If this show powered by Agri-Gold for Central Illinois, your Agri-Gold reps breadth are. He is your Agri-Gold reps for Central Illinois today as addition of back roads of Illinois. We were Central Illinois Agriculture Source, and in the Midwest alongside in Central Illinois Agriculture, we were glad you were here on Thursday afternoon.
I'm your host Cesar Delgado. We were going to have a conversation about the statistics of the harvest. Planning season in the state of Illinois with Marques.
From the field office in Springfield, from the state capital of Illinois, then we are going to have a conversation about updating on Iowa agricultural with Mike Nagy, the Secretary of Agricultural Iowa. Now was the harvest season in Iowa, and we'll be discussing with Secretary about the farm bill in E-15. Bird flew with the Secretary.
Then we'll be discussing about the commodities markets and hogs markets with Joe Cap from Comstock and Brian Hoops from Midwest Solution, John Heinberg from Total Farm Marketing. And the markets club plot cash. Okay, this is your agriculture news and information sponsored by Agri Gold in Central Illinois.
The Midwest is turning into cooler than the average. We were going to have a couple of inches in central Illinois near Pontiac and LaSalle, Illinois. Next week is going to be having below temperature. The farm economy is dropping for this month. However, the barometer it's been up for this month.
The farmers are skeptical about the commodities markets and trading, the demand for next couple months. Congratulations to Markov Hall for the Hall of Fame in Kansas City for National Association of Foreign Broadcasters. He dedicated server to farmers into the radio and TV.
This is your agriculture news and information on back roads of Illinois. We write back with Marcus from the field office in Springfield. This is your opening numbers of the commodity markets from Kyle Bumstead from Allendale, Inc.
Corn futures are down at six to eight cents on the quarter. Soybean futures are down at four to five cents on half. Wheat futures are up to five to ten cents. Let's go with livestock markets. How is the cattle markets and hogs markets for today's opening for this morning?
Cattle futures are up and four to six cents. Feet are cattle are up at six to five cents. Lean hogs are down at six to eight cents to down quarter. Crude oil are up to nine to eight cents per barrel. Dow Jones is up to five points.
We were going to have a conversation about the statistics of the harvest, planting season in the state of Illinois with Mark. Yes. From the field office in Springfield. Welcome, Mark. Thank you, Cesar. I'm looking forward to our discussion. This will be my second podcast with you. I hope you and your family are doing well.
Mark, let's start with our discussion, discussion of the statistics for this harvest season and the planting season. What is the trends for the state of Illinois on the dry weather?
Well, Cesar, I thought about your question, and I think the best way to answer it is to use an old title from a classic book. This is a tale of two seasons, not a tale of two cities, but a tale of two seasons. The early part of the growing season was wetter than normal, but not so wet that it delayed planting. So in general, quite good.
And then later on in the year, and I'll provide details, it got pretty dry in Illinois and across the Midwest. So let me provide a little bit more information on that. In general, planting was on time in Illinois, but may be lagging a little. So let me tell you about April.
April precip was more than two inches above the normal precipitation across Illinois, but corn and soybean planting continued on normal pace. So there were enough breaks in the rain for farmers to get things done. But the total rainfall, average rainfall across the state for April was 6.1 inches, and the average is 3.8, so more than two inches above normal. At the end of April,
Corn in Illinois was 25% planted and the five-year average is 25. On that same date, April 28, soybeans were 26% planted and the average is 16. What is the river level at Missouri River into the Quad Cities?
I don't know about the river levels, but the dry part of the late season certainly lowered river levels in the Mississippi and other shipping lanes. And I don't know if the late rains we've had in November have increased river flow so that barges can flow at full capacity. I don't know what the barge capacity is these days.
What is the statistics for the Midwest alongside the drought for this fall in the harvest season?
In general, the pattern that I described for Illinois, where the early part of the season, let's say April, May, and June, and also in July, it was quite wet, that was generally true across the Midwest. And for your listeners, if you haven't been to the US drought monitor, it's a really good tool to see how things were. And what you can see is that April, May, June, and into July, things were quite good across Illinois and the Midwest, and then it started to get dry.
