Market Skeptics

Mainstream Waking Up To Miserable 2009 Harvest

2009-11-23T01:38:00.000-08:00

The New York Times reports about a promising summer washed away In Mississippi Delta.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

November 23, 2009
In Mississippi Delta, a Promising Summer Washed Away by the Fall
By SHAILA DEWAN

LEXINGTON, Miss. — It was a long day for John Hart, a farmer in the hills just east of the Mississippi Delta.

An insurance company had decreed that, though Mr. Hart’s crop of soybeans and rice was ruined, he would have to harvest it and haul it to a salvage company for pennies on the dollar. For that, Mr. Hart needed to borrow a truck that was 70 miles away. By the time he got back to his field, the sky was so dark that a shooting star whizzed across it like a thick smear of crayon.

But that was just a minor setback compared with what he and other Southern farmers have been through this year. In August, they thought they had a bumper crop — the best they had seen in years. It was the kind of crop that could put you ahead, for once. Pay off that combine.

But just as the harvest began in September, it began to rain, and it kept raining through October, normally one of the driest months here. The soybeans shriveled and blackened with mold. The rice keeled over into the mud. The cotton hardened into tight little spitballs. The sweet potatoes rotted underground. When the combines could get into the fields, they scarred them with deep ruts that will make next year’s planting more expensive.

Last year, with commodity prices running at record highs, farming across the nation seemed to be bucking the recession. This year, with the rest of the country in a slow recovery from a man-made disaster, nature forced a crash of its own in the South.

“I was counting my money until September,” Mr. Hart said. “I don’t know whether I’m going to be able to farm another year or not.”

In the pitch black of the night, Mr. Hart’s hired hand and a friend, Edmond Clark, who were waiting to help, informed Mr. Hart that the dew had already come. The ruined beans were too wet to harvest that night.

For the thousandth time, Mr. Hart, 61, asked himself why he had come back home more than three decades ago from Chicago, where he was a lathe operator, to farm the family land where he grew up.

“You just keep going,” he said, forced to live for the most part off his wife’s salary as a nurse. “She knows that’s all I like to do.”

The rainy autumn has made it clear that farmers across the Delta will lose money this year. But for smaller farmers in the area like Mr. Hart, who owns or rents about 1,000 acres, and Mr. Clark, with about 600 acres, the question is whether they will be able to go on.

The rain has affected farmers in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, eastern Arkansas and parts of Louisiana. Mississippi and Georgia have requested disaster declarations from the United States Department of Agriculture, and Alabama is likely to follow suit. But help from Washington, in the form of low-interest loans, often takes a year or more to reach the farmers who need it.

Lester Spell Jr., the Mississippi commissioner of agriculture and commerce, has asked Congress and the Agriculture Department to speed up the process, saying in a news release, "I fear many of our hardworking Mississippi farmers will no longer be able to operate due to the excessive losses faced this year."

Mr. Spell cited losses of more than 40 percent of the state's soybean crop, almost 50 percent of the cotton and more than 60 percent of the sweet potatoes.

For Mr. Hart and his friends, the specter of failure has a double burden because they are among the few black farmers to have survived years of discriminatory policies by the federal Farm Services Administration, which were detailed in a successful class action lawsuit. As part of the settlement in 1999, the Agriculture Department admitted that it had for decades made it harder for black farmers to get loans.

"John grew up on the farm; I grew up on the farm," Mr. Clark said. "We've both seen our parents struggle to hold onto this land."

Mr. Clark has also been touched by the recession. Last month, his wife was laid off from her job at a day care center.

In December, the land rents are due for next year, but without a crop, the farmers may have no money to pay, and larger farmers will snap up their acreage. Mr. Clark predicted that small black farmers would be unable to return. "If I get out of it," said Mr. Clark, who rents mostly from black landowners, "this land is gone."

The threat of losing the family land is very real for black and white farmers alike, who have seen generational cycles of prosperity and bankruptcy, of new farmhouses and equipment sold on the auction block. Taylor Flowers Jr., 36, farms land in Coahoma County, where tufts of cotton pile up on the road shoulders. The land was lost by his mother's family and bought by his father's, all before his parents married.

It is not just that farming is in their blood. Farmers keep on navigating the complicated algebra of seed costs and bank loans, commodity markets and fuel prices, because there is little alternative.

"I've got a college education, I've got a degree in ag business," Mr. Flowers said. "But I don't know, if I had to quit, what I'd go do. There's not many jobs out there right now."

Homer Luckett, 54, another Coahoma farmer, said he had lost about all he could stand.

"I'm hoping that the people that I owe will let me spread it out over two or three years," he said. "I don't mind quitting, but I don't want to have to quit. I'm in debt, but I'd like to be able to farm my way out of debt."

On the dashboard of his truck, Allen C. Evans III, a farmer near Clarksdale, has a sheaf of receipts from the grain elevator, showing the damage levels of each load of soybeans: 39.9 percent, 67.9 percent, 51.8 percent. A born fretter, he is afraid to call, he said, to find out the final reckoning of the disastrous season.

"You're just kind of walking around like a zombie," Mr. Evans said, "saying, never could I have guessed that the best crop I've ever raised in my entire life - the one I never worried about - of all the crops to have taken away from us, how can this be the one?"

In the Delta, those elevator receipts have become talismans of the times. Michael Patterson, who helps pay for his farming with the proceeds from his grain hauling company, displayed one showing a farmer who brought in 1,110 bushels of soybeans, but got paid for 11. The rest were damaged.

That farmer was distraught, Mr. Patterson said.

“You don’t want to be the generation,” he said, “that loses the family farm.”

The Calhoun County Fournal reports about bill introduced offering disaster aid to farmers.

Bill Introduced Offering Disaster Aid To Farmers

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senators Thad Cochran and Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) today introduced bipartisan legislation to offer direct and timely disaster assistance to farmers throughout the nation who are experiencing significant crop losses due to excessive rainfall this fall.

The crop disaster legislation is intended to assist farmers who have been unable to harvest crops because of excessive rain since early September. Some areas of the Mississippi Delta have received more than 15 inches of rainfall above normal. Similarly wet conditions have been reported in parts of the Midwest. The extreme precipitation has ruined crops and created field conditions unfavorable for harvesting. The bill would also offer aid to livestock producers.
…
“The extraordinary amounts of rain poured on the Mississippi Delta have caused significant crop losses throughout the region. Sweet potatoes, grain sorghum, soybeans and cotton harvests have been compromised to an extent that the financial survival of many producers is uncertain,” said Cochran, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee. “Existing Department of Agriculture disaster aid programs cannot provide the near-term help needed by growers. The Direct Payment mechanism, which has been used to provide assistance numerous times, is the only way for the Department of Agriculture to provide timely assistance.”

“What was looking like a bumper crop for many Mississippi farmers in August has turned into enormous losses totaling nearly half a billion dollars statewide,” said Wicker, an original cosponsor of the measure. “These excessive losses have made it nearly impossible for many hardworking Mississippi farmers to pay their bills or to prepare for planting next year. The hardship caused by the excessive September and October rains will be felt beyond Mississippi’s agriculture community. This disaster will have a negative effect on our entire economy. The enormity of this problem has made it clear that additional disaster assistance is necessary.”

In Mississippi, 79 of 82 counties have been granted primary disaster designations by the USDA based on a minimum 30 percent loss for at least one crop in each county.

Agriculture economists at Mississippi State University estimate that crop losses in Mississippi are nearing $485 million with losses exceeding 30 percent of the state’s overall crop value. Based on crop reports, the MSU report noted that almost 64 percent of the state’s sweet potato crop will be lost. Nearly half of the state’s cotton, 44 percent of soybeans and 41 percent of grain sorghum will also be lost this year.

My reaction: Mainstream America is beginning to wake up to miserable 2009 harvest experienced by farmers.

The “biggest crop ever” reported by USDA cannot coexist with the “worst harvest ever” being reported by farmers. Recognition of damage suffered by farmers also means recognizing USDA production estimates as fraudulent. We will be seeing much higher food prices soon.

-----

(On another note, I spend a lot of time working on major article. Wasn't able to finish, but made very good progress. It will be doen this week.)

Abnormal Weather Across The Midwest

2009-11-23T01:31:00.000-08:00

Jsonline.com reports that Lafayette County to explore federal assistance after devastating storm.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Lafayette County to explore federal assistance after devastating storm
By Joe Taschler of the Journal Sentinel
Posted: July 26, 2009

[Wisconsin]

Officials in Lafayette County on Sunday said they will explore what federal disaster assistance might be available after severe storms Friday shredded thousands of acres of corn and soybeans.

Officials say wide swaths of the county were pummeled by the storms from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Friday.

"This is just absolute devastation for our agricultural economy," said Sheriff Scott Pedley.

In 20 years as sheriff, Pedley said he has never seen crop damage as severe as what occurred.

So much hail fell, "one of our townships had to get a plow out to clear roadways," Pedley said.

A large portion of the county's residents are involved in agriculture somehow, Pedley and County Board Chairman Jack Sauer said.

"It's the most agriculture-dependent county in the state," Sauer said.

Sauer said the number of acres damaged in the storm could top 20,000.

"It's devastating," he said. "You wouldn't wish this on your worst enemy."

In addition to crops, Pedley said at least 50 homes in the county were damaged.

Two sheriff's squad cars were also hit by hail.

Joe Riechers farms about 800 acres in the county. He figures he has about 170 acres that were not damaged by the storms.

"The soybeans - there are just stems," Riechers said.

He said he has crop insurance.

Teams of insurance adjusters will be fanning out across the area Monday, said Bob Flogel, a Rural Mutual Insurance Co. agent in Darlington.

"It's dramatic damage on crops," he said. "It's widespread and it's severe. It's just acres and acres."

In addition to hail and high winds, the National Weather Service says two tornadoes touched down in the county as severe thunderstorms moved through the area Friday.

Sauer said county officials will explore what disaster aid might be available, including agriculture disaster assistance.

According to a weather service report, "Significant hail damage was observed in a swath about 4 to 5 miles wide from near Platteville, southwest of Belmont, to just east of Shullsburg" and south into Illinois border.

The hail was driven by 60 to 65 mph winds south of Shullsburg, the weather service said.

"The maximum hail size reported in this area was baseball size" the weather service said.

Madison.com reports that Friday's storms left many farmers with huge losses.

TUE., JUL 28, 2009 - 9:51 AM
Friday's storms left many farmers with huge losses
By BARRY ADAMS

[Wisconsin]

Of the 1,000 acres planted by Dan Kamps this year between Belmont and Darlington, only about 150 acres will produce corn for his 1,000 head of beef cows and beef steers.

For Kevin Leahy, it’s a total loss. He doubts any of his 600 acres — of what used to resemble corn — north of Shullsburg will be harvested.

The two farmers are not alone.

What appeared to be a record corn crop in Lafayette County has been shredded.

An estimated 20,000 acres of corn sustained hail and wind damage Friday, while about 10,000 acres of soybeans were damaged. Officials say it will be days before they know the full impact of the storm, which created two tornadoes, torrential rains and hail that turned profits to silage, at best.

“It looked to be a record crop,” said Ted Bay, UW-Extension agriculture agent for Lafayette and Grant counties. “It’s too early to say what the damage will be, but it’s going to be a large number.”

…
The storm came at a time when the corn had just started tasseling and pollinating, with ears 6 to 10 inches long.

“It looked as good as it ever looked. It was a terrible time to have it happen,” Leahy said of the storm. “I just don’t think there’s going to be any bushels to harvest.”

The damage was widespread but varied in its intensity. Some fields suffered 100 percent losses while others just a few miles away had only minimal damage, Bay said. Farmers should watch their crops over the next 10 days for recovery, contact their insurance agents and check with the Farm Service Agency for possible enrollment in programs that could help cover some losses, he said.

The hail and wind storm is another blow to farmers in the area and devastating to those that did not have hail insurance, officials said. Many farmers last year had too much water from heavy June rains and were forced to delay planting this year. Others, such as Kamps, lost the majority of their alfalfa crops during the winter of 2007-08.
…
Kamps was at home during the storm and knew his crops would be in trouble when the oak leaves around his house started falling to the ground. The wind blew a drift of hail more than 2 feet high in front of his patio door, he said.

“It was like a big sand blaster,” Kamps said. “I’ve seen damage before but not near so widespread and so major. This took everything we had.”

Coosa Valley News reports the April 2009 Climate Summary for Georgia.

April 2009 Climate Summary for Georgia
Tony Potts
05-12-2009

April hit Georgia with almost every weather punch, including floods, hail, high winds, tornadoes and even two earthquakes. Except for a few isolated areas in far north-central counties, rainfall across the state was above normal. More than 10 inches of rain was observed by radar in southeast and south-central Georgia, with some isolated unofficial reports in the U.S. Department of Agriculture weekly crop bulletin listing over 20 inches.
…
Because of the heavy rains this month, farmers had a difficult time working in the fields. Many fields of corn had to be replanted due to soggy conditions. High winds and hail damaged peach and pecan trees. Mild frost damaged grapes, strawberries and blueberries the week ending on April 13.

Omaha.com reports that Nebraska's weather went from meek to mad in June.

Published Friday July 3, 2009
June was bustin' out all over state
By Nancy Gaarder
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

[Nebraska]

Lethal heat, hailstones as big as baseballs, rain seemingly without end and tornadoes, some reported to be a quarter- to a half-mile wide. After a relatively placid May, Nebraska's weather went from meek to mad in June.

“I don't know where that switch in the sky is, but it turned on,” said Ken Dewey, an applied climatologist with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

And one of the odd things, Dewey said, is that in terms of rainfall, the switch went on only over Nebraska. States to the north and south are below normal for precipitation while parts of the Cornhusker State received twice as much rain as normal. Some areas of Nebraska reported more rain in June than is normal for the entire first six months of the year.

For most of the month, two frontal systems clashed over Nebraska, Dewey said. As they stalled out, they dumped rain and storms.

Al Dutcher, who as the state's climatologist has the task of tracking data related to weather, said the results are readily apparent in his statistics.

“It rained somewhere in Nebraska every day of the month,” Dutcher said. For 25 of those days, some part of the state got more than an inch of rain; for seven of those days, some part received more than 3 inches.

The Panhandle received so much rain, damage reports could end up showing that 1,000 miles of roadway were washed out, according to the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency.

Widespread hail was reported across the state, with one rancher telling the National Weather Service that he found dead animals along the road. In the far western Panhandle, it hailed so much that the roads had to be plowed, as hail reached 6 to 8 inches deep.

Complete damage estimates weren't available, but Gov. Dave Heineman is asking for at least $4 million in federal aid to repair public infrastructure such as washed-out roads and bridges.

According to the federal Farm Service Agency, some 750,000 acres of crops were damaged and a small percentage destroyed.

Tim Reimer of the Farm Service Agency said he has received reports that 3,800 head of cattle died from the hot, windless weather that occurred in late June. Many areas reported triple-digit heat indexes during that period.

Most of the cattle that died were in feedlots. Dutcher described the die-off as one of the most significant of the decade.

Based on an estimated value of $1,000 per head, the losses could reach $3.8 million.

For the most part, the tornadoes avoided heavily populated areas. Officials were still analyzing debris paths to determine how many tornadoes struck. Dutcher estimates about 17 at this point — typical for June.

The season had been quiet until just about mid-month, when researchers from the largest tornado study ever packed their bags and called it quits.

Within about 10 days of the study's final day, there were 20 tornado reports in Nebraska.

Msnbc reports that parts of Texas see worst drought on record.

Parts of Texas see worst drought on record
At least nine counties see driest times in more than a century
updated 6:32 p.m. ET, Fri., Aug 14, 2009

DALLAS - The most parched areas of Texas have been wilting in the blistering heat for two years, but only now is it now official: This is their worst drought in recorded history.

[Here is what the drought in Texas looked like this summer:

]

Texas state climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon said Friday that at least nine of the 254 counties in Texas — the nation's most drought-stricken state — are suffering through their driest conditions since modern record-keeping began in 1895.

Making matters worse are the relentless 100-degree days across the southern portion of Texas that has been under drought conditions since September 2007.

The impact has been felt most by farmers and ranchers in the nation's No. 2 agriculture-producing state. Texas officials estimate statewide crop and livestock losses from the drought at $3.6 billion.

"We've had some dry spells, but not as bad as this," said Rod Santa Ana with the Texas AgriLife Extension Service. "It hurts bad. A lot of these cotton fields didn't even come up. It's just bare ground. You'd never know cotton was even planted there."

The worst hit counties are Bastrop, Caldwell and Lee in Central Texas, and Victoria, Bee, San Patricio, Live Oak, Jim Wells and Duval in south-central Texas, Nielsen-Gammon said. He studied precipitation over several three-year periods and concluded the historic drought level in those counties.

Roughly half the state is under some form of drought. About 26 percent — a large swath of Central and South Texas — is suffering through the worst two categories of drought. Texas is the only state in the U.S. with areas enduring the worst category, according to the latest U.S. Department of Agriculture Drought Monitor map. Small areas in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Hawaii are in the second-worst category.

For the first time since 1904, the entire cotton crop was wiped out this year in Kleberg County, which borders two of the historically drought-stricken counties in South Texas and has seen only 2 inches of rain since January. The county typically gets 27 to 28 inches of rain in a 12-month period and produces between 30,000 and 40,000 acres of cotton.

Larry Falconer, an AgriLife Extension economist in Corpus Christi, estimated the economic hit to Kleburg County alone at about $50 million.

In nearby Nueces County, 95 percent of the cotton crop failed, and more than 90 percent failed in San Patricio County.

Lots of days over 100

The heat has made the drought even more unbearable. There have been 57 days over 100 degrees in the San Antonio area this year and 54 days in the Austin area. Both typically see an average of about 12 days.

Jim Wells County has seen 78 days over 100 (up from an average of 20), Live Oak Canyon has had 71 (up from 36), and Victoria has had 33 (up from 5).

"Everywhere down here has been hurting," said Roger Gass, a weather service meteorologist in Corpus Christi.

While about half of the state isn't experiencing drought, the rest is suffering. Austin's Lake Travis is at its third-lowest level ever and has closed all its boat docks. Wildlife has been creeping into developments in search of water, and cities across the state are restricting water usage. Kerrville even shut down the city pool.

Read more news from across the U.S.

Conditions should improve in September, but for many farmers and ranchers it won't really matter.

"If you're crops already failed, it doesn't matter how much rainfall you're missing from here on out," Nielsen-Gammon said.

My reaction: 2009 saw abnormal weather across the Midwest.

Hail Ravages Iowa In 2009

2009-11-23T01:16:00.000-08:00

Hail damage on June 17 and June 18.

Webstar reports that hail meeting encourages farmers to explore options.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Hail meeting encourages farmers to explore options
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
By Jean Caspers-Simmet

Agri News staff writer

LAWLER, Iowa -- When Don Blazek Jr. and the other Seed Solutions Group partners quickly organized a hail meeting for Friday morning, they were expecting 25. Twice that number showed up at Blazek's machine shed to find out what their options are after hail damaged an estimated 150,000 acres of crops late June 17 and early June 18.

Some crops between Lawler and Protivin and near Waucoma were damaged so severely that fields look bare.

Tony Utley, an agronomist with Five Star Cooperative's Lawler branch, said hail damage stretches from north of Lourdes to Hawkeye in a band 25 miles long and 10 miles wide in Howard, Chickasaw and Fayette counties. The worst of the damage is in two, three-mile-wide and six-mile-long stretches, one northwest of Lawler and the other west of Waucoma.

"Damage ranged from total crop loss in the worst areas to moderate damage," Utley said. "Farmers will have to assess their crops to see if they can keep the stands or if they need to replant. This is the worst I've ever seen this early in the year, and it's the most widespread."

Iowa Farmer Today asks What the Hail?

