocking up on supplies now. It takes a lot of equipment to measure a few ears of corn and count soybean pods. Scouts on the annual tour must be ready for nearly anything when they head into fields to gather data for estimates of this year’s corn and soybean harvest.
Let’s start at the bottom – boots. Solid footwear is essential for tromping through rows of corn, many of which are expected to be muddy due to surplus rainfall around the Corn Belt. More storms are in the forecast for this week, good for crops but bad for crop scouts. A raincoat and pair of waterproof pants can make the difference between merely a bad day and a miserable one if it storms during the tour.
Sunglasses also are important, even on a rainy day, to protect your eyes from sharp edges of corn leaves. To further guard against the elements, scouts coat themselves in sun block and bug spray every morning. To be sure, many scouts are farmers who are used to loading up on such supplies before heading to work. But for scouts who are grain traders or journalists, the equipment is not part of their normal job description.
Grain markets flashing warning signs
Another food price spike could be on the horizon, analysts told Reuters. Consider these factors: * Grain prices, led by soybeans, have been up since March. * South America’s crop is expected to be a disappointment. Crops in both Brazil and Argentina have a poor outlook. In fact, the U.S. Agriculture Department steadily lowered its forecast for Argentina’s soybean crop throughout the year.
* Many will be looking to the United States to come through with a big crop. But U.S. soybean stocks began the 2009/10 marketing year at a five year low. That means there’s not a lot of surplus to keep prices level if there’s any type of disruption in supply or weather calamity.
Signs of an economic recovery, which are just now beginning to be realized, would be threatened if the world were to face soaring food prices reminiscent of last year. “It would not be what the financial media is describing today as a green shoot,” said Rich Feltes, senior vice president at MF Global Research. “It’s going to be a green shoot that’s being killed with Roundup Ready herbicide. It’s not going to be good.”
U.S. soy planting record possible, corn out of reach
U.S. farmers could set a record for soybean plantings this year, topping 2008′s 75.7 million acres. The Agriculture Department will release its initial projection of seedings later this week. Some economists see plantings of 79 million acres (32.9 million ha) given that market prices and production costs currently favor soybeans.
Most expect corn plantings to lose ground as global recession takes the shine off demand from livestock and ethanol. But it would be daunting to break the U.S. corn plantings record even if the biofuels boom were re-ignited.
Corn seedings hit 93.5 million acres (37.8 million ha) in 2007 in a land rush to profit on ethanol. Although it was the largest total since 1943, it ranks 16th at USDA. The largest corn planting on record is a giant 113 million acres in 1932 — 21 percent larger than 2007. It may not give a full picture of corn-growing in America.
USDA began recording corn plantings in 1926. It has records of corn harvest area from 1866. From 1909-18, harvest area usually exceeded 100 million acres, so plantings had to be much larger, to allow for abandonment and other uses. In 1926, for instance, plantings were 99.7 million acres and harvest area was 83.3 million acres, a decline of 16 million acres. In recent years, the shrinkage from plantings to harvest area has been around 7.5 million acres, mostly for silage.
There are plenty of reasons for large corn plantings in the early 20th century. Corn was needed to feed the vast herds of horses and mules used as draft animals on the farm and in the city before gasoline power was adopted. Corn is easy to store. Livestock could glean cornfields after harvest. And, yields were a lot lower — 25.7 bushels an acre in 1926 for a crop of 2.14 billion bushels. In 2008, the corn crop was 12.1 billion bushels with a yield of 153.9 bushels an acre from 86 million acres.
Five largest soybean plantings (Records begin in 1924) 75.718 million acres, 2008 75.522 million acres, 2006 75.208 million acres, 2004 74.226 million acres, 2000 74.075 million acres, 2001