Let me put a few more numbers into the mix. In May, the rainfall in Illinois was 4.76 inches, more than 1.5 inch above normal. And at the end of May, corn planting was 89% finished compared to 84 for the five-year average. And soybean planting was 81% finished compared to a normal of 73. So planting went well in Illinois.
I think we can also say that the early planted crops really benefited from those early rains, in particular the rain in July.
People say rain makes grain and that's typically true. And in particular in July, July rain falls associated with corn yields. It's highly correlated. So for the crops, for the corn crop in Illinois that was planted early, July rains were wonderful and abundant and helped grow some very, very nice yields, some record high yields later planted crops probably. What about the census?
NAS conducts a census of agriculture every five years, and 2022 was the last one. We've been publishing a lot of results from that, and it's a treasure trove of information that can be used to look at not only crop acreage and production, but livestock.
also fertilizer and chemical use, expenses and the demographics of the farm operators. One of the best things about the census of agriculture is that it's a uniform data collection process across all the states. So all the states and all the counties are tabulated for things like the number of farms and the acres of cropland and the expenses for fertilizer and feed and seed and rent and things like that.
There's plenty of information for anyone to get to for free. Start at www.nass.usda.gov. That's nass.usda.gov slash AG Census. If you click on AG Census, there's lots and lots of information at the county level.
And sometimes we even have some tabulations at the congressional district level. And one of the things I think this is really valuable to the lawmakers, the federal, state, and even local legislators who are deciding on policies that will impact farmers and ranchers. And our job is not to tell the legislators what the policy should be. Our job is to provide statistics so they can look and see.
If they make a change in some rule, how many farms will it impact? That's in the census of agriculture. If there's a change in taxation, how many farms will that impact? That's in the census of agriculture. So we're not the coach or the manager to tell farmers how to run their business or legislators how to do their jobs. But we are kind of like the umpire in a baseball game.
We're calling the balls and the strikes and fair and foul and safe and out. That's our job. Do you have any final thoughts or recap of our conversation about updating from the harvest season?
I think I'll go back to a couple of main points. In general, it was two different seasons where the first half was really nice and wet, but not too wet. And that has contributed to some very high yields across the Midwest and across the country. But later on in the season, things did get dry. And in particular in October,
Illinois had net only got 0.95 inches less than one inch of rain was the average across Illinois and it compares to almost three inches is normal. So two inches below. The good thing is in October, most of the grain fill soybean pot, it's done. So that late impact later drought did not have a significant or huge impact on crop yields, but it probably
held them down somewhat in particular, or later, planted crops. And Cesar, I would really like to thank all the farmers that respond to the NAS surveys. Every individual response is confidential by law, and they are also exempt from the Freedom of Information Act. But NAS uses that information to tell the story of agriculture in Illinois and around the country. Only state totals and averages, county totals and averages, never individual reports.
Yeah, it is. However, what a great season for this year. Science Park says are you're very welcome. I hope you and your family are doing great. And I'd love to talk with you again sometime. This is Marcus.
From the Field Office and Springfield from the Department of Agricultural and Back Roads of Illinois. We have a special guest on today's show with the Secretary of Agricultural Iowa, Mike Naig. Cesar, it's great to be with you.
Let's start with our discussion on the E15 for the state of Iowa. Could you tell our audience about this topic? You bet and great to be with you and I just want to start at the top by saying congratulations on having a lot of success with this podcast.
I know you're a great market analyst and you've got a lot of good insights and had some incredible guests over the last many months, so happy to be a part of that group. Yeah, so E15, critically important topic, of course, biofuels, generally for the state of Iowa, a very important piece of what we kind of would refer to as value added agriculture, right? It's the fact that we
We're the number one corn producing state in the nation. We're number two in terms of soybeans. And I always like to say that it's that alone does not make us the agriculture, it doesn't drive our economy. It's what we do with those commodities. And so it's the fact that we feed that to livestock to create high value protein. It's the fact that we have this bioeconomy, making bio-based anything and everything. And certainly Bob fuels being one of those
key pieces. So we also lead the nation in ethanol and biodiesel production, again, stands to reason. And so what we're trying to do is continue to drive, demand drive opportunities for usage in the United States, but also for exports. And so we think one of the best ways to, you know, increase that ethanol usage
across the country is to see year-round access to E15 all across the country. And, you know, I like to think of this in this way in that doing so.