What the Hail?!?!?!?
June 18th, 2009
Amy Asmus

I haven’t blogged much because we have been really fortunate to have had the time and conditions to get the crops in and pretty much everything was looking good – and a lot of it still is looking good. But, scouting fields just north of us that were in the way of a band of hail yesterday, just breaks my heart. Growers work hard preparing for a good crop, getting the seed in the ground and doing everything they can to nurture that crop, then they have to look at this…

[North Central Iowa]

Whether you call it God, Mother Nature, or warm air rising, accumulating a sufficient amount of supercooled water in the clouds, forming ice that then falls back to the earth, it is a reminder that we are not always in control of our crops…

Hail damage on July 7 and July 9

Iowa Farmer Today reports about severe hail storms on July 7 and July 9.

Ideal conditions?
July 17th, 2009
Paul Kassel
…
recently we had some hail events that have caused some major crop damage. There was a severe hail storm on July 7 that damaged crops south of the Royal/Rossie area. Then on July 9, another storm damaged crops in the Terril area. Both storms damaged about 5,000 acres of crops. A lot of the corn in the heart of these damaged areas suffered a lot of stand loss and defoliation loss – so those corn fields have little yield potential. The soybeans are recovering to some degree. We have had fairly good weather for recovery of the soybeans. However, with the defoliation loss, node loss and stand loss – we are expecting about third of a crop of soybeans in the heart of the hailed areas.

Hail damage on July 24

Brownfield Ag News reports about intense crop damage from hail in Iowa.

Intense crop damage from hail in Iowa
July 29, 2009 by Julie Harker

Hail last Friday caused unprecedented damage to crops in northeast Iowa – from Howard to Dubuque counties – and producers are figuring out what to do next. Iowa State University Extension agronomist Brian Lang tells Brownfield that 400-thousand crop acres were hurt, 10 percent of which have been decimated. Corn in the area was in the tasseling stage, the absolute worst time, Lang says, to be hit by hail, “So, even these other areas that had less hail, if they’re still looking at something like 75 percent defoliation – which is very possible over a large area of this damage – that easily cuts the yield by as much as two-thirds.” Lang says the affected area has a lot of livestock and farmers can green chop some of the corn while figuring out other feed options. “If we can get a little off of that… We’ve still got time in August, here, for maybe a planting of a small grain like oats,” says Lang.

Lang says at least half of their feed is gone because of the storm, “There’s areas where it looks like barren lands that are ready for some spring planting – is kind of what it looks like in some of these places.”

Lang thought he’d seen the worst hail damage in the area last month when hail struck 100-thousand crop acres in Howard and Chickasaw County. But, last week’s hail storm is, by far, the worst he’s seen with Fayette County having the most acreage hit, where they’re considering seeking government disaster aid. Lang advises producers not to touch anything until their crop insurance agents and hail adjustors have done their work.

The same storm system caused crop damage to about 20,000 acres in southwestern Wisconsin.

Webstar reports that best hope for hail-ravaged fields is a federal disaster declaration.

Best hope for hail-ravaged fields is a federal disaster declaration
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
By Jean Caspers-Simmet

Agri News staff writer

WEST UNION, Iowa -- Northeast Iowa counties ravaged by hail July 24 will try for a federal disaster declaration.

Two storms pounded an area from Lime Springs to Cascade and then jumped the Mississippi River to hammer Wisconsin counties. Damage was reported in Howard, Winneshiek, Fayette, Clayton, Allamakee, Delaware, Dubuque, and Buchanan counties in northeast Iowa.

Corn was snapped to foot tall stumps in some areas. No-till beans had more corn residue from last year's crop than beans left in the field. Golden oats was smashed to the ground, and hay fields had nothing left. Hail as big as baseballs pummeled property.

"This was the mother of all hail storms," said Dan Burkhart, Fayette County Extension education director.

In 38 years on the job, he's never seen anything like it. [The familiar theme in 2009]

In Fayette County alone, 250,000 acres were damaged. Of that 30,000 acres were completely destroyed. Hail storms had already decimated crops from Waucoma to Hawkeye in June and east of Sumner July 10.

"Eighty-five percent of the crops in our county have been hurt by hail this year," Burkhart said. "Of that, 33,000 acres were completely destroyed."

The worst areas in Fayette County from this storm were north of West Union to Ossian and then northeast east of West Union toward Elgin and along Highway 56 toward Elkader.

When hail decimated crops near Lawler and Waucoma in June, it was the worst Iowa State University Extension field agronomist Brian Lang had ever seen.

Until July 24.

"I've never really seen bad hailed corn at tassel state and I've never seen it this bad, this widespread," Lang said. "There were 400,000 acres damaged with 10 percent totally destroyed. Even for the crop that didn't get hurt too much, this came at the worst possible time, tasseling."

Lang said before farmers do anything, they need to check with their insurance agents and get their OK.

Livestock producers might be able to chop the corn and plant oats to get additional forage. Some might be able to start an alfalfa seeding depending on the corn herbicide they used.

"I've never seen a hail storm this big," said Julie Vulk, Farm Service Agency executive director in Winneshiek County and interim director in Fayette County. "It's just hard to wrap your brain around it."

Vulk estimated that 50 percent of farmers don't have insurance. [Ouch…]

Affected counties are trying for a federal disaster declaration.

"We need help," she said. "If we get a disaster declaration there will be emergency loans."

Mike McCloud, Emergency Management coordinator in Fayette County, said supervisors in his county and surrounding counties will be approving disaster declarations early this week.

He estimates crop and property damage in Fayette, Winneshiek and Clayton counties is $170 million.

Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey toured hail damaged crops in Fayette and Winneshiek counties.

"I've never seen hail damage so bad," Northey said.

With dairy prices tough, some dairy farmers thought they were diversified enough that they could go without crop insurance, Northey said. They never dreamed they'd lose all their crops.

"This is just devastating," he said. "You look into the eyes of these guys right now, and it's hard. They're at a loss. Do you keep the cows around? It's an easier decision if you know you'll have $15 milk three months from now. There's no way to make folks whole. There are just too many dollars of loss."

Northey said the best hope is a federal disaster declaration, which would make low-interest loans available through the Farm Service Agency.

Webstar reports that Iowan storm brings devastation and heartbreak.

Storm brings devastation and heartbreak
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
By Jean Caspers-Simmet

Agri News staff writer

ELGIN, Iowa -- Kathy McMillan says she's willing to talk about the devastation caused by two hail storms July 24 because getting the word out will help her neighborhood.

The storms decimated crops, busted windows, ruined fences, pounded roofs, blew down trees and ripped siding off buildings in a swath that extended from Howard to Dubuque counties and then into Wisconsin.

Kathy and her husband, John, farm as McMillan Farms Inc. with John's uncle, Henry.

"Henry will be 90 this year, and he has never seen anything like this," McMillan said. "He remembers a little hail, but nothing like this. It's a complete loss of everything. It's devastating, unbelievable.

The McMillans have 1,100 acres of crops and 85 percent of it is gone. The only ground that wasn't touched was near Elgin.
…
McMillan and her neighbors suffered significant property damage. She had nine broken windows in her home.

"I was upstairs with my son's very hyper dog and I heard an explosion and we started downstairs," she said. "We were pelted with hail in the hallway. We closed the door and came down to this level when my three bow bay windows exploded taking everything across the room. We tried to get to the next level with glass shooting past us."

Plywood covers the windows. The roof is damaged, and the machine shed is covered with dents. All the outside night lights and the mirrors on the tractor are broken.

They had many cattle get out. Some they rounded up but others are still in the corn field too spooked for anyone to come near them.

"Luckily there was no loss of life and the only injuries in this area were a fractured hip and a fractured leg," she said.

McMillan is concerned about her neighbors. She knows dairy farmers who lost their crops and have no crop insurance.

"There are a lot of really good farmers who may not be here next year," she said. "It's breaking my heart."

Hail damage on August 9

The Wallaces Farmer reports that hail ravages a large swath of Iowa this past weekend.

Hail Ravages A Large Swath Of Iowa This Past Weekend
Farmers can get answers about assessing and salvaging crops, making silage, harvesting issues, emergency forage and more from ISU Extension.
Rod Swoboda
Published: Aug 11, 2009

On Sunday morning August 9, yet another severe storm with hail and high winds caused severe property and crop damage in North Central and Northeast Iowa. The hail trampled crops in fields in five counties along U.S. highway 20—from Webster and Calhoun counties, east to Hamilton, Hardin and Grundy counties. The storm trampled many corn and soybean fields with heavy damage and left many homes, businesses and automobiles with shattered windows.

This weekend's hail storm left many Iowa cornfields devestated.

Damage in Hardin County alone is estimated at $25 to $30 million—and that's a conservative estimate, says Darwin Miller, the county Extension agent with Iowa State University. The hail has been called the worst in decades in this area.

Miller toured a 25-mile long, five-mile wide swath through which the late-morning hailstorm moved in Hardin County, from southwest to northeast. Miller says the majority of farmers carry some form or hail or crop insurance, but a storm like this one means a year without profit or capital for improvements.

Crops this year are sheared off and shattered

"We had a tough year here last year with the floods and the late plantings, and our yields weren't as good as normal," says Miller. "This year everything looked so good until this hailstorm hit. We were looking at yields of 180 bushels or better on corn and 50 bushel per acre soybeans, until this happened."

The path of the storm stretched all the way east to Independence in Buchanan County. Farmer Chuck Walters who works 800 acres of his own east of Eldora and also farms for other landowners, says, "You can't see a tassel now. I don't think there will be much to salvage in many of these fields around here." He says until Sunday morning August 9, his corn and soybean crops this summer "were absolutely perfect."

Miller, the Extension agent in Hardin County, says some of the corn crop that is standing or leaning might be salvaged, at least for silage. But the soybean crop was too immature to escape damage.

This was the second major hailstorm to hit

Sunday's storm was the second major hail-related calamity to hit Iowa's crops this summer. Two weeks ago, on July 24, hailstorms hit approximately 400,000 acres in Allamakee, Clayton, Buchanan, Fayette and Winneshiek counties in northeast Iowa. ISU Extension field agronomist Brian Lang who serves this area says at least 10% of this damaged acreage has around a 100% yield loss.

Other recent storm events have left smaller pockets of severe damage across the state. For example, hail also hit some fields in northeast Iowa on July 10. "Hail adjusters are reporting that some of these fields have been damaged by more than one storm this summer and a re-evaluation will be necessary," says George Cummins, ISU Extension field agronomist at Charles City.

The Times Republican reports that Eldora hail damage 'a real mess.

Ag secretary says Eldora hail damage ‘a real mess’
Corn and soybean crops statewide still in good shape
By MELANIE S. WELTE, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
POSTED: August 12, 2009
…
Gov. Chet Culver was touring Eldora on Tuesday. On Sunday, he issued an emergency disaster proclamation for Hardin County.

Northey looked at the crop damage in the Eldora area on Monday.

''It's a real mess,'' he said.

Northey said 10-foot-high corn west of Eldora had been sheared.

''Now it's not even knee-high,'' he said.

Ray and Betty McDowell were attending church in Eldora when the storm hit. Ray McDowell, who farms east of Eldora, told The Des Moines Register he suspected the worst.

''Most of the cornstalks were broken and the soybean plants were ripped apart, with the pods on the ground,'' McDowell said. ''I can't remember a hailstorm this bad for at least 20 years.''
…
Eldora-area farmer Gregg Reisinger told the Register that his soybean crop was a total loss, with about 500 acres of corn either damaged or destroyed.

''There's not much I can do except wait for the insurance adjuster,'' said Reisinger, who has farmed for 40 years and said he'd never had damage this bad.

Iaturf reports about hail damage at pine lake c.c. in Eldora.

Tuesday, September 1, 2009
HAIL DAMAGE AT PINE LAKE C.C. IN ELDORA

The greens after seeding as they appeared on Aug. 27

Hail damage Aug. 9

[Wow…]

Damage to club house.

On August 27, I had a chance to stop and see the hail damage at Pine Lake C.C. in Eldora. I have not seen hail damage like this in Iowa for more than 25 years.

Here is a description from Supt. Daryl Clingerman:

On Aug 9th, Pine Lake Country Club in Eldora, Iowa was hit by a hail and wind storm. 12-14 minutes of sustained 2"-3+" hail driven by straight line winds with gusts over 100 mph. This caused extensive damage to turf, trees and structures alike.

The greens have since been cored aerated, heavily top dressed, and seeded to combat estimated 35% turf loss. Fairways, tees and collars will be seeded the first week of September. The course is closed indefinitely.

--------------------------------

Below is a batch of entries from the CropWatch Blog. The CropWatch Blog is run by Iowa Farmer Today and Iowa State University’s Corn and Soybean Initiative and is designed to provide up-to-date information on crop growing conditions throughout the state.

Wet weather and delayed soybean planting
May 28th, 2009
Palle Pedersen

Remembering last year, many Iowa soybean farmers are wondering whether this spring’s rain has already delayed planting enough to hurt yield potential. Yes, it has but it’s not yet time to worry. Right now we are not doing too badly, even though we haven’t got a lot of work done this week. Currently, we have close to 90% of the corn planted and probably around 35% of the soybean planted.

“Just [about] what the doctor ordered”
June 19th, 2009
Roger Elmore

…
Cool wet conditions this year plagued corn in Iowa especially corn following corn… that is until Wednesday. Many articles in the Integrated Crop Management News - ICM - this spring highlight these issues. On Wednesday a change occurred. It was one of our first days with temperatures in the 80’s coupled with high humidity….perfect for corn growth! The crop needed some sun and warm conditions to accelerate growth and that was happening!
…
But high temperatures and humidity also spell the chance for strong thunderstorms and associated high winds and hail. We’ve had it all across Iowa in the last few days. Strong winds either broke – greensnap - v7 to v8 or bent over corn in many locations. Pounding hail shredded tender plants. Devastation occurred in some fields.

Interesting July weather for NW Iowa
July 14th, 2009
Joel DeJong

Usually we are hoping for rain in July. I don’t remember many years when we have producers hoping it stops! It is great to have moisture for most in NW Iowa, but I also know that there are problems out there related to these rain events - like hail loss, lodging, some green snap, and areas of saturated soils.

Diseases showing up in some corn and soybean fields
July 20th, 2009
Clarke McGrath

With the wet weather we have had in much of the state this summer, it was bound to happen; areas of the state are starting to show some pretty good disease pressure. This entry isn’t meant to spur a bunch of fungicide apps- but rather to get everyone out to do a little scouting. We want to spend that $25-30 per acre that fungicide apps cost wisely- put it where we need it and skip it where we don’t.

Corn hail loss chart & a few things to consider
August 10th, 2009
Roger Elmore

Hail storms again devastated portions of Iowa’s corn crop. Storms on August 9th cut a 1 to 8 mile swath across North Central Iowa.

Undoubtedly my colleagues on this blog will post more detailed reports and photos.
…
These losses are devastating. Prior to the storm, the crop looked better than ever. Recovery of the crop - and growers- will be difficult.

Corn, soybeans hit by hail
August 12th, 2009
Mark Licht

Sunday morning a thunderstorm producing damaging hail started near Schleswig moving east, in the corridor between hwy 175 and hwy 20, to Eldora and Wellsburg. Severe damage occurred in a 2 to 3 mile wide stretch and lesser damage 6 to 8 miles wide. In my area the worse hit places were near Wall Lake, near Yetter and near Somer/Calendar. It is easy to see that there will be some fields, both corn and soybean, that will result in 100% yield loss.

Severe hail damage
August 24th, 2009
John Holmes

The big news in central Iowa has been the very severe hail that occurred the morning of August 9th. The hail started south of Ida Grove and ran to Grundy Center. The storm path followed a corridor bounded on the north by U.S. Highway 20 and on the south by state highway 175. Although the damage varied by regions, damage along the center of the storm path was extremely severe. The crops in the center of the path were destroyed and damage along the margins of the storm path showed significant injury. ISU Extension hosted several meetings to discuss crop recovery, the potential for ear molds, and financial considerations. There were lots of interesting discussions about the potential for volunteer corn, lower test weights of corn, stalk rots, and ear molds.

No Dog Days of August
August 24th, 2009
Mark Licht

August has not given us the dog days of summer that we are so used to. As a human I’ll take that, but the crops really could use the heat, especially the soybeans. The crops in west central Iowa lot well and I expect the corn crop to reach the 194 bu/acre west central estimate put out by the USDA. I’m not as confident in the soybean estimate and therefore won’t even state it. [I am not the only one doubting the USDA’s numbers]

I’m not confident in the soybean estimate because the soybeans have not had the heat units they would like, but also because there are a lot of fields that show are great deal of height variance. While soybean aphids have not been as problematic as last year, sudden death syndrome seems to have taken a tighter hold. There are many fields that are showing sudden death syndrome symptoms for the first time in 2009. Don’t confuse sudden death syndrome with brown stem root; split the stems to get a positive confirmation of brown stem rot.

Soybean Sudden Death Syndrome widespread
August 24th, 2009
Jim Fawcett

Sudden death syndrome (SDS) is much more widespread this year than last. You can find some SDS in most soybean fields now if you look for it, and you don’t have to look for it to see it in many fields. 2007 was the last time we had SDS this widespread in the area. It is common along field edges where there has been extra soil compaction and in areas that were wet this spring.

SDS found in SW Iowa
August 24th, 2009
Kyle Jensen
…
Sudden Death Syndrome is very evident in many of the soybean fields here. Small spots in the fields have now grown to larger areas that are very noticeable from the road. High yielding areas that are along end rows are the first areas I noticed SDS this year. Other areas that show signs are those areas where field traffic is heavy, grain cart paths and truck loading areas. SDS is favored by cool wet growing seasons, for some reason this sounds familiar. Foliar symptoms of SDS can also be confused with brown stem rot and stem canker. With brown stem rot the stem is all brown, with SDS the pith remains white. Nothing can be done about SDS now, management needs to be planned for next time these fields are planted to soybeans. SDS resistant varieties, delayed planting, earlier maturing varieties, reducing SCN, and alleviating compaction layers will be the best management for this disease.

Finally a few dry days
September 8th, 2009
Jim Fawcett

Rains of 7-10+ inches last week caused flash flooding and some crop damage, but fortunately the canopy cover of the crops helped to reduce the soil erosion.
…
The widespread sudden death as well as the soybean aphid problem will cut into the potential soybean yields. Very few fields are turning yet, except where the sudden death is present.

Fall is upon us
September 8th, 2009
Mark Licht

As I mentioned in my last blog, we missed the dog days of summer. I now seems fall is upon us. The cooler weather the last couple of weeks has been good, right? For humans yes, for crop not so much. The corn is the best I’ve seen. I’ve been in fields where the primary ear has less than a half inch of tip back, girth is 18 around, and length is approximately 40. Doing the math, that makes for 250+ bushels per acre. I’m not saying that all fields are going to top 250+ bushels per acre, but there are definitely going to be good yields out there.

I’m not so optimistic about soybean yields. Soybeans did get tall and lanky, but the height of the plant does not make yield. I’m not a pod counter, but by looking at the number of bean per pod I think yields will be pushing to get to trend line this year. I hope I’m wrong and soybean yields hit record highs, but I just don’t think this year was perfect for growing soybeans.

Now a report on how things look in hail country… it still don’t look good. The white combine did some damage for sure. Some of the worst hit corn has been and is being salvaged for silage. It has dried down considerably faster than I had expected. This hail damaged corn is also fast approaching black layer; in fact I’ve heard reports in the Yetter area that some fields have already black layered. Molds and stalk rots are a reality. As the plant matured the stalk cannibalized itself to fill grain and damage to both the ear and stalk caused enough stress for disease pathogens to set in. Harvest in this area may be starting soon, but regardless of when harvest starts it will be ugly.

