Grain not so golden

Brian Specht has a pragmatic view of farming.
“It’s either feast of famine,” Specht said on a sweltering afternoon this week when he took a break while cutting corn northwest of Iola.
Specht referred not only to crop yields but also prices that newly harvested grain fetches. And his analysis even could apply to differences between crops.
This spring many farmers harvested bumper wheat crops and with its cutting in high gear, corn production promises to be just as robust. The outlook for soybeans, depending on what the weather does the next few days, doesn’t look so bright.
But, there is more to success in farming than planting a crop, having the weather cooperate and then cashing a paycheck after harvest.
The field Specht was cutting likely shook out at well over 100 bushels an acre, maybe even more after the figures are tabulated.
He gambled on this summer being a little on the dry side, planting 20,000 seeds per acre. However, although spotty throughout the area, rain generally fell in good enough amounts during prime corn-growing weather that farmers who planted more densely — 24,000 to 28,000 seeds per acre — reaped the benefits, i.e. greater yields.
“There’s going to be some 140- and 150-bushel corn this year,” Specht said. Probably even some in the 200-bushel range, opined Arlyn Briggs, who farms in the Kincaid area.
The dry weather of late and mid-90-degree days have dried corn to desirable moisture levels, putting combines to work throughout the area.
Specht’s corn tested at 14 and 15 percent moisture, with 15½ percent considered dry.
Briggs’ corn isn’t quite as far along as Specht’s. A couple of test cuts Tuesday found moisture at 16 and 17 percent. That has Briggs anticipating having his combines rolling in a day or two.
Meanwhile, the downside of what a cursory spectator might view as a bang-up corn harvest is found in ag economics 101.
At mid-week corn was bringing a touch over $3 at local elevators and as the harvest quickens, both in Kansas and other Midwestern states, what promises to be a glut of corn coming from fields will depress prices.
“The price changes sometimes by the minute,” Briggs observed.
The ethanol plant in Garnett pays a premium of a quarter dollar or so per bushel, but the effects of this year’s harvest already has been felt there, Specht said, with enough grain on hand for distilling into alcohol to last until late in the year.
A year ago corn sold in the neighborhood of $4.50 a bushel, pointing to what a difference a year with rainfall at the right time means.
The average person would be tempted to do a bit of multiplication and find that 120-bushel corn sold for $3 a bushel means a farmer is raking in a windfall of $360 an acre.
Appearances are deceiving.
Specht and Briggs agreed corn planting costs — for seed, fertilizer, equipment and fuel and chemicals — can run up to $250 an acre. In addition farmers have to consider land costs, insurance, taxes and machinery costs again at harvest. Some farmers also have labor costs, and to be honest must include themselves. Farming is their occupation.
As with anyone self-employed, a farmer has to come away from each year with enough income to pay normal living expenses and, hopefully, enough profit either to re-invest in land and machinery and to deal with more than family necessities, including an occasional few days off “to get away from daily chores.”
“I remember when I first started farming I thought if I made $25 or so an acre, I was doing pretty good,” said Specht, who at 45 has been farming full time 25 years.
Were that still true, his take-home from 800 acres of corn this year wouldn’t last long if he went shopping for a new piece of equipment.

BUT THERE’S always soybeans, might come a retort from the sidelines.
In a typical year Allen County farmers put about 60,000 acres to soybeans, twice as much as either corn or wheat, and expect yields of 40 to 50 bushels per acre. Planting costs are less and per-bushel prices in recent years have been in double digits.
That would be a lucrative aside to corn and/or wheat income, except today the area’s soybean crop is at a critical juncture.
“If we don’t get a good rain soon (as in three or four days) some of the soybeans aren’t going to make much,” Briggs said.
He recalled beans got a good kick-start with ample rain in June and again in many fields when they started to bloom, but recently — since late June — rain has been scarce. A saving grace before the past week or so was cooler than normal summer temperatures that kept soil from drying too quickly.
A check of weather records maintained by the Register shows 2.4 inches of rain has fallen locally since the first of July and only once — .84 of an inch on Aug. 7 — has rainfall been more than slight showers that resulted in little moisture soaking in to root level.
“We haven’t had much rain since July 1,” said David Bedenbender, who farms in the Neosho Falls area. “My soybeans are about done.”
What has occurred is pods stemming from blooms started to fill recently and there hasn’t been enough moisture in the soil to fulfill the process.
“Soybeans can hang on a long time, but there’s a limit,” Specht said.
“They can last only so long,” agreed Briggs.
The forecast is for a chance of thunderstorms this weekend and a better chance for rain early in the coming week.