has a great impact for consumers. I just filled up this morning, E15 was $0.15 less per gallon than E10. So that adds up. And I've got two teenagers who drive, right? I'm buying a lot of gas right now in our family. And so this is a big deal for consumers. It's good in that it drives the economy. Look, we make ethanol, it creates jobs, it increases,
The price paid for corn and soybeans because there's demand for those products And of course the other thing that we don't often talk about is that it's good for the environment as well It's cleaner burning and especially in an age where we're starting to talk and thinking more about how do we how do we really focus on American made products? I can't think of a of a
better way to prioritize American-made energy than to make sure that we're being very inclusive of biofuels. And so at the state level, we're pushing for E15 adoption. We think that nationwide adoption of E15 would also be a good thing for consumers and farmers alike. Thanks, Mr. Secretary.
Do you have any thoughts on the 35 Z for next few months? Yeah, I think that, of course, this is the next piece, which is we often will say ethanol has been such a game for the state of Iowa.
roughly half of our corn production in the state of Iowa first processed at an ethanol plant so we're oftentimes trying to think of what's the next ethanol and I think one way to think of it is the next ethanol is actually ethanol and in that we can use that for as a as a feedstock for things like sustainable aviation
at whether or not those programs are being effectively delivered and whether there needs to be some changes made along along the way. But it's an important component of getting a farm bill done and it will be in the next version of the farm bill as well. Can you give us some update the bird flow outbreak to the state of Iowa?
Yeah, boy, H5N1, high path avian influenza, certainly been a, it's one of the dominant issues for 2024. I would certainly say, and of course, we're really coming, 2024 was the third year in a row that we've dealt with, high path avian influenza in the state of Iowa, and many other states have as well. Of course, prior to this year, it was only in poultry.
In 2024, we had the occurrence then of it happening in dairy as well, spreading throughout dairy herds across the US, which added a complexity, and then human cases as well. In Iowa specifically, we had three poultry positives this year, and we had 13 confirmed dairy cases. But we haven't seen cases now, knock on wood, since the end of June.
though it is getting to be the time of year fall we're seeing the fall migration the weather just turned uh really kind of starting to feel more like winter here today and and uh those cold fronts are starting to move through which will push the migratory bird south and that's a time where we do always say it's high alert for those wild birds bringing high path back into the state so the things i'm thinking about and and that we're going to
really focus on the rest of this year and into next year is what's that interplay between or across species? For a state like Iowa, we're number one in swine production, number one in egg production, four in beef, top 10 dairy, top 10 turkey. We have significant livestock and they occur and they're in close proximity to each other. And so for us,
When you've got something that's starting to cross over between species, that is very concerning. And so we can't handle this just as it's a single species issue. We have to think about the interplay between the two or three or however many species. And that makes us a little different here in Iowa. So we think more research is needed.
We think that we need to be pushing as hard as we can to get some effective vaccinations, protocols in place and deal with the trade implications of that. But certainly this remains one of the top issues and is a significant threat, especially for our poultry producers as we're coming into the fall here. What do you hear about the bird flu with your state veterinarian?
Yeah, so really just again that we need to be on high alert. We need to be thinking about biosecurity and how can we make sure our biosecurity is actually addressing the ways that the virus is moving.
In order to do that, what the state vet and his team is looking at is what kind of research needs to be done to figure that out. You know, it's one thing to say, you need to increase your bio security. We all know that. What are the specific ways or what has the research shown as being the most likely ways that a virus would be moving? Those are the types of things that the veterinarian, the state vet and his team and our folks are looking at.
Finally, is there anything else that would you like to tell us about the foreign economy with the prices has been down? Yeah, I think what we need to be focusing on and it's important now and it's important really anytime in good times and bad times or challenging times is that we in the United States were so blessed. We've got an incredibly productive
agriculture you know it's a time next week thanksgiving it's time to be thankful it's we've got a great bounty in this country
But we need to make sure that we've always got markets for our products. We should use as much of what we produce with US agriculture here in this country. And that's where, again, things like biofuels, sustainable aviation fuel, bio-based anything and everything. We should use our US agriculture to the maximum benefit of Americans. And it has served us very well. We have food security in this country, largely. And that leads to economic security.