Harvest is underway
September 25th, 2009
Mark Licht

Harvesting of corn that was damaged by the early August hail storm is underway. This corn matured early and with 80+*F temperatures it dried down very quickly. Yield vary so much that there’s not much sense in talking about yields, but test weight and grain damage are notable. Test weight is running 42 to 49 pounds per bushel, grain damage is running 10 to 30 percent. Of course, the grain damage is a matter of how sieves and fans are set and the amount that is kept versus being blown out the back. Grain moisture is as low as 15 percent. Stalks are weak and lodging may appear if strong winds accompany any storms.

Away from the hail damage areas of West Central Iowa, soybean harvest is underway. There are a considerable number of soybean acres harvested. I have heard of moisture as low as 10%. Many yields are coming in the 45 to 55 bushel per acre range, but general consensus is that yields are slightly lower than expected. Shattering has been low thus far.

Combines rolling in NW Iowa
September 28th, 2009
Joel DeJong

The soybean harvest has started in NW Iowa, and early reports are mixed to a little lower than hoped. It seems that most of the early bean reports I have heard are below what we harvested last year – maybe about 5 bushels per acre. I don’t think many are surprised by lower yields, the cooler temperatures and very rapid dry down in September seemed to lead to lower node numbers and small bean sizes.

Are we having fun yet?
October 12th, 2009
John Holmes

Farmers in central Iowa are harvesting soybeans when they can but most are focused on combining corn.
…
This area was hit hard by the August 9th hail storm. In a matter of minutes the crop went from one of the most promising crops at the milk stage to shattered stalks and severely damaged ears. ISU Extension staff are tracking what kinds of molds and mycotoxins have developed in this corn.

The picture above is from a combine cab of one Iowa Falls farmer. He reminded me that a local weather station had recorded gusts of 102 mph and commented that it was pretty logical that the corn would lodge. He was struggling to stay on the row when this picture was taken. His yields we running in the mid-70 bushel per acre range but he has seen corn yields as low as 20 bushels per acre and as high as about 120 bushels per acre.

I took a quick look at some of the ears, and yes, they did have some mold on them. I’m guessing they had gibberella ear rot and fusarium ear rot. The local elevator has been carefully screening incoming grain from the area for mycotoxins. Yes, they are finding mycotoxins, but I’m not sure of the levels. I’m certain some samples exceed tolerable limits. They are also tracking test weights and grain damage. The test weights are very low and the grain damage levels are pretty high.

NW Iowa crop (lack of) progress report
October 13th, 2009
Joel DeJong

It’s been a cold, wet and snowy beginning of October in the NW corner of Iowa. We progressed pretty well with the soybean harvest until the first of October, and only scattered combine activity has taken place since then. Maybe a third of the soybeans have been harvested here, and very little corn. We did see a few combines running on Saturday afternoon and Sunday – but not a lot. This activity created questions I have not heard for a long time – how do you dry down soybeans that are over 13%?

The University of Minnesota has a pretty good web page discussing “Soybean Drying, Handling and Storage” that addresses many of these questions. To learn about it, go to this web site. Progress has been slow, and patience might be wearing thin. But, what else can you do but wait? Yield reports seem to have a wide range to them, with a lot in the 50’s, a few in the 60’s and 40’s, and an occasional report at the 70 range. Overall, my feeling from a broad area of reports would be that yields are a little lower than we got last year for many, maybe 5 bushels per acre [Funny, the USDA says Iowa yields will be 5 bushels per acre HIGHER this year]. However, it still seems like a pretty good bean crop.

Iowa's July coldest ever

The Telegraph Herald reports about Iowa’s July coldest ever.

July coldest ever

No other July in Dubuque's recorded history has felt less like July than the one that ended Friday.

Hot and humid days were few and far between as the city set four records for cold high temperature en route to a preliminary monthly average temperature of 65.5 degrees -- the coldest on record. And these records go back to 1851.

2008 Production by county for Iowa

Notice that most of Iowa’s soybean production happens in the northern two thirds of the state, especially in the NW corner of Iowa. So the area’s devastated by hail are Iowa’s most productive counties.

2008 Yield Per Harvested Acre by county for Iowa

Notice that yield distribution isn’t even. So 45 bushels per acre can be an amazing or terrible yield, depending on location.

USDA 2009 Soybean Production and Yield estimates for Iowa

Iowa produces 15% of the US soybean crop.

	Yield		Production
	(Bushels per acre)		1000 bushels
	2008	Nov est	2008	Nov est
Iowa	46.5	51	449,655	486,030

My reaction: Considering that Iowa was ravaged by hail in 2009 and that reported yield are down on last year, USDA production estimates for Iowa seem way too optimistic.

Dynamics For Disaster In Agricultural Markets

2009-11-21T08:10:00.000-08:00

Below is a batch of entries from Nogger’s Blog.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Friday, 6 November 2009
Romanian Winter Plantings Seen Down 30 Pct

Romanian farmers are expected to plant 30% less winter grains this year, according to UkrAgroConsult.

Drought in 2009, delayed receipt of farm subsidy payments, an antiquated infrastructure and low grain prices are all partly to blame.

Agrimoney.com report that since the collapse of Communism, the amount of irrigated land has slumped by more than 90% to well below 300,000 hectares.

A recent USDA tour of the country reported a "large amount" of deserted farms - "not land just lying fallow or waiting for next season's crop but vacant land" they add. [example of low prices leading to lower production]

Lack of on-farm storage, in a country where half of the tillable area is still ploughed by horse-drawn equipment, means that many farmers are forced to take whatever price is on offer for their crops at harvest time.

Many have clearly had enough, at least for now.

Wednesday, 11 November 2009
Brazil To Put Wheat Import Tariff On The Chopping Bloc

Nogger's favourite grains website Agrimoney.com is reporting that Brazil might be about to scrap it's duty on wheat imported from outside the Mercosul trade bloc. [leading to increased demand for wheat imports in 2009/10]

Brazil's regular No 1 wheat supplier is Argentina, who in previous years have normally had enough to meet almost all of Brazil's import needs. Of course things haven't gone according to plan for the Argies in the last two years, with the 2008/09 crop wrecked by drought and this year's plantings the smallest on record in a two fingered salute to the government.

So with a wheat crop of only around 7.5 MMT potentially coming out of Argentina this year, and them consuming around 6.5-7.0 MMT themselves, there isn't going to be much left for Brazil's best mates to export this year.

Hungry Brazil are set to consume 11.4 MMT of wheat in 2009/10 according to yesterday's USDA figures, but with their own production badly affected by heavy rains they are likely to deficient to the tune of around 7 MMT this year, say Agrimoney.

Clearly the vast majority of that is now going to have to come from outside the bloc.

Well it's a good job that the shops are still open isn't it? Certainly the US will be fancying their chances of a slice of that action, as Brazilian millers are famously anti-Russian wheat.

Tuesday, 17 November 2009
Wheat Continues To Pour Out Of Ukraine

Grain continues to pour out of cash-strapped Ukraine with Nov 1st wheat reserves standing at a fraction over 11 MMT, over 20% down on year ago levels, and 4.75 MMT less than two months previously.

You don't have to be Pythagoras to figure out that at this rate they will run out long before next season's harvest begins. [evidence suggesting decreased capacity for wheat exports in 2010]

Against a backdrop of political uncertainty, farmers and trading houses alike are keen to export anything that isn't nailed to the floor. Quickly.

Wednesday, 18 November 2009
First Imported Wheat Shipments Clear Indian Customs

Fed up waiting for the government to release state-owned wheat stocks onto the market at realistic prices, flour millers in southern India have taken matters into their own hands and begun importing wheat in containers from Australia.

Media reports from India confirm that "a few containers have arrived and they have been cleared by the phyto-sanitary and plant quarantine authorities”. ]

Suppliers in Australia literally have to clean the wheat before it leaves to meet stringent Indian quarantine restrictions, but with prices fetching USD300-315/tonne (Rs 13,900-14,575/100kg) CIF the southern Indian port of Tuticorin there are plenty prepared to take the risk.

From the flour millers point of view it's a win-win deal, local wheat is costing Rs 15,400-15,800/100kg, availability is tight and what is available has high levels of infestation (typically 5-6%).

When the first few deals were done a risk premium of USD25/tonne was being added by the sellers, pessimistic that the wheat would get customs clearance. Now that the first consignments have got through OK, this has dropped to USD7-8/tonne, with more sellers now coming forward, say millers.

[evidence suggesting strong demand for soybean imports in 2010]

The Roller Flour Mills’ Federation of India is urging the government to relax the strict quarantine regulations until new crop wheat is available in March, to facilitate bulk imports. But for now the government continue to stick their heads in the sand. Their mysterious 27 MMT or so of strategic stocks remains under lock and key, yet neither do they seem prepared to open the doors to wholesale wheat imports.

Wednesday, 18 November 2009
Bug Damage A Problem In Black Sea Wheat

An interesting report on Reuters suggests that damage by bugs is a serious problem in this season's Black Sea region wheat crops.

Quoting the Vice President of Global Technical Governance at SGS Agricultural Services, they say that Russian wheat this season typically has an average of 2.6% bug damage, with Ukraine wheat damage estimated at an average 4.6%. In some parts of the Ukraine bug damage has been as high as 80% he says. No wonder they're so keen to get rid of it, still it saves a few bob on loading charges when the wheat can walk onto the boat by itself.

As well as climatic conditions, much of this season's wheat problems can probably be attributed to economising on pesticides in these cash-strapped times, he says. [example of low prices leading to lower production]

With Egypt having recently lowered it's maximum tolerance to bug damage to just 1%, in theory that leaves the door open for better quality European or US wheat to make inroads into 'difficult' homes like Egypt and perhaps even India.

Not that you'd know it the way recent tenders have been going, with Russia picking up the lion's share once again of late.

Thursday, 19 November 2009
Heavy Snows Might Hit Chinese Wheat Production

The Chinese government may have shot themselves in the foot with their cloud seeding efforts in northern China's wheat growing areas.

Warm and dry October weather hampered wheat planting and development on the North China Plain. Rainfall had been practically non-existent in October in leading wheat provinces Henan and Shandong and adjacent Anhui and Jiangsu, say Gail Martell of Martell Crop Projections.

So the military were duly dispatched into the countryside armed with the usual array of silver iodide and heavy artillery.

The seeding, plus temperatures falling as low 29 F, brought an early covering of 'fake' snow to Beijing on November 1st. The snow was the earliest to hit the capital in 10 years, according to the Beijing Evening News.

Perhaps what the authorities hadn't reckoned with was that Mother Nature has seen fit for it to continue to snow more or less ever since. [There has been a lot of terrible weather for farming this year, hasn’t there?]

The heaviest snow in 22 years hit Hebei last week, with falls as deep as 37 cm in some parts of the province. The snow has been accompanied by bitterly cold weather with temperatures of minus 15 to minus 17 degrees Celsius, according to the Xinhua News Agency. [more abnormal weather destroying production]

The drastic temperature drop will harm the province's 2.4 million hectares of wheat, said Zhang Wenzong, director of Hebei Agri-Meteorological Center.

The sudden switch from almost summer-like conditions to winter seems to have by-passed autumn completely. Whilst the snow will certainly ease the drought, it's early arrival along with sub-zero temperatures will badly affect further planting and potentially send newly planted wheat into premature winter dormancy.

They might be able to make it rain, but can they stop it snowing and freezing in the world's largest producer and consumer of wheat?

Thursday, 19 November 2009
USDA Weekly Export Sales

For the period November 6-12, 2009 the USD today reported the following weekly export sales:
…
Soybeans: Net sales of 1,349,700 MT were up 6 percent from the previous week and 58 percent from the prior 4-week average. Once again the primary destination was China (724,700 MT). Trade estimates for weekly sales had ranged from 750,000 and 950,000 MT. Exports of 1,724,200 MT were a marketing-year high, the primary destination (no surprises here) was China (914,500 MT). [evidence suggesting strong demand for soybean imports in 2010]

Thursday, 19 November 2009
Heatwave Might Trim Australian Wheat Yields

Eastern Australian farmers might be thanking their lucky stars that this year's much-touted El Nino event didn't arrive on the scene Down Under earlier than now, or wheat production this season might have been severely curtailed.

Much of western New South Wales sweltered in near-record heat today as temperatures soared to the high 30s and low 40s. In some parts of the far west of the state highs of 46 degrees were hit, and tomorrow is forecast to be even hotter.

The current record heat wave, which has caused kernel-shriveling that will reduce wheat yields, became established in a very dry October where conditions damaged wheat in the top 2 producing states of Western Australia and New South Wales, say Martell Crop Projections.

Victoria also report crop damage and reduced yield expectations.

Friday, 20 November 2009
Analysts Cut Australian Wheat Crop Estimates As Temperatures Hit 46 Degrees

November temperature records are being broken all over eastern Australia, with much of New South Wales seeing the mercury hit 10 to 20 degrees above their November average today. [more abnormal weather destroying production]

The hottest today was felt through the Upper Western where Wanaaring and Brewarrina reached 14 degrees above average at 46 degrees, making it their hottest November day on record. Other November records broken through the state were at Cobar, Condobolin, Forbes and Trangie all reaching a toasty 45 degrees, according to Elders Weather.

With the wheat harvest well underway lower yields than expected are being reported, not just in NSW but also Victoria and Western Australia. Current sweltering temperatures may knock a bit more off yields yet in late maturing crops, analysts say.

Profarmer Australia yesterday cut their Australian wheat production estimate by 1 MMT to 20.9 MMT, whilst Commonwealth Bank of Australia lopped 700,000 MT off their output ideas to 21.6 MMT.

Both estimates are considerably lower than the hapless USDA's current stab in the dark of 23.5 MMT. [Agreed]

Friday, 20 November 2009
Things Could Be Worse, You Could Be Indian

Food inflation running at 14.55%, prevented from importing foreign wheat in bulk by the strictest quarantine regulations in the world. Whilst the government sits on it's supposed stocks of 27 MMT of wheat, which it will only sell if you want to pay well over the market price for it.

And this is a government who got elected on their promises of cheap food for all. Is it just me, or is there something innately immoral about buying USD6.7 billion worth of gold from the IMF whilst the people are starving?

Subsequently smarting at allegations that they are a load of profiteers who are so bent that they can't lie straight in bed at night, the government are now said to be 'considering' lowering their minimum tender price for wheat from a laughable USD292-USD365/tonne to the equivalent of USD240-290/tonne.

Well whoopee do. Considering that they've been 'considering' whether to release any wheat or not for months now, I wouldn't go holding my breath for a snappy decision on that one.

They should try 'considering' that the average Indian on the street can't afford to be paying almost 15% more than last year for his food, and get their fingers out.

Sell their domestic stocks off cheap, what are they there for food security or profit? Failing that, waive the strict import regulations as they did back in 2006. Nobody can seriously tell me that the wheat in the state granaries is better quality than the French or German material that Egypt just bought at below USD200/tonne yesterday.

Meanwhile, the opening day of parliament was adjourned yesterday after angry farmers marched through the streets of Dehli, protesting against low state-set sugarcane prices. The dispute may delay cane crushing in Uttar Pradesh, pushing domestic sugar prices even higher, and could also affect early sowing of wheat, farm leaders said.

Friday, 20 November 2009
Breaking News

Just popped up on the screen that China's CNGOIC website says that the regular weekly government soybean and corn auctions that have been in operation since September are to cease from Dec 1st. No explanation offered. [evidence suggesting strong demand for soybean imports in 2010]

That might get the market going this afternoon, particularly after yesterday's strong sales and exports news.

The thoroughly excellent Agrimoney.com say that "this left US soybean sales for the 2009-10 marketing year, which only started in September, at more than 70% of Washington's full-year forecast already" which is a pretty startling statistic, I'm sure you'll agree.

US sales to China, which have been running at almost a million tonnes a week recently, look like continuing unabated.

Chinese soybean imports are expected to be around 3.5 MMT in November, rising to 4 MMT each in Dec and Jan, with the vast majority of that set to come from the US, before the Brazilian harvest gets into full swing.

Friday, 20 November 2009
Rice Market Simmering Nicely

Whist the poor monsoon season slashed Indian summer rice production, flooding in the south of the country is seen doing likewise with winter rice output, analysts say.

That could leave India needing to import 3-5 MMT of rice next year, which considering that they are normally an exporter of around 4.5 MMT, is a pretty significant turnaround.

This would be the first time India has needed to import rice in more than twenty years, and also coincides with a pick up in demand from the Philippines, who have had their own production slashed by a series of typhoons.

India lost 18% of it's summer rice crop and could lose a similar proportion of it's winter production, analysts say.

That would slash stocks perilously low to under 1 MMT, without imports, and that is only enough to keep hungry India going for just four days.

Government mandates insist that state food agencies hold minimum stocks of 5.2 MMT of rice, pushing import requirements up above 4 MMT in 2010.

Strangely, the Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma told reporters today that the government "have adequate stocks" after refusing to offer a subsidy to state-run companies looking to import rice.

Friday, 20 November 2009
Ukraine: The Golden Goose Is Dead (Maybe)

Rumours are sweeping the market that Ukraine Rail has failed to restructure its debt on a bond owed to Barclays Bank.

This rumour is compounded by speculation that a second bond is near default - one that is underwritten by Ukraine's government and owed to Deutsche Bank.

That's got the currency markets spooked and we are back to a flight to safety, which sees the unpopular pound taking a spanking in the corner down to USD1.6475.

On a separate issue, to highlight just how badly the bottom has fallen out of the agricultural market in Ukraine, the production of tractors for agriculture and forestry purposes fell by 85.1% in January-October 2009 year-on-year, according to the State Statistics Committee.

The production of seeders shrank by 81.5% and the production of disk harrows fell by 85.7% during the same period, they add. [another example of low prices = lower production]

Friday, 20 November 2009
Here's An Interesting Thing

Figures out today from the Russian customs department show that they exported just over 2 MMT of wheat in October, bringing exports for the current marketing year so far (July/Oct) to just under 7 MMT.

What's so interesting about that, you rightly ask?

One of the takers in October was ultra-fussy we don't need to import anything India with 24,600 MT, apparently. [evidence suggesting strong demand for soybean imports in 2010]

The Wallaces Farmer reports that it was a phenomenal year for U.S. soybean exports.

It Was a Phenomenal Year for U.S. Soybean Exports
Record soybean exports from the United States were reported for the recently ended 2008-2009 soybean marketing year.
Compiled by staff
Published: Oct 28, 2009

The U.S. Soybean Export Council has released key export data for U.S. soy export marketing year 2008-2009, which ended September 30, 2009. It was a phenomenal year for exports with the third record year of soybean exports in a row and over 55% of the U.S. 2008 soybean crop exported. Soybean exports were up 11% from the previous marketing year.

Iowa Soybean Association director of market development Grant Kimberley expects strong demand to continue for soybeans and soy products.

"As people continue to improve their diets by consuming more meat protein, world demand is projected to remain strong for soybeans and soybean meal," says Kimberley. "International marketing is one of ISA's top priorities, and we will continue our work to build demand and create customer preference for Iowa and U.S. soybeans."

China was by far the top soybean export market with over 686 million bushels, followed by Mexico with 113 million bushels. Mexico was the top soybean meal export market and India was the top soybean oil export market. [evidence suggesting strong demand for soybean imports in 2010]

Dewitt-ee.com reports about farming in 2009 in Arkansas County.

Farming ’09
By Christina Verderosa
November 18, 2009

[Arkansas]

Jared Holzhauer, who farms along with his father in Gillett, had no doubt the weather affected his operations, “negatively.”

His rice crop turned out well, but “We had beans that drowned,” Holzhauer said. “The later rains effected the seed quality,” resulting in problems with mold and seed stain.

The biggest long-term impact of the record rains looks like it will be on the 2009-10 wheat crop. Between low prices and the delays from the weather and late soybean harvest, Bell is estimating the wheat crop for Arkansas County will be down 90 to 95 percent. Mike Merritt of Farm Inc. gave some more specifics.