as well, but we also need to be able to export our products around the world and so we need to be playing offense.
finding new markets, we need to be diversifying our trade portfolio, knocking down non-tariff trade barriers where they exist, making sure there's fairness in trade and all those types of things. So I would say, you can write a bad free trade agreement. You need to be good at it. You need to think about your own interests, to be sure. But I believe that we can write trade agreements
that are in our best interest as a country and that happened to benefit folks around the world. So we just need to be focused, continue to be focused on markets wherever they are, the very local level domestically in the United States, and frankly anywhere around the world that we can develop a customer and serve them. That's a good thing for us. We've always got to stay focused on that. Thanks, Mr. Secretary.
Thank you, Caesar. Appreciate the opportunity to be on the podcast today. That's Mike Nag is the secretary of agricultural. We were coming back with Brian Hoops from Midwest solution for back roads of Illinois. We were discussing the markets for today's close.
Yeah, it does seem in pre-level position of the commodity prices with the holiday season. But here's Brian is talking about that. How is the beans markets?
We did not have a great day for the bull markets on Thursday. We posted fresh contract lows in a couple of the soybean contracts, and we're testing that downside support in a lot of the front-month soybeans. I do think it's a matter of time before all the contracts
fall to contract low Caesar. You know, we have soybean meal at those contract lows. And despite some strong export sales, despite some private export sales, we just have a monster crop coming along in South America. And that is going to probably cause some of these sales that are now in the books to be canceled.
and our no doubt our exports program will slow down considerably as we go through the winter months. So I'm really not very friendly at this time to the soy complex. I think it has the most downside risk from here, maybe down into the low $9 range, less of course we get hot and dry weather in Brazil or Argentina. And then we could have some sort of a rally because then the yields and the crop will actually be threatened.
How is the January beans for this morning? Well, January beans, they were down about nine and three quarters by the closing bell. We took out a little bit of.
support and found some cell stops just below it, but we did hold contract lows, which are going all the way back to August at about 973 and a half. So, so far we've held that. The March soybean contract did fall to new contract lows, and I'm thinking it's a matter of time before all the months get down into that new contract low area.
Let's talk about the cash markets in Central Missouri, how it goes without saying that the tariffs
Yeah, right now, from a cash standpoint, producers really, the market's encouraging, especially if you have corn, to go ahead and make these cash sales right now. The spreads, we talk about spreads from Deese to March or Deese to July, that sort of spread.
It's really narrowed up and this is true for soybeans going from January to July. The spread has narrowed considerably. Despite us falling to these contract lows in the futures, the cash markets are very tight. Farmers selling is very limited.
And basis levels are very firm. So if you're wanting to make some cash sales, this is a great time to do that because of the tight basis. And if you're on a big bullish, South American weather is in the cards, you can buy that market back on paper. But this is a time where with tight basis levels, producers really should take advantage of it. I know some people don't want to because of tax reasons, but there's considerable downside risk here in both corn and soybean markets.
How is the cash market in your area and Springfield, Missouri?
Not a lot of soybeans down here, but a little bit of corn and winter wheat. These markets here are one thing that's been red hot. I think it's basis levels tightened up quite a bit. I think this is something that, again, producers in this area really want to take advantage of is the narrowing of the spreads, tight basis levels, and make some cash sales.
You know, you talk about the cash markets being strong. This is it. This is time to make some look for opportunities here and make some cash sales. Brian, how is the Dean's Harvestman sent from U.S. from I-35?
Virtually wrapped up we've got a lot of the product put away under bins here and You know just a big harvest has taken place and so there's a little bit more product to go But I'd say for the most part Within a week or two everything should be completed as far as harvest But yeah, there's a little bit left, you know just for small purchase sandwiches out of the entire crop of
to harvest. But for the most part, it's all locked up and hard to get it to pry out of farmer's hands now that it's in storage. How about the corn harvest?
Corn is very similar. It may be even a little bit more corn done in Missouri than soybeans at this time. Some of that double crop soybeans are kind of waiting on. It shouldn't be an issue of drying down. It should be dried down by now, but it's just a matter of getting out there and getting it done. Of course, in Missouri, you're not real worried about the weather, but there is some snow forecast next week to come through. But as far as soybean harvest, corn harvest, it's virtually completed.
Winter wheat seedings are done for the year and actually we've had a lot of moisture through the last three, four weeks. That's helped the winter wheat crop germinate and seed and it's off to a great start so far. How is the cattle markets and hogs markets for today's clothes?
So we were down a little bit in the front month of cattle. The hogs were just a little bit higher. I think the hogs traded higher because mid-day cut-out values were slightly higher. But the afternoon cut-outs are down over a dollar. So I imagine we're going to give back some of that gain tomorrow morning on the opening anyway without any other fresh news. The hog market is one that's going to struggle on rallies.
just from the standpoint that we ran into some resistance.
We're seeing funds starting to take some profits on their long positions, and that's producing a pullback in prices. Whereas the cattle market, we really haven't seen any cash cattle trade yet. We saw a mid-week rally in the future is anticipating stronger cash trade, and we haven't seen any of that cash trade develop. So we're still looking for some cash trade. If we could get a dollar higher, we should see a pretty good rebound or rally in the futures market. And then of course, we have a cattle on feed out tomorrow afternoon.
It looks to be just a slight and very capacity with placements maybe three to five percent more than a year ago while on-feet supplies are going to be very steady with last year. So, you know, get past this report, get into the winter months, then I think we can see a little bit tighter supplies that could give us a rally in the cattle market. But for the near term, it's going to be a rough go.
Do you have any knowledge of the cattle on feeds report tomorrow about placement? So placement number looks to be larger, about three to five percent more than what we saw a year ago. And that's what I think is a concern for me and for a lot of the trade is if we get those heavier placements, we already
We haven't dialed a lot of that in. And that could be where the price comes from is increased placements even more than what the trade has been expecting. It looks like the on-feed numbers should come in very similar to last year, maybe a half percent more, half percent less, something like that. But it's the placement numbers that is the most variable. It could be 3% larger, it could be 5% larger. I think anything other than
that, maybe something less than that, something more than that, would be a surprise to the marketplace. Recently, because of all the planes, moisture that we've seen, a lot of cattle have gone onto winter wheat grass. There's been some demand to buy new calves and put on that grass, and that could keep that placement number down just a little bit because of the moisture that levels that we've seen those cattle may get placed into feed lots a month or two later.
Do you have any final thoughts or recap of our conversation about the summary of the green markets for today's close?
Well, one thing that I don't know that a lot of people have been talking about, but China and Brazil have signed new trade packs on Wednesday that included meats and grains. And this I think is probably an agreement that China wants to make with Brazil to buy more product and less product from the US more product from Brazil with President Trump taking office in January. One of the things that US has been selling
to China this year aggressively, besides beef and pork, has been grain sorghum. And we don't trade grain sorghum, but China buys about 95% of the sorghum that is produced in the United States. They have now signed an agreement to buy sorghum
from Brazil and they have no import restrictions on that sorghum that they are buying. So that means our market here in the US could suffer and if prices suffer enough, maybe grain sorghum producers across the plains, plant corn or some other small grains crop that have better pricing opportunities. But it certainly looks like China's preparing for tariffs and another trade war with the Trump administration.
where people can find you for your consulting services for their grain marketing and livestock marketing. Yeah, you can reach out to us at our website midwestmarketsolutions.com, or you can give me a call directly. My number is 417501, 5132. Thanks, Brian. Appreciate talking with you, Caesar. Have a great day. Thank you.
It generally feed your cattle dollar plus 1.125 closing a dollar 253.450 February live cattle dollar dash 500 closing a dollar 187.425 February lean hugs dollar plus
175 closing a dollar 8 for that 650. March corn minus 3 single quote 6 closing at 4 dollars and 36 cents single quote to January soybeans minus 12 single quote 6 closing at 9 dollars.
and 77 cents single quote six March Chicago wheat minus two single quote six closing at five dollars and 69 cents single quote for March case elite minus five single quote for closing at five dollars and 67 cents single quote two.
Closing quotes provided by Kyle R. Bumsthedrin, office manager Ericsson, Nebraska 3. Thanks to our friends from Allendale for bringing the final numbers of trade.
Thanks to everyone on the show. We were running of time but you can listen to our show on YouTube and when you get your podcast. This been back roads of Illinois. I am Caesar Delgado.