On Monday, Merritt said the price of wheat has rallied a bit to $5.40 a bushel, but that’s still a far cry from what it was just a few years ago. A number of farmers had already decided against planting wheat and the weather delays “sealed the deal.” Merritt said. “Yields start hurting after Thanksgiving.” Adams estimated that wheat acres, which dropped to 25,000 last year from a peak of 100,000 about five years ago, will drop even further.

Some local farmers had decided to drop wheat even before the rains came. Holzhauer said the price was the main reason he decided to forgo wheat. Weather is also still a concern. “We’ve had too many close calls on frosts [in the past few years],” Holzhauer said. [another example of low prices = lower production]

Graves normally plans to grow wheat but won’t this time.

“If I don’t have wheat to mess around with, I could have a pretty good bean crop next year,” Graves said. “And I won’t have to worry about geese in the wheat.”

“Usually I try to plant wheat every year,” Graves said. The trend is not just in the county, but also statewide. He said a USDA representative had said that the Arkansas wheat crop is 26 percent planted. “I’d like to know where that is,” he said.

Pjstar reports that Illinois harvest still slow.

Illinois harvest still slow
Most soybeans are in, but yields are disappointing
By STEVE TARTER (starter@pjstar.com)
of the Journal Star
Posted Nov 16, 2009 @ 08:42 PM

[Illinois]

EDWARDS — The wet weather kept Ross Pauli from getting into his field near Edwards on Monday but he figures he's still ahead of a lot of other area farmers.

"We're done with the soybeans and we've harvested about 70 percent of the corn," said Pauli.
…
Pauli called his bean crop "very disappointing" this year. "Yields are off considerably from last year," he said.

While he averaged 50 bushels of soybeans an acre last year, this year's bushel counts were in "the low 40s and some even in the 30s" per acre, said Pauli, citing the area's unusually cool, wet weather as one of "the factors that were against soybeans this year."

Those cool, wet conditions made white mold more of a problem for beans than usual in this area, he said. "That mold often hits soybeans grown in Wisconsin and Minnesota because of the cooler weather up there. This year, we had that kind of weather," said Pauli.

A shortage of good growing days was also cited. "A lot of soybeans didn't get in until June because it took farmers so long to get the corn in this year. Beans like a lot of sunlight and we had a lot of cloudy days this year," he said.

Delmarvanow.com reports that storm floods roads and fields.

November 18, 2009
Storm floods roads, fields
Nor'easter closes schools, roads in five-day rain event
By Ceri Larson Danes and Ted Shockley
Staff writer

[Virginia]

GROTON TOWN --Real-estate agent Toni Trepanier heard the noise around 1:30 a.m. Friday -- "this metal noise," she said -- and she heard her dogs begin to bark anxiously.

"I said, 'Oh my God, what's that?'" said Trepanier, who lives in a large home in this small settlement near Mappsville, Accomack County.

It was the roof of her barn, which was ripped off and flung into her yard during the teeth of last week's nor'easter, which dumped more than 7 inches of rain in Painter -- more in other areas -- and produced wind gusts up to 60 mph.

The nor'easter combined with the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida to produce rain over parts of five days and wind that soaked roads, canceled schools and damaged buildings.

Bobby Isdell, acting administrator of Virginia's Department of Transportation in Accomac, said the department would begin cleaning debris and noting drainage problems when the storm ends.

…
Oyster flooding

Low-lying Oyster experienced flooding Thursday that rivaled Hurricane Isabel, the 2003 storm that caused damage in the area.

"It wasn't Isabel, but it was pretty close to it," said Dave Fauber, an Oyster resident. "It was pretty bad."

…
Farm report

With farmers busy harvesting soybeans and planting cover crops like barley and wheat, rain from this week's nor'easter will likely provide a significant delay.

"It's going to set us back two weeks," said Bill Shockley, agricultural extension agent for Northampton County on Friday morning as he conducted a damage assessment throughout the county.

"The next few days are going to tell us a whole lot."

He estimated 50-60 percent of the soybeans in the county had been harvested.

The Times Dispatch reports that Virginia crop outlook muddied by deluge.

Va. crop outlook muddied by deluge
JOHN REID BLACKWELL TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Published: November 17, 2009

[Virginia]

Last week's torrential rainfalls have caused damage and delays to some Virginia farm crops, but the extent of losses is unknown, some agriculture experts said yesterday.

Several crops that were recently planted or still in the fields were hurt by the widespread, three-day deluge, including winter wheat, barley and soybeans, said Molly Payne Pugh, executive director of the Virginia Grain Producers Association.

"There is definitely going to be damage," Pugh said. "I don't have a good feel for how much yet. Right now, we are assessing."

Pugh said she and her husband planted about 400 acres of red winter wheat on their farm in Tidewater.

After last week's storm, "we know for sure that we won't see at least 100 acres of that," she said.

Soggy ground conditions could prevent farmers from replanting any lost winter wheat in time to make a good crop. Winter wheat produced about $135 million in cash receipts for Virginia farmers in 2008.

The state's soybean and cotton crops also are a concern now because the rain further delayed an already late harvest.

The Michigan Farmer reports about Snow, Slush and Discouragement.

Snow, Slush and Discouragement Give Way to Blue Skies
Posted on November 17, 2009 at 8:50 PM

[Kansas]

Well, the reprieve for getting crops harvested proved to be short-lived. We had a few days of nice weather, then a whale of a whammy this week.

The weird thing for south-central Kansas is that three days of rain, cloudy weather and downright dreary conditions STILL did not produce a freeze OR a killing frost. So those folks hoping for frozen ground to get into corn and milo fields are out of luck. And the green crops are still green, which just might be a blessing.

Producers fighting soybean shatter are in a world of hurt because this weather just makes their challenge even worse.

Now, the good news. Blue skies were visible to the west from my vantage point in Wichita tonight, and the forecast is for warmer weather with breezy conditions for several days. Maybe, just maybe that means harvest for at least some folks.

My reaction: Dynamics for disaster are playing out in agricultural markets. Demand for imports increases while production falls. Once distressed sellers like Ukraine are done selling, prices will begin to move higher.

Britain Risks 'Debt Spiral'

2009-11-20T20:55:00.000-08:00

The Telegraph reports that OECD warns Britain risks 'debt spiral'.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

OECD warns Britain risks 'debt spiral'
Britain is at growing risk of a "public debt spiral" unless the Government takes "drastic" action to cut the deficit, according to the OECD, world's leading economic institution.
By Edmund Conway
Published: 19 Nov 2009

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said that even if Britain reduces its deficit in line with other leading nations, it will still have the rich world's biggest deficit from now until 2017 and potentially beyond, casting serious doubt on its economic credibility.

The warning coincided with shocking public finance statistics showing that public borrowing in October was 88 times what it was in the same month last year, making it likely that the Chancellor will miss his £175bn borrowing forecast this year.

The double blow is acutely embarrassing for Downing Street, coming ahead of next month's pre-Budget report and only 24 hours after it pledged to create a Bill to halve the deficit within four years and to reduce debt every year for the coming decade.

In fact, the OECD predicted in its annual Economic Outlook, Britain's deficit was likely to be even higher next year than this year, at 13.3pc, raising the prospect that the Government could break its own law in its very first year.

Britain's deficit will remain higher than any other major country, including even Iceland and Ireland, unless the Government takes far more drastic action to repair it, said the OECD's acting chief economist Jørgen Elmeskov.

"Halving the deficit would be a start, but since the UK is starting out from a deficit which is in double figures, one should go further still," he said. "The concern is that there could be a cost spiral - where debt increases, hitting confidence in the market, which pushes up interest rates, and this leads to even higher deficits."

The prospect of interest payments on Britain's rapidly growing debt rising to 12pc of tax revenues has already prompted Standard & Poor's to issue a warning about the security of the UK's credit rating.

The OECD said that it expected the total gross debt levels owed by the British Government to rise from below 50pc of GDP in 2007 to 120pc of GDP by 2017. This would be higher than any other G7 economy apart from Japan, whose gross debt would reach an unprecedented 223pc of GDP. [Japan, Britain, and the US all face currency collapses]

The OECD, which predicted that growth in the rich world would recover this year at a "tepid" rate, also forecast that Britain's economy would grow by 1.2pc in 2010, having contracted by 4.7pc this year.

Its UK debt warning came as the Office for National Statistics said that public sector net borrowing in October was £11.4bn - a record for the month. The shortfall, caused by a slump in tax revenues and the increased cost of supporting the unemployed, leaves the deficit almost treble that of last year. October normally shows a surplus as corporation tax receipts arrive.

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said: "Today is a defining moment in the debate about Britain's debt - the moment when we see that Gordon Brown has not just lost control of the public finances but lost the economic argument about the debt crisis.”

My reaction: Britain fiscal position is spinning out of control.

The Bank of England’s ballooning toxic assets

The chart below from Cumberland Advisors offers a visual depiction of the balance sheet of the Bank of England. Notice that “other assets” (ie: toxic assets) now make up most the Bank of England’s assets.

Like the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England is running out of room on its balance sheet. The only way it can keep buying UK debt (and funding the UK budget deficit) over the next year is by significantly increasing the size of its balance sheet (printing a lot of money).

Conclusion: Everything is reaching the breaking point as we approach the end of 2009. I would like to repeat the advice I gave a eight months ago when I wrote about Britain monetizing its national debt.

The pound and the dollar are dead. I urge anyone who owns dollars or pounds to buy physical gold, euros, Swiss francs, or anything else for that matter. The dollar and the pound are about to become the two worst performing asset classes on the planet.

Fed Buys Another 71 Billion Mortgage-backed Securities

2009-11-19T21:02:00.000-08:00

The Fed has bought another 71 billion mortgage-backed securities in the last week, as you can see in the chart below,

Two important points to note:

1) The Fed's balance sheet is now overflowing with assets it cannot sell: Treasury securities (politically difficult to unload in large numbers) and toxic assets (no one wants to buy them).

2) The Fed can’t keep buying more US debt (ie: treasuries and mortgage debt) without expanding its balance sheet (essentially printing more money).

-------------

Martijn said...
It would be nice if you'd post the historic balance all the way up from the 30s or so. That shows quite nicely how it has been slowly building up until august 08 and than exploded. class="Section1">

Here is the same chart as above going back to 2002.

49 mn Americans food insecure: USDA study

2009-11-19T01:13:00.000-08:00

Commodity Online reports that 49 million Americans food insecure.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

49 mn Americans food insecure: USDA study
2009-11-17 23:50:00

CHICAGO (Commodity Online): The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service reported on Monday that 49 million Americans, including nearly 17 million children, are food insecure. The 2009 report on Household Food Insecurity in the United States paints an alarming picture of the pervasiveness of hunger.

This is an increase of 36 percent over the numbers released one year ago by the USDA, which found that 36.2 million American were at risk of hunger. "It is tragic that so many people in this nation of plenty don't have access to adequate amounts of nutritious food," said Vicki Escarra, president and CEO of Feeding America. "Although these new numbers are staggering, it should be noted that these numbers reflect the state of the nation one year ago, in 2008. Since then, the economy has significantly weakened, and there are likely many more people struggling with hunger than this report states.

The new data reinforces recent findings from a research study conducted by Feeding America, the nation's leading hunger-relief organization, reflecting a dramatic increase in requests for emergency food assistance from food banks across the country.

Conducted in September, the Feeding America study shows that its network food banks experienced an average increase in need of nearly 30 percent this year. While the numbers vary geographically, some food banks are reporting increases of more than 50 percent in requests for emergency food assistance over a year prior.

"National socio-economic indicators, including the escalating unemployment rate and the number of working-poor, lead us to believe that the number of people facing hunger will continue to rise significantly over the coming year," added Escarra. "Research on previous economic recessions indicates that people who fall into the grips of poverty in a time of recession do not recover financially. Many of those people are likely to be in need of our services now or in the future.

"Feeding America's 200 food banks continue to work on the front lines feeding more than 25 million people each year, through our country's food pantries, soup kitchens, and emergency feeding centers - more than 63,000 agencies in total," said Escarra. "These establishments, many of which are grass root and faith based centers operated solely by volunteers, serve as an oasis for the more than 4 million people who seek relief weekly to help feed themselves and their families. Emergency food assistance is a critical link in the nation's response chain to help people through times of crisis."

Escarra observes, "Our network food banks are calling us every day, telling us that demand for emergency food is higher than it has ever been in our history. Feeding America will continue to work closely with our partners at USDA to ensure that the public and charitable sectors are keeping pace - as best we can - with the dramatically increasing needs for food assistance." [Imagine what is going to happen as food prices double then triple over the next few months as the dollar/food panic unfolds]

Feeding America provides low-income individuals and families with the fuel to survive and even thrive. As the nation's leading domestic hunger-relief charity, our network members supply food to more than 25 million Americans each year, including 9 million children and 3 million seniors. (Courtesy: PRNewswire)

Commodity Online reports that US role in world economy shrinking alarmingly.

US role in world economy shrinking alarmingly
2009-11-18 09:15:00

BALTIMORE, USA (Commodity Online): For the first time in 200 years, American consumers are no longer the driving force behind the world's economy. In his book, Fiscal Hangover, Keith Fitz-Gerald--one of the world's leading experts on global investing--picks apart every important change and identifies unprecedented opportunities.

Investors will discover how the U.S. role in the world economy is shrinking at unheard-of rates; how and why government intervention may well prevent the U.S. markets from normalizing in years to come; why Asia is already well on its way to becoming the next great financial center; and why China's Yuan is quietly replacing the U.S. dollar as the world's reserve currency.

Commodity Online reports that dollar collapse to ravage US economy and Obama.

Dollar collapse to ravage US economy and Obama
2009-11-18 08:35:00
By Christopher G. Galakoutis

…
As discussed last post, I don’t believe the US will resort to outright money printing as per Weimar Germany in the 1920’s or more recently Zimbabwe. The bond market has a gun to Ben Bernanke’s temple, and is telling him in no uncertain terms that if he were to drop dollar bills from helicopters, he would get his head blown off. Think of it as the bond market staring down the Fed and telling it that the dollar had better start behaving like gold. [This is flawed logic. The reason Bernanke will print money like a madman is to prevent the treasury market from collapsing.]

All sides agree we will see deflation in terms of gold. What happens in nominal terms is the big question. A bond market up until now going along with Fed actions is not signaling that the Fed has or will lose control of the dollar. ~~In fact, it is signaling the opposite~~ [The Fed has bought over 1 trillion US debt in the last year. This is the only reason interests rates aren’t higher]. ~~Bernanke’s SAT score was 1590 out of 1600. He’s no dummy~~ [Bernanke’s intelligence is irrelevant, he is a mere pawn of the US Treasury department]. He knows who his bosses are, and he will do what they ask [The US treasury (Bernanke’s master) will demand he print money]. He and the government tipped their hands in that respect during the crisis, when they chose who they chose to bail out in a massive way, while the first tent cities where going up across the country.

That leaves a loss of confidence in all paper currencies and specifically a collapse of the US dollar as the only other trigger that takes gold to much higher levels. But that would also mean the US’s friends and allies turning their backs on this country at a time when it could be argued the US is most in need of their continued support. [The global food crisis which will start in two or three months, will cause the world to abandon the dollar]

It would mean the world turning its back on a new administration and a new president loved the world over. And whom might the world have to deal with next, should a collapse of the US dollar ravage the economy and Obama in 2012?

If the world turning its back, and dumping the dollar in a coordinated effort, is the scenario that plays out, then holding dollars will prove to be a bad move. But I don’t see that scenario playing out [if you were aware of the global 2009/10 food shortage, you would]. Sure, at some point foreign creditors will tighten the screws on the US, and it won’t be able to borrow as much as it has been. That is the day of reckoning I have written about.

That is when the US will be forced to make the tough choices. That is, cut deficits and perhaps negotiate repayment terms on its debts. I suppose those are the key issues that all of these arguments rest on.

Will the US make the tough choices and retain some semblance of self-respect [no way in hell], or will it simply print money and go the way of Zimbabwe? [Anyone who even has to asks this question knows nothing of history or how the world works.]

I would argue that anyone who believes there is no difference between a Zimbabwe and the US [me] -- in that the US takes the easy way out and literally prints greenbacks to pay off creditors -- simply does not understand how the world works [you kidding me? THE US HAS ALWAYS TAKEN THE EASY WAY OUT THE EASY WAY OUT IN THE LAST FEW DECADES. Did the US deal with social security crisis, the budget deficit, the trade deficit, etc? No. The Idea that the US would start being responsible at this point is ludicrous], and should they be investing in anticipation of such an outcome, will be looking at substantial loses in the near future [bullshit].

My reaction: It isn’t a pleasant subject, so I don’t write about it too often. Things are going to get much worst in the US over the next year.

With 49 million Americans food insecure and a looming global food shortage/dollar collapse, it shouldn’t take too much imagination to understand just how bad things will be. I have already written about the potential for famine in the US earlier this year…

The imminent collapse of the dollar leaves the US vulnerable to Famine.

1) There is no fixed relation between food and famine.

2) Many large famines have taken place despite moderate-to-good food availability

3) A famine develops when a sizeable number of people lose the economic means of acquiring food.

4) This can result from unemployment or from a sharp drop in earnings compared with food prices (ie: hyperinflation), even when there is no fall in food output or supply [although food shortages do also increase the potential for famine].

5) Market-based movements of food are related to demand and purchasing power.

6) The general prevalence of poverty and weakness of the economy in the country or region is an important pre-requisite for famine.

7) The sense of distance between the ruler and the ruled (between 'us' and 'them') is a crucial feature of famines. [ie: the distance Goldman and the average American]

Conclusion: Famine is caused by sudden loss of purchasing power by a portion of the population already living near poverty. If the dollar collapses and the food stamps one out of nine Americans depends on become worthless, the US would meet all the criteria for a potential famine.

Famine in Weimar Germany as an example

In January 1922, hyperinflation exploded in Germany. By December 1922, Germany was unable to feed its population or provide employment for even 60 per cent of the labor force. People began to die in the streets from starvation and hypothermia…

USDA Designates Mississippi As Disaster Area

2009-11-18T13:50:00.000-08:00

The Daily Comet reports that USDA designates 79 Mississippi counties as disaster areas.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

November 18, 2009
79 counties declared disaster
$500M in Miss. crops damaged by heavy rain, drought
LaRaye Brown

The federal government on Tuesday agreed to assist the state's farmers after excessive rains in the spring and fall and a summer drought damaged nearly $500 million in crops.

The Department of Agriculture designated 79 of the state's 82 counties natural disaster areas, opening the doors for farmers to apply for federal assistance programs. Farmers in three other counties - Kemper, Neshoba and Newton - also will be able to apply for assistance because they are contiguous to those declared primary disaster areas.

Among the state's five largest crops - soybeans, corn, cotton, rice and sweet potatoes - losses total more than $459.4 million, Mississippi State University's Agricultural Extension Service estimates show.

Tuesday's disaster declaration gives farmers up to eight months to apply for low-interest loans. They also can apply for the Supplemental Revenue Assistance Program, or SURE.

If approved for SURE, farmers could receive grant payments to help make up for revenue losses not covered by crop insurance. In order to apply for SURE, farmers must have crop insurance.

"It's a start," said George King, who farms in Chatham, about 25 miles south of Greenville, a region of the state hit hard by excessive rainfall. He won't be sure how he feels about the declaration until he learns more about the programs being offered. "A lot of those programs are hard to qualify for."

In this, his 22nd crop, King got only 40 percent of his expected yield on cotton and had to leave some soybean acreage unharvested because of excessive damage. This was the first time he had to plow over crops.

It's been a year of painful firsts for many farmers. Spring rains forced them to plant late or washed away seeds, leading many to replant.

Recent unseasonably heavy rains kept farmers from harvesting. What was harvested was of poorer quality and - in many instances - excessive moisture rotted crops which had to be plowed over.

To qualify for the declaration, counties had to show at least 30 percent crop damage.

The state office of the Farm Service Agency did not release information about losses in counties. But MSU Extension Service figures show many crops will take substantial hits this year.

The state's sweet potato crop is expected to record about a 64 percent loss. Soybeans are down nearly 44 percent and cotton suffered a 48 percent value loss.

The Daily Comet reports that disaster declaration for farm losses in 5 states.

Disaster declaration for farm losses in 5 states
The Associated Press
Published: Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 7:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 7:00 a.m.

JACKSON, Miss. - Federal agriculture authorities have declared disaster areas in parts of Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee due to crop losses from a combination of severe spring and fall flooding and summer drought.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the declaration will "provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to a wide variety of crops."

The declaration qualifies many farmers in the designated areas for low interest emergency loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Farm Service Agency.

The primary disaster areas are in 79 Mississippi counties and contiguous counties and parishes in the other states.
…
To qualify for the declaration, counties and parishes in the five states had to show at least 30 percent crop damage.

"Unless something equivalent to the wasted money that we put into the (banking) bailout is done for farmers, they are going to have a long, difficult road, after which they still may not be able to come out of this," said Ernie Flint, an agronomist with MSU's Extension Service.

Flint said many farmers had debt before this season and giving them new loans - even if they are low interest - will only add to the burden.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour began the process of getting the disaster declaration last month when he wrote a letter to the USDA asking the state's Farm Service Agency to begin tallying damages.

"While I am pleased these areas can qualify for much-needed assistance, we have to understand this crop disaster will continue to put downward pressure on tax revenues," Barbour said in a statement Tuesday. "The important agriculture sector faces a long road to recovery, just as does the state's economy as a whole."

The Daily Comet reports that USDA designates 79 Mississippi counties as disaster areas.

79 Mississippi counties disaster areas
Nov 17, 2009 4:50 PM

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has designated 79 counties in Mississippi as primary natural disaster areas due to losses caused by the combined effects of severe spring and fall flooding, and summer drought, that occurred March 1, 2009, and continuing.

The 79 counties are:

Adams, Alcorn, Amite, Attala, Benton, Bolivar, Calhoun, Carroll, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Claiborne, Clarke, Clay, Coahoma, Copiah, Covington, De Soto,

Forrest, Franklin, George, Greene, Grenada, Hancock, Harrison, Hinds, Holmes, Humphreys, Issaquena, Itawamba, Jackson, Jasper, Jefferson, Jefferson Davis, Jones,

Lafayette, Lamar, Lauderdale, Lawrence, Leake, Lee, Leflore, Lincoln, Lowndes, Madison, Marion, Marshall, Monroe, Montgomery, Noxubee, Oktibbeha,

Panola, Pearl River, Perry, Pike, Pontotoc, Prentiss, Quitman, Rankin, Scott, Sharkey, Simpson, Smith, Stone, Sunflower,

Tallahatchie, Tate, Tippah, Tishomingo, Tunica, Union, Walthall, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Webster, Wilkinson, Winston, Yalobusha, and Yazoo.

“President Obama and I understand these conditions caused severe damage to the area and serious harm to farms in Mississippi and we want to help,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “This action will provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to a wide variety of crops including corn, cotton, rice, soybeans, wheat, pasture and forage crops.”

Farm operators in Kemper, Neshoba and Newton counties in Mississippi also qualify for natural disaster assistance because their counties are contiguous.

Farm operators in the counties and parishes listed below in the adjacent states of Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Tennessee also qualify for natural disaster assistance because their counties are contiguous.

Alabama: Choctaw, Colbert, Franklin, Lamar, Lauderdale, Marion, Mobile, Pickens, Sumter and Washington.

Arkansas: Chicot, Crittenden, Desha, Lee and Phillips.

Louisiana: Concordia, East Carroll, East Feliciana, Madison, St. Helena, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Tensas, Washington and West Feliciana.

Tennessee: Fayette, Hardeman, Hardin, McNairy and Shelby.

All counties and parishes listed above were designated natural disaster areas Nov. 13, making all qualified farm operators in the designated areas eligible for low interest emergency (EM) loans from USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA), provided eligibility requirements are met.

Below is the updated graphic showing counties designated as disaster areas by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (data from USDA).

My reaction: The USDA has basically designated the entire state of Mississippi as a natural disaster area.

But don’t worry, the USDA is also projecting a near record Mississippi soybean crop (sarcasm)! Just look at the chart below.

Conclusion: According to the USDA, both of the following is true:

1) 79 of the Mississippi’s 82 counties have suffered at least 30 percent crop damage.
2) Mississippi soybean production is only going to fall 1.7% from last year's record breaking crop.

Amazing…

China Plans To Drop Dollar Peg to Slow Inflation

2009-11-17T21:04:00.000-08:00

The Globe And Mail reports that China sets plan to let currency move higher.

China sets plan to let currency move higher
Andy Hoffman and Barrie McKenna
Nov. 11, 2009

China signalled it will allow its currency to appreciate against the U.S. dollar, bowing to international pressure days ahead of a visit from U.S. President Barack Obama.

The move to allow the yuan to rise against the greenback would provide much-needed relief to countries trying to compete against China's mighty export machine and put further downward pressure on an already battered U.S. dollar.

China's latest quarterly monetary policy report said its foreign exchange policy will now consider “capital flows and changes in major currencies,” indicating China will carefully expose the yuan's value to fluctuations in global markets.

The statement avoided the government's usual boilerplate language of keeping the yuan “basically stable at a reasonable and balanced level.”

China's trading partners have complained the government keeps the yuan at artificially low levels, providing an unfair price advantage for China's goods as they compete for market share around the world. Until now, China has largely ignored calls for greater currency flexibility.

The decision to allow the yuan to climb also points to the maturing of China's rapidly expanding economy, while giving its people and companies more purchasing power for goods and assets produced outside the country.

“China is exporting blood and sweat and importing copper and oil. Is that really good in the long term? You are sacrificing the local people's purchasing power in pursuing export growth,” said Na Liu, China analyst at Scotia Capital.

The rise in the yuan is expected to be gradual and is not likely to occur until next year. Still, China is likely to quickly draw increased capital flows into the country as international investors aim to benefit from an eventual rise in the currency and local assets. But that trend brings the risk of potential unsustainable bubbles in its real estate and stock markets.

Other Asian exporting countries such as South Korea, Singapore and Thailand, which should be able to compete better with China as the yuan appreciates, are likely to follow suit and let their currencies appreciate as well.

“A little gradual appreciation in the yuan will not naturally hurt China's exports because other Asian countries will follow,” Mr. Liu said.

China's currency has been pegged to the U.S. dollar since July of 2008 in an effort to shield exports from the global recession. But the latest economic data released Wednesday suggest a recovery is well under way in China. Industrial production rose 16.1 per cent in October, the most since March of 2008. Exports declined 13.8 per cent, the smallest drop recorded this year.

“It was inevitable,” Benjamin Reitzes, an economist at BMO Nesbitt Burns said of China's hint it will shift its foreign exchange policy.

“The reason they can do it now is because they see external demand from the global economy is improving,” he added.

Bloomberg reports that China will allow yuan gains to slow inflation.

China Will Allow Yuan Gains to Slow Inflation, Riverfront Says
By Allen Wan

Nov. 11 (Bloomberg) -- China will allow for faster appreciation of the yuan against the dollar next year as it seeks to curb accelerating inflation, according to Riverfront Investment Group and RBC Capital Markets.

“China can either let the yuan appreciate or allow inflation to accelerate at the risk of causing social unrest,” said Michael Jones, who manages $1.4 billion in stocks, including Chinese equities, at Richmond, Virginia-based Riverfront. “Inflation pressures will push China to allow substantial yuan appreciation.” [this is what I have been predicting]

The world’s third-biggest economy expanded 8.9 percent in the past quarter, the fastest pace in a year, according to official data. Money supply increased a record 29.4 percent in October from a year earlier, the central bank said today.

“Rapid Chinese money supply growth led to inflation in 2004 and 2008," Jones said. "It ~~could~~ [will] happen again."

He predicts the inflation rate may rise as high as 7 percent next year, with food prices double that estimate. Under that worst-case scenario, Chinese policymakers may be forced to revalue the currency by 25 percent, Jones said.

Consumer prices fell 0.5 percent last month, the smallest drop since declines began in February, according to a Bloomberg survey. Prices will rise 2.7 percent in 2010, according to the average of 16 economist estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

"Pressure from the international community to allow yuan appreciation is not that big," People's Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said Nov. 6.

Economic Stimulus

China's 4 trillion yuan ($586 billion) stimulus spending and record lending may lead to a pick-up in inflation, prompting the government to allow for an appreciation of the yuan, said RBC's global head of emerging research Nick Chamie.

"Strong stimulus and very easy liquidity conditions are likely to stoke inflation pressures in the months ahead, suggesting that tighter policy will be needed -- currency appreciation will likely be part of the package," Chamie wrote in a note to clients.

…
"We believe that as other currencies continue to rally, China will likely resume a crawling peg strategy against the dollar," Jones said. "Such a shift in policy will likely motivate a rally as global financial markets breathe a collective sigh of relief."

'Material Revaluation'

China may resume the crawling peg as early as next week, when U.S. President Barack Obama visits the Asian country, Jones said.

Asian currencies such as the Taiwanese dollar and South Korean won may appreciate further if the yuan gains as governments in the region have been reluctant to risk further gains on concern they may become less competitive, he said.

"A material revaluation of the yuan could potentially unleash substantial domestic consumption in China, be a catalyst for a boom in global trade, and spark a secular bull market in equities,” Jones said. [“unleash substantial domestic consumption” would drastically increase the demand for food in the face of a global food shortage]

People’s Daily Online asks will China suffer from imported inflation?

Will China suffer from imported inflation?
11:12, November 12, 2009

When the shadow of the financial crisis still lingers on in the world, China's National Bureau of Statistics' recent statement that China will achieve its goal of 8 percent GDP growth for the whole year indicated its earlier recovery than other countries. Experts warned that early recovery may make China the first country to encounter inflation. In Fact, with dollar depreciation and rising commodity prices in the world market, there's now mounting imported inflation pressure on China.
…
Emerging pressure

Inflation, especially imported inflation, becomes another problem facing China. Countries around the world have injected huge liquidity into their markets.

U.S. monetary base, the stock of money in its banking system, doubled to 1.70 trillion U.S. dollars in August from 842 billion a year earlier. Central banks in Britain and Japan also implemented unprecedented loose monetary policies. In the first ten months, new Renminbi-dominated loans totaled 8.92 trillion yuan (1.31 trillion U.S. dollars) in China. Huge liquidity has generated increasing inflation expectations.

Driven by the depreciated dollar, rising commodity prices in the world market are adding the pressure of imported inflation to China. A report presented in October by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) showed that oil prices have increased by 60 percent compared with the beginning of this year, and prices of nonferrous metal and iron ore have grown by around 40 percent. The pressure of imported inflation has increasingly direct influence on China's consumer prices.

The hike of commodity prices was the result of dollar depreciation. As Renminbi exchange rate to dollar remains stable, China will inevitably feel the pressure of imported inflation, explained Zhao Qingming, a senior researcher with China Construction Bank.

…
Zhao said China should allow Renminbi to appreciate moderately to reduce the influence of the price hike of imported products.

Bloomberg reports that dollar overwhelms central banks from Brazil to Korea.

Dollar Overwhelms Central Banks From Brazil to Korea
By Oliver Biggadike and Matthew Brown

Nov. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Brazil, South Korea and Russia are losing the battle among developing nations to reduce gains in their currencies and keep exports competitive as the demand for their financial assets, driven by the slumping dollar, is proving more than central banks can handle.

South Korea Deputy Finance Minister Shin Je Yoon said yesterday the country will leave the level of its currency to market forces after adding about $63 billion to its foreign exchange reserves this year to slow the appreciation of the won. Chile Finance Minister Andres Velasco said the same day that lawmakers approved an increase in local debt sales to finance spending, a move that will allow the government to keep more of its dollar-based savings overseas and slow the peso's rally.

Governments are amassing record foreign-exchange reserves as they direct central banks to buy dollars in an attempt to stem the greenback's slide and keep their currencies from appreciating too fast and making their exports too expensive. Half of the 10-best performers in the currency market this year came from developing markets, gaining at least 14 percent on average, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

'Slow the Advance'

"It looked for a while like the Bank of Korea was trying to defend 1,200, but it looks like they've given up and are just trying to slow the advance," said Collin Crownover, head of currency management in London at State Street Global Advisors, which has $1.7 trillion under management.

…
International Investment

An unprecedented net $47 billion flowed into equities in India, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand in the last three quarters, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That eclipsed the previous full-year high of $33 billion in 2005, nine year of data show.

"The dollar is weakening because the U.S. has the lowest short-term interest rates in the world will be the sell side of the carry trade as long as that remains true," Chris Low, chief economist at FTN Financial in New York, wrote in a note to clients yesterday.

…
'Hard to Fight'

Brazil's economy emerged from a recession in the second quarter, swinging to a 1.9 percent expansion after six months of contraction, a Sept. 11 report from the statistics agency showed. Six straight months of job growth, coupled with tax breaks and record low borrowing costs, pushed up consumer spending and helped Latin America's largest economy rebound from the global financial crisis.

"I hear a lot of noise reflecting the government's discomfort with the exchange rate, but it is hard to fight this," said Rodrigo Azevedo, the monetary policy director of Brazil's central bank from 2004 to 2007. "There is very little Brazil can do," said Azevedo, who runs $1.8 billion at JGP SA in Rio de Janeiro, in an Oct. 16 interview. [Brazil could buy more dollars to weaken its currency, but that is evidently not even being considered.]

My reaction: China is signaling that it will drop the dollar peg and appreciate the yuan to contain inflation. So when food prices start rising fast in the next few months, the dollar will start falling just as fast.

Keep in mind that:

Chinese (and world) CPI numbers are about to turn positive

Below is a chart showing China’s monthly CPI. As you can see, since February, CPI numbers have been negative, but that is about to change…

The reason CPI turned negative last year was the collapse of commodity prices. Oil and agricultural commodities started trading at lower prices than they did a year yearlier, which drove the cost of food and gas down. However, this November things are about to change.

Below is a chart of oil prices last year. See the price plunged from $90 in October to $60 in November?

Oil prices are now at $80 higher, which is $20 more than a year ago. Higher year on year commodity prices will quickly start showing up as positive CPI numbers around the world and in China.

"The stimulus is working" (humor)

2009-11-17T09:02:00.000-08:00

Below is a fun clip from last week’s Saturday Night Live about how “the stimulus is working”.

Two other bits of news:

1) The Globe And Mail reports that China sets plan to let currency move higher.

2) Gold is still going up:

Worst Harvest Season Ever Seen

2009-11-16T14:45:00.000-08:00

Below are extracts from all the entries I have made on the US’s 2009 harvest, in chronological order. Points to notice and consider as you read through them:

1) How the crop losses continue to grow due to excessive rains.

2) The number of times “ever seen” and “worst” are mentioned.

3) Remember that the USDA is projecting the largest U.S. soy crop on record (at 3.3 billion bushels) and the second-largest corn crop (at 12.9 billion bushels).

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

[Iowa, June 29]

"I'd say this year is one of the most unusual years we've had in the last 20 years," said Don Fry, executive director of the Des Moines County USDA Farm Services Agency. "Because it seems like it rains every second or third day, the ground is constantly kept wet. We've heard a lot of reports from people with wet spots turning up in fields that they and their parents ... don't ever remember being a wet spot."

The combination of constant rain and cool temperatures this spring kept farm fields saturated, making planting difficult and hampering crop growth. Also, frequent rains have rinsed a portion of nitrogen fertilizers from fields and hindered the application of herbicides, all of which cuts into yields, Kester said.

"This spring has just been a terrible struggle," Kester said. "Anybody that mowed hay within the last three weeks probably lost their hay crop because it got wet."

[Texas, July 08]

If not for the triple-digit heat, central Texas rancher Debbie Davis could almost think it was a different season entirely.

"The (pasture) grass looks like it's the dead of winter,'' said Davis, who raises beef cattle and Texas Longhorns northwest of San Antonio. The region is enduring its driest 22-month span going back to 1885. "It's horrible. It's probably the worst I've ever seen.''

[Maine, July 25]

This has been a bad year for dairy farmers: Milk prices have plummeted and rain has prevented them from getting onto their fields to harvest hay. Fertilizer they applied simply washed away in the rain.

The longer hay grows without a cutting, the poorer the nutritional quality and the more money farmers will spend this winter to supplement it. Cornfields are rotting without enough sun or heat to ripen the plants.

"The season is lost," Julie Marie Bickford of the Maine Dairy Industry Association said Friday. "With milk prices so low and this feed disaster on top of it, farmers are like deer in the headlights."

[Maine, July 25]

Hay and corn are critical components of livestock feed, Bickford said. "This stunted corn and alfalfa is forcing farmers to purchase grain and feeds. That is a very bad situation. Prices are extremely high because of the Midwest floods earlier this year. Maine's farmers couldn't come up with a worse situation in their worst dreams."

On Thursday, a 75-year-old former dairy farmer visited the Wright Place in Clinton. He recalled delivering glass bottles of milk and told Brian Wright that he never remembered a rainier summer.

"This is unreal," Wright said. He cut back from 700 acres of feed corn to 600 acres to trim his budget this year, and now he may not get to harvest much of that.

[New York, Aug 14]

WEST WINFIELD - A panel of political representatives and aides sat for over three hours at a rally Friday in Mount Markham Middle School gym as over 200 upstate New York dairy farmers pleaded for action on a range of issues crippling their industry.

One after another dairy farmers and others involved in the industry took a microphone to berate county, state and federal representatives from throughout the region.

Some were brought to tears describing their inability to make a living, a few simply screamed in frustration and others demanded answers. But the dire situation facing the men and women speaking was painfully clear.

“We are in a disaster,” declared Ken Dibbell, of Chenango County.
…
“The people who feed the nation can’t feed themselves,” Gretchen Maine, a dairy farmer from Waterville, “what’s wrong this picture.”
…
The time frames for both solutions seemed in contrast from farmers need for help, with many emotionally explaining they have either already abandon businesses or are on the brink.

“I don’t think they get the message yet,” Tewksbury said, referring politicians unaware of the uncharacteristic display of emotions from prideful farmers. They don’t have until 2010. They have the next couple of months to decide if they can stay in business, he said.

[South Dakota, August 21]

Mark Tubbs, who ranches in southwest South Dakota and inside the Wyoming border, plans to sell about a third of his cows this fall after putting up a sixth of the hay he usually does. He had been expecting a decent cutting — until the grasshoppers started chomping.

"This year we had a good start but they just took it," said Tubbs, 57. "The grasshoppers have taken it down to the dirt. They've eaten everything but the cactus."

[South Dakota, August 21]

That's little comfort to David Kane, a rancher near Sheridan, Wyo., who said the grasshoppers on his ranch are the worst they've been in more than 20 years. Kane already sold off part of his herd because the pests ate his cows' food.

"They're devastating," Kane said. "They were so bad here on the ranch that we sprayed our meadows because the second-cutting of alfalfa wouldn't green up because they were eating it as fast as it was trying to grow."
…
"We've had one good year in the last 10 years, and that was in 2005," he said. "That's the problem we're having with the grasshoppers. It's just taking the will and the heart out of us."

[South Dakota, September 2]

Butte County, which borders Wyoming just north of the Black Hills, is an area that's been hit hard, said Steve Smeenk, a farmer and rancher who is a member of the county commission.

"Grasshoppers are just about as bad as most people around here have ever seen them," said Smeenk, 61. "There's tremendous numbers. The ground moves when you walk."

"All of a sudden, they just exploded," Smeenk said. "I've killed millions and millions of them, but I haven't killed enough to make a dent. There's billions and billions of them out there."

[Mississippi, September 22]

“They are deteriorating in the field by the hour,” Glenn Mast, a Brooksville farmer, reported of his corn, soybean and cotton crops. “Some of the crops have sprouted and are regrowing and some are just plain rotting. What percentage we don’t even know at this point; it’s too wet to go out and check.

“This is very unusual,” he added, noting he’s been farming for 40 years. “It’s always hard to say which is the worst, but this is as bad as I’ve seen it for this time of year.” [Mississippi then proceeded to have a month and a half of the record rain.]

[Oklahoma, September 22]

Continuing showers are further fueling concerns about Leflore County farmers’ harvests.

Jerry Singleton, an agent with the Leflore County Extension Service, said farmers are concerned about this year’s crop. Heavy rains have kept them out of the fields, and many are uncertain about their yields.

“A lot of the farmers out here are really starting to hope for the rain to let up,” Singleton said. “The amount of rain we have been seeing is usually associated with hurricanes.”

“It’s so hard to tell what is being affected by this rainfall, and I think most farmers are really just wanting to get out there and see what is going on and just how much this has affected their crop,” Singleton said. “It could be a loss in yield, or it may be a loss in quality. We’ll have to wait and see.”

[Oklahoma, September 22]

Darrin Dodds, Extension cotton specialist, said cotton farmers have to worry about boll lock and boll rot, both of which can cause devastating losses in both yield quality and quantity.
…
“These hot, humid conditions just provide the perfect environment for disease to develop,” Dodds said.

The wet weather also causes other problems.

“A lot of the farmers are prepared to start defoliating, but they have to wait because of the rain,” Dodds said. “It’s possible that with all this moisture, seeds may start sprouting in the boll.”

When that happens, Dodds said, it not only makes a seed worthless for resale but also risks staining the crop.

“This weather pattern is creating a lot of problems for farmers across the board,” Dodds said. “It’s a problem for corn, cotton and soybean farmers. It’s hard to find an optimistic side to this recent weather, although too much rain is usually better than none.”

[Mississippi, September 23]

After a spring and summer marked by prolonged wet and dry spells that hampered some of the state's crops, fall is beginning with waterlogged soybeans.

Bolton soybean farmer Bobby Mashburn hasn't been able to assess the steady rain's impact on his crop - it's been too wet for him to do any serious work in his fields.

But he's hoping for a weather let-up soon, or else he says his yield likely will be less than he projected, perhaps up to 20 percent less.

"They're deteriorating each day it rains," he says of his soybeans. "It hasn't dried out enough for us to get out and take a look."

[Arkansas, September 23]

For area farmers, the excess water has led to reduced yield and quality in their crops, according to Don Plunkett, an agent with the Pine Bluff office of the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service.

“It’s just a nasty situation,” Plunkett said. “We’ve got farmers that have tried to harvest this week, and we’ve had just a couple of days of drying time. We are seeing a lot of damage.”

Rice farmers have been particularly hard hit, Plunkett said.

“We’ve got some rice that’s on the ground, and that makes it extra slow to harvest,” he said. “It just really costs a lot of time and manpower. It’s just a slow go to get that stuff off the ground.”

Plunkett added that rice and corn have been “sprouting.”

“That simply means that the grains are trying to make new plants,” Plunkett said. “That affects the quality of the crop.”

[Arkansas, September 23]

Don Plunkett, Jefferson County extension staff chair for the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, said soybean growers and consultants are also complaining about weather-related problems.

"One is that the rain stopped harvest," he said. "Second is that the rains have prevented timely fungicide applications as well as insecticide applications.

"A third problem is soybeans are splitting along the suture of the pod and beginning to sprout. These split pods also allow infections."

According to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, only five percent of the soybean crop had been harvested in Arkansas, some of which was affected by soybean rust and an infestation of aphids.

Unfortunately for Lawrence County farmers, rains are forecast through Sunday.

[Texas, September 23]
Bruce Wetzel has been a farmer in Sherman all his life, learning from his father back in the 1960's.

He's seen all the ups and downs of producing wheat and corn in Texoma, and he says this was one of the worst years for corn.
…
"All the rain we got back in April and May, we got 20 inches of rain in a two week period there, really just damaged our corn. Our corn just never quite recovered from too much water,” said Wetzel.

Wetzel says he lost about 50% of his wheat and corn crops this harvest season, a trend that farmers are experiencing across Texoma.

[Louisiana, September 24]

"There are a lot of beans out there ready to be cut," said Lecompte-area farmer Dale Schexnyder, who fortunately was able to get his corn crop harvested despite the frequent rains. "This isn't helping the cotton or the beans, either."

"Right now it's harvest time, it should be dry," Schexnyder said. "If we keep getting these little, small showers, it's going to be hard. Hopefully, next week it will dry up."

[Louisiana, September 24]

Three months ago, area farmers were praying for rain. Now, some are praying for it to stop.

"We had significant yield loss due to dryness in the summer," said Matt Martin, county agent with the Rapides Parish office of the LSU AgCenter. "Now, we're looking at the possibility of seeing some quality loss due to too much rain at harvest."

"Right now, all the farmers are kind of wishing it would quit," Martin said. "We have soybeans ready to harvest, we have cotton ready to harvest, and we have a little bit of corn ready to harvest. This rain is preventing that."

[New Jersey, September 26]

South Jersey farmers are coping with heavy crop losses after steady summer rains saturated fields, creating an environment ripe for overgrown weeds, rot and disease.

The downpours damaged crops, from tomatoes, green bell peppers and corn, to barley, peaches and watermelon, decimating whole crops or severely reducing yield.

"The rains have just killed me this year," said Tucker Gant, 51, a vegetable and fruit farmer in Elk, who estimates his total losses this year at nearly $220,000.
…
"Nobody has ever seen rain as drastic as this year, even talking to old-time farmers," said Grasso, a third-generation farmer who estimates losses so far at roughly $50,000.
…
"It's never been that bad as far as I can remember," said Gant, pointing to water pooling in a field as he drove his pickup truck along a bumpy dirt trail toward 35 acres of barley overrun by tall weeds. "I have never seen water lay there more than two days. It should have been harvested, but you can't harvest weeds taller than barley."

[Louisiana, September 27]

Farmers that delayed stinkbug apps for two weeks due to weather will notice considerable damage. How much will be left to the discretion of the tester at the elevator. Some we hulled out had over 80% damage early last week. But we have also done this earlier this year and the soybeans graded less than 10% damaged. We cannot manage the numbers of stinkbugs that are now entering soybean fields. Threshold levels are returning too quickly. Some farmers are talking about planting more late beans next year. Better figure 5 – 8 apps for stinkbugs in that budget.

No soybean is safe from stinkbugs as long as it remains in the field. High numbers can harm even soybeans at R7.

[Mississippi, October 2]

Harvest season rains have robbed soybean growers of strong yields and bean quality, reducing profits in an already challenging year.

“We were harvesting a beautiful crop with outstanding yields before the rains came the last two weeks of September,” said Trey Koger, soybean specialist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service. “Now that farmers are finally back in fields, we are seeing average yield losses of 5 percent to 10 percent.”

In addition to the yield losses, damage estimates average between 5 percent and 20 percent.

“The amount of damage the crop received is extremely variable,” Koger said. “We’re seeing damage from 2 percent to 80 percent. You couple these numbers with the yield losses, and farmers are not seeing as good a harvest as they anticipated just a few weeks ago.”

[Mississippi, October 2]

Rainy weather is not the only thing attacking the state’s soybean crop. Jeff Gore, a Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station research entomologist, said a new, smaller but more aggressive feeding species of stinkbugs has moved into the state.

“The red-banded stinkbug is slowly creeping its way up our state from Louisiana,” Gore said. “We had them in low levels last year and had to treat a couple of fields for these stinkbugs, but they are a lot more widespread this year on the later-planted soybeans.”

Gore said producers have sprayed a significant number of acres for the red-banded stinkbugs. Existing insecticides are effective, but they break down in six to 11 days and the bugs re-infest quickly.

“Either you spray for these stinkbugs or you’re not going to harvest beans,” Gore said. “Since you have to spray more frequently and at a little higher rate, you have to make a management assessment according to how the beans are looking when the stinkbugs move in.”

“I’m afraid this one has the potential to be a lot more of a problem than rust,” Gore said. “They appear to be well-established through most areas of Mississippi now, and it’s likely to be an annual problem that will get worse before it gets better.”

[Louisiana, October 8]

"It's killing us," said Ouachita Parish producer Gary Mathes. "We cut some beans a week ago that we had to sell at a salvage price of $3 a bushel."

Soybean prices have been hovering near $9 a bushel.

"We fought a short corn crop, but we had one heck of a bean crop and the rain is taking it away from us," Mathes said.

[Louisiana, October 8]

Venoy Kinnaird said his farm has been drenched by about 20 inches of rain since Sept. 12.

"I've got some beans that I won't cut; they're not salvageable," Kinnaird said. "And I've got some sweet potatoes that are halfway out of the ground. Cotton has taken a terrible hit, too, even though we don't have that much planted around here this year.

"We're absolutely waterlogged. What's really bad is we're coming off of a disaster last fall."

[Alabama, October 10]

Three weeks ago Jamie Tate thought his 200-acre cotton crop would be the best he's ever harvested from his family's Shelby County farm.

Then near-constant rains fell across the area in September and early this month, dashing his hope for a bumper crop.

"It went from being the best cotton crop I've ever harvested to one of the worst in three weeks," Tate said. "I'm in shock."

[Alabama, October 10]

John DeLoach, a farmer from Vincent, said the large number of days without sunshine has hurt his crop more than the excessive rain. Many of his soybeans were hit by rot and mold because they couldn't dry out.

"They just stayed damp," DeLoach said.

DeLoach recently harvested 90 of his 500 acres in soybeans. About 55 percent of them were classified as damaged. That cost him about $7,000 or more, he said.

[Iowa, October 13]

Edwards and fellow farmer Tim Burrack of Arlington in Fayette County said corn in their fields had heavier moisture than usual, the product of continued wet, cold weather and lack of sunshine.

"We're seeing white mold in the soybeans here, and it could cut the yields down into about 40 bushels per acre," Burrack said. "The farmers here were expecting soybean yields in the mid-50s, maybe 60 bushels per acre."

[Crop Comments, October 26]

10/26 - East Central North Dakota: Total stand still in East Central North Dakota. Too wet to dig beets, too wet to combine soys, 1/2 or more of the dry beans left and too wet. Sunflower moisture went from 17 two weeks ago to 27 yesterday. And weather man says snow for Thursday, Saturday and Sunday of next week...Man are we in trouble...

10/26 - Cedar County, Neb.: Sunshine is getting to be an abnormal object in the sky. We received 2" of rain Tuesday thru Friday and raining this mourning. Harvest is slow, we have two soybean fields out over the scale 69bu.irrigated and 50 on dryland well above average. Corn harvest looks to be great but very wet irr.250 dryland 200. Praying for sun and warm weather. Be careful; safety first!!!!

10/26 - Floyd County, Iowa: We had 4 inches of rain Oct.20 thru Oct.24. Most are 60% to 70% done with beans, of which most were harvested too wet. Corn will vary from 21% to 38% in one pass across the field, rather unusual for 100 day corn planted before April 24th. Yields good, reports of dried corn test weight 48 to 53 lbs. Corn harvesting is practically non existent.

…
10/26 - Bond County, South Central Illinois: Is this really possible? We have had the wettest couple of months in history. Most corn is still 30% and they are calling for 2-3 more inches of rain this week. We are losing crop as we speak. Lodging in the corn is starting to take place. Any suggestions? I am ready to punt!!!!

--------------------------------

10/27 - Northwest Minnesota, along Canadian Border: We had a hard killing frost Sept 27th and now the corn has ear rot on 75 - 90% of the cobs. Federal Crop is releasing thousands of acres and corn choppers are going. There won't be many fields combined in NW MN. The moisture is 45%. Lots of beans left. Moisture is stuck at 18 - 20%.

--------------------------------

10/28 - Far Northern Illinois: Many fields of soybeans untouched some corn being picked but hard to find corn under 30%. Mold is present on almost every ear I looked at yesterday. Stalk quality is starting to slip quickly in some fields. There simply is not enough drying capacity to harvest this crop with any speed. Most guys have drying capacity for a half day of harvesting and two big 12 row combines can bury the local elevator at 32% corn. Feels like a real disaster is just around the corner with any type of wind or snow event. We will be talking about the fall of 2009 for many years to come.

10/28 - Lancaster, Pa.: We are wet and getting wetter. Harvest is at a standstill with 3 inches of rain in the past week. Corn moisture still running in the upper 20's. Quality will soon become an issue as well. It will be a challenge to get the remaining acres of small grain planted.

10/28 - Ramsey County, Northeast North Dakota: Rain again with more rain & snow in the forecast for the next few days. We have only harvested 3 partial days in the past month. Pinto beans are less than 25% harvested, moisture has been over twenty on most, what is left will only be a salvage operation. Soybeans are less than 10% harvested, and they were upper teens to over twenty moisture. We had not planned to even try the corn until after Thanksgiving, may harvest it in the spring, did a lot last year and was pleasantly surprised by the increase in test weight and minimal loss.

10/29 - Clark County, Ark.: If there were any doubts about how nasty it is down here this ought to answer those questions.

-- Clark County, Ark.

--------------------------------

10/30 - Lafayette County Wis.: WET, WET, WET. I guess we are all in the same boat. We are way, way behind. Corn is developing green mold. Broker says when weather straightens out there is a big crop out there. Problem is will the sun ever shine again? Stay safe everyone…a safe harvest is a good harvest.

10/30 - Nebraska Panhandle: Guess we don't have to worry about the irrigated corn blowing over before harvest, the snow is holding it up!

-- Nebraska Panhandle

10/30 - Buena Vista County, Northwest Iowa: Raining here again, close to 10 inches now in October, Still some beans out in the fields here, I just got done, Yields decent in the 50's which is normal. Some have gave up on beans and started corn, most of it from what I've heard is anywhere from 20% to 40% moisture and yields from 120 to 220, with very low test weights. Stalk Rot now a real concern & some guys are finding green snap they didn't know they had, those yields cut in half. I believe this harvest, when it's over, if ever will be one, we all will want to forget!

10/30 - Bond County, South Central Illinois: UN-FREAKIN-BELIEVABLE.

[Crop Comments, November 2]

11/2 - Winnebago County, North Iowa: 9.8 inches of rain last 35 days -Winnebago River is bank-full slowing drainage-beans 40% harvested -corn -5% at most. Corn running from 24-30%. Won't turn a wheel here to at least Wednesday/Thursday on sandy ground. Local elevator can dry only 25,000 bu daily of 25% corn. Almost all reporting points in Iowa are showing from 2x to 3x normal rainfall from history in past 30 days. Tow ropes are sold out. Fields will look like war zones before this December harvest is over!
…
11/2 - Houston County, Minn.: Help me out here. I am confused. Just finished reading the crop comments. No harvest progress, beans to wet to combine or frosted while green. Corn molding, too wet to combine and many reports of very low test weight. Snow burying corn in Colorado and Nebraska. Flooding burying crops in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, etc., etc. Was at the local elevator yesterday. They are in a bind because they have contracts to fill but either no beans are coming in or they have to reject them because of high moisture. Biggest crop ever coming in??? Where?

[Missouri, Illinois, November 2]

The autumn monsoons are hard to figure, said Benjamin Sittrell, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service office in suburban St. Louis.

"Typically during the late-year period, it's our driest portion of the year," Sittrell said. "To see such astronomically high amounts of precipitation, where we got several inches above the previous record levels, is very abnormal.

Sittrell said thousands of acres of farmland are under water, particularly in the flat areas of southern and western Illinois, where the Illinois, Ohio and Kaskaskia rivers are among several that are flooding.

[Arkansas, November 3]

"It's bad," was the way Ashley County Cooperative Extension Agent-Agriculture Kevin Norton described the status of Ashley County's crops this past week.
…
Overall, Norton said, he expects farmers to carry over a lot of debt this year. "I am afraid we will see a shakeup," he said. "It will be months before we see the full magnitude of how bad this fall has been."

[Iowa, November 3]

Farmer's Coop Association General Manager Randy Broesder has been involved in farming for a long time, but he can't remember a harvest season that's been as scary as this one.
…
“Some of the guys have told me that harvest hasn't been this late since 1962, and that's a long time ago,” Broesder said.

[Iowa, November 3]

Darwin Luedtke, a grain merchandiser for the North Central Cooperative office in Woden, said this harvest has been a major battle for farmers.

“I haven't seen anything like this in 37 years,” Luedtke said. “The fields are wet, beans and corn aren't as mature as they should be because of the cooler weather this summer, and it's going to cost farmers money to dry the crop. It's been a very difficult harvest.”

[Crop Comments, November 3]

11/3 - Central Nebraska: 12 in snow just melted. Fields a saturated and corm is wet with little hope of drying down because of freeze before maturity. The USDA needs to wake up and smell the roses.

11/3 - St. Clair County, Southwestern Illinois: We picked up a mere 14 inches of rain in October. Not only was this the wettest October on record, it was the fourth wettest month ever recorded in our area. Saturday brought about panic for guys farming in the bottoms along the rivers. Many were doing anything possible to get their crops out before any of the rivers crested. It is slow going for everyone as you cannot bring any trucks, wagons, or grain carts into any fields for fear of burying them. The neighbor down the road buried his combine and it took two Caterpillars to get him out. I would put corn harvest at maybe 8 percent complete as some folks have never started due to high moisture and no on the farm drying. Beans are maybe 30 percent complete. I guess we will see how much the beans rotted in the next few days. We are hoping for beans to go on Wednesday or Thursday in this area. It was 70 degrees today and we could use another six weeks of this weather. Many nervous folks around here and who can blame them. Corn yields are running anywhere from 170-240 and beans are running 35-54. Be safe everyone and best of luck with your harvest.

11/4 - Franklin Country, North-Central Iowa: Corn at 28%, we have maybe 10% harvested in this area. The last load of beans I took in was 14.2%, we have around 33% harvested around here. Yields for beans going low-50's to low-60's. Corn yields- only God knows. I would say we will be down around 25 bu from 2004 record yields; probably 190-195 will catch it this year. Certainly no record yield in my part of Iowa as the USDA is saying. Quality will be a big issue this year; I see a lot of corn getting dumped, rather than stored. The old-timers are saying they have not seen a harvest like this for many years and I hope we never see another one like this one for 30 years.

[Arkansas, November 4]
…
And further downstream in near Des Arc, the crest is not expected until Saturday or Sunday. Farmers there are paying the big price. Five-hundred acres of Doyle Burnett's soybeans are already underwater.

THV's Mike Duncan asked Burnett, "What are you going to do with that? Just let it go I guess", Burnett replied. "It will be gone. I don't see any chance of the river coming back down anytime soon. So I think they're totally gone."

[Arkansas, November 4]

“As long as the weather holds, guys will be going 24/7,” Jeremy Ross, extension soybean agronomist for the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, said Wednesday. “They were harvesting around my house last night ‘til around 9 p.m.”.
…
Beyond the harvest, there is anxiety about the future for some farmers.

“Some growers expect to go out of business in this region, based on the heavy damage to their soybean and cotton crops,” Ross said.

[Mississippi, November 5]

Hartwell Huddleston returned the extra combine he bought to help harvest what looked to be one of his best soybean crops ever.

After two months with little letup in rain, he figures he got five days' of work out of it, and one was spent just looking for dry ground to cut. And the quality of some of the crop he did bring in from his northwest Mississippi fields was so rough, an elevator refused truckloads.

"We've had a lot of rainy years, but this one puts those to shame," said Huddleston, who also sells crop insurance. "If a person's a farmer you start to think, 'Where am I going to sleep? How am I going to feed my children?'"

[Mississippi, November 5]

Stephen Logan was weighing whether to tear up his water-logged fields to get at a cotton crop speckled in places with mold, mildew and stains. He said he got 28.1 inches of rain on his northwest Louisiana farm last month, more than he said he's seen in some entire years, and the shorter days have meant less sunlight to dry things out.

"This was shaping up to be one of the best cotton crops we ever had, but it's absolutely rotted away on the stalk," Logan said. "It's very frustrating and humbling, to say the least."

[Mississippi, November 5]

In Mississippi, farmer Andy Clark doesn't know what he'll do. He put everything this year into sweet potatoes — an expensive-to-produce crop that in a good year can yield strong returns.

This wasn't a good year. Delays in getting into the fields meant potatoes rotting in the wet soil, and even if one were lucky to harvest some, odds were good — given all the rain — they'd rot in the storage house. And it's hard to justify the labor costs for that, he said.

"It's really going to be hard to sit down and talk with the bank. There's probably not going to be any way to persuade them to give you any more money," he said. "At this point, you're probably going to have to ask them to give you a little more time to pay them back."

Of the 82 acres he'd planted in central Mississippi, he'd harvested about four. His side business, hauling potatoes, "is shot."

[Arkansas, November 5]

Dollar amounts have yet to be placed on crop damages in Lafayette and Miller counties, but estimates by the University of Arkansas Extension Service indicate the losses will be tremendous, especially for soybeans.

The grain elevator companies are turning down soybeans because the damage is “too severe,” said Joe Vestal, Lafayette County Extension agent, staff chair. “We can’t put a dollar amount on the damage yet, but we’ve had lots of damage. It will be tremendous for soybeans. Most of the soybeans ready to be cut, before the rain started in September, will probably be a total loss." About 70 percent of the loads to grain elevators are damaged.

[Alabama, Georgia, north Florida, November 6]

Alabama Commissioner of Agriculture Ron Sparks is calling it a “potential crisis” — the rainy weather conditions throughout most of September and October that have frustrated growers who were eyeing pretty good cotton, peanut, soybean and corn crops.

The same holds true for producers in Georgia and north Florida, where harvest has been delayed by almost continuous rainfall, during what is usually the driest months of the year.

“Prior to September, many producers were expecting to harvest a bumper crop and were very optimistic for the upcoming harvest season,” says Sparks. “Uncommon and unfavorable precipitation during September and October have degraded various crops and caused poor harvesting conditions, which caused the harvest to be behind schedule by around four to six weeks.”

The major crops affected by the recent rainfall are cotton, soybeans, corn and peanuts, says the Commissioner. “Reports indicate that our state is in dire need of dry weather within the next two weeks, which may eliminate a potential state disaster [Area was then hit my 5+ inches of rains from Topical Storm Ida],” he said in early November. “Producers are already suffering from heavy September and October rainfall and dry conditions will not eliminate damage that has already taken place to crops across the state. Many producers are experiencing a sharp decrease in crop yield, lower grading, and crop damage from recent rainfall.”
…
“The bottom line is that Alabama producers are uncertain as to what the commodity markets will bring forth and where agriculture in our state is going,” says Sparks. “The recent weather conditions over the past two months will definitely have a negative impact on Alabama’s crop harvest.”
…
William Birdsong, agronomist at the Wiregrass Research and Extension Center in southwest Alabama, reported that wet and rainy conditions continued to delay harvest for row crops. Cotton yields and lint quality continued to suffer as a result of the wet conditions, he said. Less than 5 percent had been harvested in his area, and this could go down as the worst crop in years if the rain does not subside.

[Mississippi, November 8]

Ray Mosby can't remember tougher times -- and he's not talking about the newspaper business.

For 16 years, his weekly Deer Creek Pilot has chronicled the ups and downs of Mississippi's Issaquena and Sharkey counties, about 175 miles south of Memphis.

Although his 130-year-old newspaper is small, with a circulation of only 1,500, its editor has won state and national recognition for his community-minded journalism.

Lately, though, the news has been discouraging.

The last manufacturing plant in Sharkey County, the Stonecraft tile factory that employed about 70 at one time, closed up shop earlier this year. And recent heavy rains have damaged or destroyed most of the area's cash crops: Soybeans were left to rot in waterlogged fields, and ready-to-harvest cotton is deteriorating as the rains keep coming.

In a community where agriculture is the main source of capital, that spells calamity.

"I've never seen a place that needed as desperately a dose of good news as this place," says Mosby, 58.

[Kansas, November 09]

In far southwestern Kansas, combines are moving furiously through fields at lightning speed. Cory Kinsley, vice president of risk management for Conestoga Energy in Liberal, Kansas, says harvest likely will be done by about the middle of next week. Even better, yields, quality and moisture have all been great.

Others in our area, though, have been less fortunate and are still waiting for fields to dry down. After weeks of constant rain, fog and drizzle, the soil may still be too wet to support heavy machinery. Some fields are still flooded and won’t be drying out any time soon. It likely won’t be until much later this winter that those fields get harvested – if ever. Some portions of fields may ultimately be abandoned if they’re still too wet in the weeks ahead.

Field losses in wet fields are also mounting from lodging. As corn and milo stalks soften and break over in the wind due to the excessive moisture, more bushels inevitably end up on the ground instead of in the combine. That means more field losses long term if harvest drags out any longer.

[Alabama, November 10]

What had started as a good season for cotton could be a complete loss for some farmers if heavy rains hit fields before harvest, said Richard Petcher, agent with the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service.

"It's been a 30 percent loss so far in southwest Alabama, and more rain could make it 40 to 50 percent," Petcher said Monday. "Some fields are already a 100 percent loss."

Financial damage from Ida could be in the millions of dollars for Alabama farmers, he said. Rains have delayed harvests by about three weeks affecting not only cotton but also leaving some peanut crops vulnerable to early frosts.

"The majority of the cotton crop is still in the fields," he said. "Peanuts are about 60 percent harvested. There's been concern about rain, but now it's almost panic."

Soybeans have also been hurt by rain, with crops rotting and sprouting in the fields, Petcher said.

[North Florida, November 11]

Preliminary reports show that Tropical Storm Ida caused or heavily contributed to millions of dollars in losses on Escambia County’s farms.

“Agricultural losses are significant for peanuts, soybeans, hay, and cotton,” said Suzette Cooper, Farm Services Agency. The damage, she said, was not from Ida’s winds, but from four to seven inches of rain in a 12 hour period. That rain only served to further the crop losses from heavy rains in October.
…
“With all of the rain, there is some terrible looking cotton,” according to Libbie Johnson, Escambia County Extension University of Florida IFAS agent. “There is one field I know of on Highway 97 that was so pretty Saturday and Sunday. Some of it was harvested, and now the rest is basically ruined.”

[Mississippi, November 12]

"We're seeing catastrophic losses," Andy Prosser, a spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce, said in a phone interview.

Ida swept in from the Gulf of Mexico into neighboring Alabama on Tuesday. Mississippi was spared a direct hit but still got an unwelcome soaking.

"We got a few counties in east Mississippi that did get a lot of rain. Of course any more rain at this point is not good in terms of crop harvest," Prosser said.

[Arkansas, November 12]

On Nov. 4, Gus Wilson took a sample of soybeans with 100 percent damage.

“It was the first time I’ve seen that,” says the Chicot County, Ark., Extension staff chair. “The situation here is bad, bleak. We’ll be lucky to make half the crop we’ve made in the last three to four years. That’s strictly due to the weather.”

Chicot County in extreme southeast Arkansas has caught huge rains all fall. Now, watching crops deteriorate, Wilson says he’s not seen “a group of growers who’ve been more discouraged. Those who were planning to plant wheat may be out of luck. If there’s wheat planted and emerged in Chicot County, I don’t know where it’s at.”

…
Faced with a seemingly unceasing deluge in 2009, veteran farmers are struggling to come up with a similar year in the past.

“My father is 82 years old and he’s farmed 55 to 60 years,” says Wilson. “He says this is the worst harvest season he’s ever seen. Out of his career, he said only one year comes close — he can’t remember if it was in the late 1950s or early 1960s.

My reaction: 2009 is the worse harvest many farmers have ever seen.

USDA’s latest estimates for the 2009 soybean crop

Don’t worry about all the depressing news above. After all, the USDA increased its estimated 2009 soybean crop to a record-breaking 3.3 billion bushels this month! (HEAVY SARCASM)

Soybeans for Beans: Area Harvested, Yield, and Production by State
and United States, 2008 and Forecasted November 1, 2009
	Production
	1000 bushels
	Prior Years		USDA 2009 Estimates
	2007	2008	Sep	Nov
Alabama	3,885	12,250	16,280	15,910
Arkansas	101,520	123,500	127,300	128,060
Delaware	4,030	5,308	6,768	7,137
Georgia	8,550	12,450	16,320	14,850
Illinois	360,180	427,700	398,200	420,750
Indiana	220,340	244,350	235,640	249,780
Iowa	448,760	444,820	505,960	486,030
Kansas	86,130	120,250	140,000	156,950
Kentucky	30,250	46,920	60,060	64,860
Louisiana	25,800	31,350	35,000	35,890
Maryland	10,725	14,550	18,720	20,425
Michigan	71,600	69,930	75,620	77,610
Minnesota	267,325	264,100	284,000	298,200
Mississippi	58,320	78,400	88,970	77,040
Missouri	175,125	191,140	224,700	233,200
Nebraska	196,350	225,990	237,150	247,000
New Jersey	2,480	2,610	3,150	3,480
New York	7,917	10,396	10,836	10,836
North Carolina	30,360	55,110	59,840	59,840
North Dakota	108,630	105,280	120,000	115,500
Ohio	199,280	161,280	215,260	219,840
Oklahoma	4,680	9,000	8,580	10,360
Pennsylvania	17,630	17,200	20,025	20,915
South Carolina	8,140	16,960	15,930	15,120
South Dakota	136,080	138,040	167,700	172,200
Tennessee	19,190	49,640	62,400	62,730
Texas	3,450	4,920	5,250	4,485
Virginia	13,750	18,240	20,650	21,460
Wisconsin	55,890	55,650	63,570	66,830
Other	750	1,840	1,413	1,982

Total:	2,677,117	2,959,174	3,245,292	3,319,270

Conclusion: There are two possibilities:

1) The USDA numbers above are correct, and drought, colder than normal summers, disease outbreaks, insects infestations, and excessive rainfall are the secret to magically producing record breaking crops. In this case, I suggest we artificially recreate the conditions experienced this year by US farmers so they can continue producing such record crops.

2) The USDA is blatantly lying, and its numbers are miles away from reality.

You decide.

El Niño Wrecks Havok In The US

2009-11-16T14:01:00.000-08:00

The Wauneta Breeze reports that El Niño responsible for cooler than normal summer in Midwest.
(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Warming ocean temps lead to cooler than normal summer for Midwest
Friday, 04 September 2009 20:50
By Tina Kitt
The Wauneta Breeze

This year’s summer weather — cooler and wetter than average — has many scratching their heads and asking “what’s the deal?”

It’s early August and Wauneta still has not hit 100 degrees in 2009, according to official data from the National Weather Service.

The hottest day so far this summer was July 24 when the mercury topped out at 99 degrees. On that day, the high in Imperial was 101 degrees, the only triple-digit high that town has seen this year, according to the NWS.

Similar conditions have dominated statewide, making 2009 one of the “top 10” cool summers on record in Nebraska. For example, Omaha was 4.5 degrees below normal for the month of July, setting a 100-year record, and this weekend Valentine set a record-low for Aug. 1 at 44 degrees, beating the nearly 100-year-old previous record low of 45 degrees set in 1911.
…
Still, there are drawbacks. For farmers whose corn, soybean and sunflower crops went in late due to wet spring conditions — or even worse, had to be replanted due to hail — they are hoping for heat units to catch up to normal as fall approaches.

So what’s behind this unseasonable summer weather?

According to the pros, warming ocean waters have translated into a cooler than normal summer for the northern Great Plains, Upper Midwest and eastern U.S. — as well as record-breaking drought and heat in the southwestern U.S. and the Pacific Northwest region.

Art Douglas, a climatologist who heads the atmospheric sciences department at Creighton University in Omaha, says that an El Niño that began building in late spring can be associated with this year’s wacky weather as jet stream patterns around the world are affected by this phenomenon. El Niño is the periodic warming of tropical Pacific waters that occurs on average every two to five years and typically lasts about 12 months.

El Niño’s impacts depend on a variety of factors, explained Douglas, such as intensity and extent of ocean warming, and the time of year. Its effects include weaker trade winds, increased rainfall over the central tropical Pacific, and decreased rainfall in Indonesia. These vast rainfall patterns in the tropics are responsible for many of El Niño’s effects on global weather patterns.

In early July, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists announced the arrival of 2009’s El Niño and expect it will continue developing during the next several months — with further strengthening possible — and lasting through winter 2009-10. [which explains this fall’s record rain]

Jackson Weather Examiner reports that United States recorded its wettest month of October on record.

United States recorded its wettest month of October on record
November 14, 2:13 PMJackson Weather ExaminerJohnny Kelly

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and based on preliminary data from the National Climatic Data Center, October 2009 was the wettest month of October on record overall across the United States.

The nation averaged precipitation amounts of 4.15 inches, nearly doubled the long-term average of 2.04 inches from 1901-2000.

Over 40 states recorded above average precipitation during the month of October!

(NOAA)

Three states recorded their wettest month of October on record! (Iowa, Arkansas, and Louisiana)

Only 3 states: Florida, Utah, and Arizona recorded below normal precipitation.

Nearly 45 percent of the contiguous United States experienced moderately-to-extremely wet conditions at the end of October, according to the Palmer Index, which is the largest such footprint since February 2005.

The very wet month of October has helped many states along the mid- and Lower Mississippi Valley achieve or near their wettest years on record and has decreased drought overall with only 12 percent of the country experiencing drought conditions, which is the second smallest drought footprint of the decade, according to the NOAA report. (El Nino is the likely cause of extremely wet weather across the South)

The Courier Post Online reports that crop losses staggering on South Jersey farms.

September 26, 2009
Crop losses staggering on South Jersey farms
By WILFORD S. SHAMLIN
Courier-Post Staff

South Jersey farmers are coping with heavy crop losses after steady summer rains saturated fields, creating an environment ripe for overgrown weeds, rot and disease.

The downpours damaged crops, from tomatoes, green bell peppers and corn, to barley, peaches and watermelon, decimating whole crops or severely reducing yield.

"The rains have just killed me this year," said Tucker Gant, 51, a vegetable and fruit farmer in Elk, who estimates his total losses this year at nearly $220,000.

In Mullica Hill, Fred Grasso, 52, said late frost damaged his peaches and rot ran through his tomatoes, green bell peppers, zucchini and watermelon.

"Nobody has ever seen rain as drastic as this year, even talking to old-time farmers," said Grasso, a third-generation farmer who estimates losses so far at roughly $50,000.

Gov. Jon S. Corzine has requested that 15 counties -- including Burlington, Camden and Gloucester -- be declared disaster areas by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture after rain, hail, wind and even a tornado caused crop and property damage across the state, said Lynne Richmond, spokeswoman for the New Jersey Department of Agriculture.

The designation would allow farmers with severe weather-related losses to apply for emergency low-interest loans.

"Weeds are a big issue, especially in a wet year. When it's time to cultivate, you can't and when you finally get in there and cultivate, and it rains day after day, weeds set in and reroot because of the moisture," Grasso said.

Weeds steal nutrients from crops, grow tall and block out sunlight, and prevent plants from drying out after rainfall. And constant rain creates problem because the weeds grow faster and herbicides get washed away before they work.

"It's never been that bad as far as I can remember," said Gant, pointing to water pooling in a field as he drove his pickup truck along a bumpy dirt trail toward 35 acres of barley overrun by tall weeds. "I have never seen water lay there more than two days. It should have been harvested, but you can't harvest weeds taller than barley."

Blueberry and peaches thrived in the wet weather but the same disease responsible for the Irish potato famine attacked South Jersey's tomato crops.

"Farmers' yields will be down this year because a lot of fruit out there wasn't able to be marketed," said Michelle Casella, an agricultural agent for Rutgers Cooperative Extension for Gloucester County.

This year's hay crop was such poor quality that Gant marked down the price for landscapers, making 25 cents profit per bale rather than $1.50.

Though struggling, Gant and Grasso are bent on persevering as operating costs continue to climb.

Gant's losses include $30,000 on bales of straw for mom-and-pop stores that order 15,000 bales and sell it as decoration during the holidays. He grew enough straw to make 10,000 bales but he had to buy the remaining 5,000 bales from a neighboring farmer.

Crop losses have cut into profits that the Gant and the Grasso family normally would have invested back into the farm.

"We have cut every corner we can without hurting the business itself," Grasso said. "We're at just about the limit where we can't cut back anymore. I'm trying to conserve."

Gant said he has depleted his retirement savings and supplements his income by working three days a week repairing tractor-trailers. He often works 16-hour days on the farm. His wife also works full-time.

He has trimmed unnecessary expenses, postponed farm equipment upgrades, and criticizes the federal government for coming to the aid of car dealers and other big businesses, but not farmers.

"Where's the bailout for farmers?" Gant asked.

"When everything went into the toilet, my costs didn't go down one bit," Gant said.

Gant said he would need a $250,000 loan to bail out his farm.

My reaction: El Niño is the culprit for all the strange weather we have been having in the US this year.

Goldman Sach Doing "God's Work"

2009-11-15T20:58:00.000-08:00

The Times Live reports that Goldman Sach is doing "god's work".

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Inside the gold mine
For CEO Blankfein it comes down to one thing: finding the best way to make money with money, then make some more money, with money on top
Nov 8, 2009 12:13 AM By - © The Sunday Times, London

-------

The men and women of Goldman Sachs are in line to take a share of $20-billion pay-and-bonus package. And their boss says it's because they're doing God's work. How do they get away with it. John Arlidge gains unprecedented access to the world's most secretive bank.

-------

'A great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money'

…
Number 85 Broad Street is the home of Goldman Sachs.

The world's most successful investment bank likes to hide behind the tidal wave of money it generates and sends crashing over Manhattan and most of the world's other financial capitals. But now the dark knights of banking are being forced, blinking, into the cold light of day. The public, politicians and the press blame bankers' reckless trading for the credit crunch and, as the most successful bank still standing, Goldman is their prime target.

Politicians and commentators compete to denounce Goldman, contrasting the bank's recent record results - profits of $3.2-billion in the last quarter alone - and its planned bumper bonus payments with what has happened to ordinary people's jobs and incomes in 2009.

Rolling Stone magazine ran a story that described Goldman as "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money".

Goldman's reputation is suddenly as toxic as the exotic financial instruments it used to buy with glee. That's bad for the one thing it values more than anything else: business.

So it has, reluctantly, decided that the time has come to speak out, to fight its corner. That's how, on a bright autumnal New York morning, I find myself walking past the security guard and into the building with no name.

…
But what about the charge sheet? Bankers brought the world to the brink of bankruptcy, and, instead of doing the decent thing and jumping out of the nearest window [I like this guy’s sense of humor], they turned up cap in hand to governments to vacuum up taxpayers' money.

Now, just one year on, they are carrying on as if nothing has happened, gambling, and winning, handsomely, with our cash.

Goldman is coining it again for two reasons. First, global markets are booming - up 50% from the credit-crunch lows, as new money, much of it from governments, has gushed into the financial system. Second, with Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns off the street, Merrill Lynch a crippled shadow of its former self, and neither Citigroup nor UBS the forces of old, Goldman has a bigger slice of a growing pie.

"We didn't f*** up like the other guys. So, now we've got a bigger and richer pot to piss in," is how one Goldman banker puts it. Small wonder the bank is on course to set aside over $20-billion for salaries and bonuses.

'You should be happy'

So far, so lucrative. But isn't it simply unfair? Isn't Goldman acting as the modern equivalent of a war-time profiteer? Even the veteran financier George Soros says the big profits made by Wall Street banks are "hidden gifts" from the state.

Blankfein dismisses any suggestion that Goldman needed to be bailed out, and, by extension, rejects any notion that the firm is now profiting from public support. Sure, he took $10-billion from Washington's Troubled Asset Relief Program. But the bank has since repaid the cash, with healthy interest - 23%. Goldman also benefited from the federal bail-out of the huge US insurance firm AIG and, at the height of the crisis, the Federal Reserve broke with an 80-year-old tradition and let Goldman turn itself from a pure investment bank into a bank holding company. This meant it could borrow funds at the same cheap rate as commercial banks for as long as it wanted. Blankfein says Goldman changed status not for the money, but because it had become clear, following the collapse of Bear Stearns and Lehman, that the market had lost faith in the ability of the US Securities and Exchange Commission to regulate investment banks. Being regulated by the central bank, the Federal Reserve, would help to restore confidence in the financial system as a whole.

Whatever the truth behind the bail-out, not even the smartest Goldmanite can deny that it is only thanks to government aid that the bank still has a financial system to work with.

Does Blankfein not acknowledge that it is maddening for most of us to watch Goldman gobble up so much cash while we struggle? Quite the opposite. He insists we should be celebrating his bank's success, not condemning it. "Everybody should be, frankly, happy," he says. Can he be serious? Deadly. Goldman's performance, he argues, is the firmest indication of a nascent economic recovery that will benefit not just him and his firm but all of us. "The financial system led us into the crisis and it will lead us out."

Blankfein goes on to say something equally audacious. We should welcome the return of titanic paydays at Goldman. Goldman is exempt from President Barack Obama's cap on bonuses because it has paid back bail-out cash.

"You will see a complete correlation throughout our history of having remuneration match performance over the long term. Others made no money and still paid large bonuses. Some are not around any more. I wonder why."

Okay, forget bail-outs, forget bonuses, forget all the money stuff, if you can. Surely Blankfein cannot dodge the playwright David Hare? Through his latest work, The Power of Yes, which tackles the issue of the credit crunch, Hare argues that it is "blackmail" to say that there cannot be a recovery unless we let bankers get on with what they have always done and pay themselves squillions.

The special sauce

Blankfein has no time for such soft talk. "I've got news for you," he shoots back, eyes narrowing. "If the financial system goes down, our business is going down and, trust me, yours and everyone else's is going down, too." [Translation: when Goldman Sach goes down, it will try to drag as many people as it can with it.]
…
So, it's business as usual, then, regardless of whether it makes most people howl at the moon with rage? An impish grin spreads across Blankfein's face. Call him a fat cat who mocks the public. Call him wicked. Call him what you will. He is, he says, just a banker "doing God's work".

My reaction: I have already made an entry on Goldman Sachs Arrogance, but still… Wow. Goldman CEO Blankfein has the gall to say "Everybody should be, frankly, happy," with the bank’s success (and massive bonuses) because it is "doing God's work".

As the True Slant blog put it, “It’s like Blankfein wants to be attacked by a ferocious mob.”

Farmers Scramble To Finish Harvest From Hell

2009-11-15T02:23:00.000-08:00

Farmers reports that farmers scramble to finish harvest from hell.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Farmers scramble to finish harvest from hell
Fri Nov 13, 2009 2:07pm EST
By Julie Ingwersen

MARENGO, Illinois (Reuters) - Brothers Steve and Ron Pierce spent most of an hour in a chilly northern Illinois field last week clearing a clog of soybean chaff from the guts of their combine, using a mix of tools and their bare hands.

"The beans get tough when they pick up moisture," Steve Pierce said.

The clog had idled the $260,000 harvester, another delay in what has been the harvest from hell across the U.S. Midwest corn and soybean belt.

The clock is ticking on farmers like the Pierce brothers all across the Midwest as they scramble to bring in the largest U.S. soybean crop on record and the second-largest corn crop before winter arrives.
…
The United States produces 40 percent of the global corn crop and 35 percent of all soybeans, and is the leading exporter of both commodities. [This should make clear why the USDA’s estimates have such a big impact on the market]

…
QUALITY PROBLEMS

Despite the delays, ~~yields have been strong, and~~ the U.S. Agriculture Department this week projected the largest U.S. soy crop on record, at 3.3 billion bushels, and the second-largest corn crop at 12.9 billion bushels. [Pure propaganda with no basis in reality]

Livestock producers and other grain end-users may face higher-than-normal costs as the harvest drags on, but U.S. food costs probably won't be affected.

"It was probably reassuring from a consumer standpoint that yesterday's USDA reports did not really change the size of the crop from previous estimates," Westhoff said.

Still, all the wet weather has caused widespread quality problems including mold and diseases. Also, crops all across the Midwest are higher in moisture than normal, creating harvest glitches like the Pierce brothers' clogged combine.

…
"I've been doing this for 30 years and I've never seen a year like this," said Ron Waldschmidt, a vice president with farm equipment dealer A.C. McCartney in Wataga, Illinois.

"It's not unusual in any given year to have wet conditions, or maybe a variety that tends to mold, or maybe the moisture is a little bit high. But this year, you've got it all," he said.

The 2009 harvest is the slowest in past 25 years

The Cattle Network asks that has it stopped raining yet?

Has It Stopped Raining Yet? [Answer: No. see story below]
11/12/2009 10:31AM

Weather has been the big story for October. Between the freezing temperatures, early snow, and the steady flow of storms across the state, Iowa crop producers have not enjoyed the last month. The late maturing crop faced a freeze that was about a week earlier than average. Areas of the state were blanketed by the 1^st measurable snowfall of the season, well before average. Typically in October, Iowa receives on average 2.5 inches of precipitation. In 2009, precipitation levels ranged from 4 to 8 inches in the month. This combination of weather has brought production expectations and delayed harvest progress. Figure 1 shows harvest progress for U.S. and Iowa corn and soybeans and compares this year’s progress with the year of the slowest harvest between 1985 and 2008. As the graphs show, the 2009 harvest in the U.S. is the slowest of the past 25 years. The story is similar for Iowa crops. The corn harvest is behind the previous slowest year (2008), while the soybean harvest is just ahead of the pace in 1985. Hopefully, conditions will improve, allowing fields and crops to dry out and combines to roll.

.

More Wet Weather for Midwest.

Martell Crop Projections reports that wetter forecast for Midwest.

Wetter Forecast for Midwest
Update Wednesday noon November 11

The latest GFS model run looks wetter and more threatening for harvesting delays in the heart of the Midwest Corn Belt beginning Saturday and continuing through Monday.

A low pressure trough developing in the Central Plains Saturday will spread a swath of heavy moisture into the Western Corn Belt. Rainfall was supposed to be scattered and very light with a fast moving front based on the previous guidance from the GFS model. Instead, a broad area of rain will develop from Kansas and Nebraska into Iowa, Missouri and Illinois. Moderate rainfall .25 to .75 inch is possible by Sunday morning.

A large, slow moving storm will develop in the US midsection producing heavy rain on Sunday and Monday on Midwest corn and soybean farms. As the storm creeps eastward, it taps into a rich supply of Gulf moisture producing heavy rain potential in Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois. Indiana and Ohio are expecting moderate rainfall as the storm churns west of the Mississippi Valley.

Originally the Mid South was targeted for the heaviest rainfall but the storm track has been adjusted northward, affecting more corn and soybean farms in the Midwest. Below is a look at 4-week rainfall accumulations ending November 7. The same states that were very wet in the recent 4 weeks also stand to get heavy rainfall on the weekend, Iowa, Nebraska, Illinois and Missouri.

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Iowa farmers are questioning USDA's estimates.

Qctimes.com reports that some Iowa farmers are questioning USDA's estimates.

With the growing season so poor and the harvest coming so late, some farmers are questioning whether this year’s corn and soybean crops will meet the USDA’s estimates. [The USDA's estimates are pure fiction]
…
Mueller said he questions whether the 2009 estimates can be achieved.

“The problem is with the quality,” he said.
…
Miller said that based on what he sees in the field, beans are slightly below expectations, but corn will be well below expectations.

Corn is already indicating a low test weight, he said, because the actual kernel of corn did not finish correctly because of the cool summer and fall.

Test weights have been around 54 pounds of corn per bushel, Miller said, adding that 60 pounds per bushel is good.

“You need a lot more bushels to get the same amount of corn,” he said, adding that he thinks the USDA estimates will change. “If we had gotten the heat units we needed, it would have been a giant harvest.”

Catastrophic crop losses in Mississippi and Arkansas

Reuters reports that Mississippi sees "catastrophic" crop losses.

Mississippi sees "catastrophic" crop losses
Thu Nov 12, 2009 2:00pm EST

MIAMI (Reuters) - Rain from Tropical Storm Ida further slowed the cotton, soybean and sweet potato harvest in Mississippi, where crop losses were devastating even before the storm hit, a state agriculture official said on Thursday.

"We're seeing catastrophic losses," Andy Prosser, a spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce, said in a phone interview.

Ida swept in from the Gulf of Mexico into neighboring Alabama on Tuesday. Mississippi was spared a direct hit but still got an unwelcome soaking.

"We got a few counties in east Mississippi that did get a lot of rain. Of course any more rain at this point is not good in terms of crop harvest," Prosser said.

At the start of the month, state economists estimated Mississippi's crop losses at $485 million. The southern U.S. state expected to lose two-thirds of its sweet potato crop, half its cotton and 44 percent of its soybeans.

Spring rains delayed planting, while record rainfall in September and October cut yields and quality, the agriculture department said.

Mississippi cotton growers traditionally harvest 95 percent of their crop by November 1 but this year the month started with only 14 percent harvested.

"A lot of the cotton producers, before this last rain, were trying to get their crop out of the field at any cost but the quality is still not very good," Prosser said.

Texas is the top cotton producing U.S. state, while Georgia and Mississippi alternate for second place.

Mississippi's sweet potatoes, a tradition at Thanksgiving holiday meals, were heavily damaged.

About 25 percent of Mississippi's soybeans are still in the field, Prosser said.

"In terms of yield, those soybeans have been average to good yields, however the quality of the beans has turned out to be very bad," he said.

Delta Farm Press reports that Arkansas would be lucky to make ‘half the crop'.

Soybeans: ‘half the crop’
Nov 12, 2009 10:37 AM, By David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff

On Nov. 4, Gus Wilson took a sample of soybeans with 100 percent damage.

“It was the first time I’ve seen that,” says the Chicot County, Ark., Extension staff chair. “The situation here is bad, bleak. We’ll be lucky to make half the crop we’ve made in the last three to four years. That’s strictly due to the weather.”

Chicot County in extreme southeast Arkansas has caught huge rains all fall. Now, watching crops deteriorate, Wilson says he’s not seen “a group of growers who’ve been more discouraged. Those who were planning to plant wheat may be out of luck. If there’s wheat planted and emerged in Chicot County, I don’t know where it’s at.”

As in the rest of the Mid-South, the county has had several good days of weather. But fields “are rutting up big-time. The cost to our farmers for field preparation next year is going to be high. Rice ground will definitely have be disked a couple of times and landplaned — we’ve got major ruts. The lower ends of fields are horrible.

“People are getting stuck, left and right. This heavy buckshot is just at the right doughy stage where it wants to stick and not shed.

“We have lost some crops already and there’s still water backed up. There will be parts of fields abandoned.”
…
Plunkett says area elevators are “looking closely at what they accept. Around here, I think they’ll go up to about 20 percent dockage. So far, the bad bean situations have been running in the 15 percent dockage range. Some may be a little higher than that.”
…
Back in Chicot County, Wilson says the early corn harvested “was okay. I’d estimate that, compared to the last two years, we were down to 35 to 45 bushels per acre [for corn]. That was because of the spring rains.”

Faced with a seemingly unceasing deluge in 2009, veteran farmers are struggling to come up with a similar year in the past.

“My father is 82 years old and he’s farmed 55 to 60 years,” says Wilson. “He says this is the worst harvest season he’s ever seen. Out of his career, he said only one year comes close — he can’t remember if it was in the late 1950s or early 1960s.

“It’s awful. I’m hearing, ‘I won’t be able to pay my bills.’ I hope that doesn’t mean there will be any bankruptcies. Hopefully, there will be a disaster payment, a direct payment from the feds.”

Soybeans production for Arkansas and Mississippi

Anyone who can't see what is wrong with the numbers below is blind.

	Soybean Production
	1000 bushels
	Prior Years		USDA 2009 Estimates
	2007	2008	Sep	Nov
Arkansas	101,520	123,500	127,300	128,060
Mississippi	58,320	78,400	88,970	77,040

My reaction: Farmers are scrambling to finish harvest from hell as more wet weather approaches.

At this point, is there anyone reading this blog that still believes in the USDA? Do I really need to explain how insane the USDA’s estimate for Arkansas and Mississippi are?

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As I have stated before, gold and agricultural land/commodities will be the best performers over the next year. This is why I am starting a fund to invest in Russian agricultural land.

I am organizing a trip to visit Black Earth farmland in Russia. Please email me for more information.

Maine And New York Farmers Facing Disaster

2009-11-14T15:19:00.000-08:00

Maine Today reports that Maine's farmers couldn't come up with a worse situation in their worst dreams.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Rain washing away farmers' hopes for harvesting hay, corn
As milk prices plunge, many dairy farmers face the added financial burden of having to buy feed.
By SHARON KILEY MACK Bangor Daily News July 25, 2009

[Maine]

CLINTON — Farmers are watching their hay crops being ruined and their feed corn shrivel as rain continues to plague Maine's farming industry.

"Everything is just devastated," Dr. Rick Kersbergen of the Waldo County Cooperative Extension said Friday.

Kersbergen is a grass and fodder crop expert and maintains the state "hay directory" for producers looking to market their hay and for livestock farmers looking to purchase hay.

Hay and corn in the fields are at the stage they would be at the end of June. "But it's the end of July," Kersbergen said.

"Farmers are now looking to out-of-state suppliers because there is no hay out there for sale at this point," he said. "The farmers are scared."

This has been a bad year for dairy farmers: Milk prices have plummeted and rain has prevented them from getting onto their fields to harvest hay. Fertilizer they applied simply washed away in the rain.

The longer hay grows without a cutting, the poorer the nutritional quality and the more money farmers will spend this winter to supplement it. Cornfields are rotting without enough sun or heat to ripen the plants.

"The season is lost," Julie Marie Bickford of the Maine Dairy Industry Association said Friday. "With milk prices so low and this feed disaster on top of it, farmers are like deer in the headlights."

As bad as the feed shortage is for dairy farms, she said, the horse industry is in even worse straits. "Dairy farmers may be able to salvage some round bales, but those who use dry hay, like the horse industry, are worse off. This crisis hurts beyond just dairy."

Hay and corn are critical components of livestock feed, Bickford said. "This stunted corn and alfalfa is forcing farmers to purchase grain and feeds. That is a very bad situation. Prices are extremely high because of the Midwest floods earlier this year. Maine's farmers couldn't come up with a worse situation in their worst dreams."

On Thursday, a 75-year-old former dairy farmer visited the Wright Place in Clinton. He recalled delivering glass bottles of milk and told Brian Wright that he never remembered a rainier summer.

"This is unreal," Wright said. He cut back from 700 acres of feed corn to 600 acres to trim his budget this year, and now he may not get to harvest much of that.

"All the nutrients have washed away. That corn is not looking well," he said. "It's a double whammy: the low price of milk and now this rain."

Herkimer Telegram reports that dairy farmers want answers from politicians.

Dairy farmers want answers from politicians
By David Robinson
Evening Telegram
Fri Aug 14, 2009, 08:13 PM EDT

[New York]

WEST WINFIELD - A panel of political representatives and aides sat for over three hours at a rally Friday in Mount Markham Middle School gym as over 200 upstate New York dairy farmers pleaded for action on a range of issues crippling their industry.

One after another dairy farmers and others involved in the industry took a microphone to berate county, state and federal representatives from throughout the region.

Some were brought to tears describing their inability to make a living, a few simply screamed in frustration and others demanded answers. But the dire situation facing the men and women speaking was painfully clear.

“We are in a disaster,” declared Ken Dibbell, of Chenango County.

Everything from free trade to transportation costs were mentioned as contributing factors, though a discrepancy between production costs and pricing was at the forefront.

The cost per hundredweight of milk is at $12 based on current pricing formula, according to rally organizers from Progressive Agriculture Organization.

A pricing floor that could maintain the farmers is at least $18, Arden Tewksbury, from Pennsylvania and manager of Pro-Ag. Moreover, Pro-Ag is advocating for federal legislation that would raise the price to $22.46, he added.

Upwards of 15 in attendance provided personal accounts of a daily struggle to provide for their families.

“The people who feed the nation can’t feed themselves,” Gretchen Maine, a dairy farmer from Waterville, “what’s wrong this picture.”

Tewksbury presented the bill backed by Pro-Ag, which Pennsylvania’s Senators Arlen Specter and Bill Casey introduced, as “the answer.” He urged the dairy farmers to get behind the bill, which raised and better regulated milk prices in the future.

The state commissioner of Agriculture, Patrick Hooker, said there’s no way the legislation will pass before 2010, however. And “it’s going to be a long shot,” he added.

Hooker proposed an amendment to appropriations that called for $350 million for the dairy industry as “the only game in town.” Having already passed the Senate, it still needs to pass Congress, he explained; and the funds could provide more immediate relief by the fall.

The time frames for both solutions seemed in contrast from farmers need for help, with many emotionally explaining they have either already abandon businesses or are on the brink.

“I don’t think they get the message yet,” Tewksbury said, referring politicians unaware of the uncharacteristic display of emotions from prideful farmers. They don’t have until 2010. They have the next couple of months to decide if they can stay in business, he said.

Syracuse.com reports that central New York counties named to ag disaster area.

Central New York counties named to ag disaster area
By Debra J. Groom / The Post-Standard
October 22, 2009, 12:49PM

The U.S. Department of Agriculture Farm Service Agency has designated Oswego, Dutchess, Lewis, Monroe, Ontario, Otsego, Seneca, Suffolk, Ulster, Washington and Wayne counties as ag disaster areas due to excessive rain and hail on May 1 and beyond.

Also named in the declaration because they are contiguous counties are Cayuga, Onondaga, Madison, Oneida, Chenango, Columbia, Delaware, Essex, Genesee, Greene, Herkimer, Jefferson, Livingston, Montgomery, Nassau, Orange, Orleans, Putnam, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Schoharie, Schuyler, St. Lawrence, Steuben, Sullivan, Tompkins, Warren and Yates counties.

All counties listed above were designated natural disaster areas Oct. 19, making all qualified farm operators in the designated areas eligible for low-interest emergency loans from the Farm Service Agency.

I have updated yesterday’s graphic showing counties designated as disaster areas by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (data from the USDA. See http://www.fema.gov/dhsusda/searchState.do). As you can see, the entire State of Maine and most of New York have been declared agricultural disaster areas.

(Click on image to see full size)

My reaction: It isn’t just Midwest farmers who are in trouble. The situation is pretty depressing.

USDA Declares Half Of Midwest As Agricultural Disaster Area

2009-11-13T21:03:00.000-08:00

The graphic below shows counties designated as disaster areas by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (data from the USDA. See http://www.fema.gov/dhsusda/searchState.do). It speaks for itself.

(Click on image to see full size)

Recent USDA Disaster Declarations

Southwest Farm Press reports that counties in Kansas designated as disaster areas.

(emphasis mine) [my comment]

Counties in Kansas designated as disaster areas
Nov 12, 2009 9:52 AM

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has designated Cheyenne, Rice and Sherman counties in Kansas as primary natural disaster areas because of losses caused by high winds and hail that occurred from July 17, through September 3, 2009.

"President Obama and I understand these conditions caused severe damage to the area and serious harm to farms in Kansas and we want to help," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "This action will provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to corn, dry beans, sorghum, soybeans, sunflowers and wheat, as well as grasses and forage."

The Farm Service Agency reports that USDA Designates 10 Counties in South Dakota as Primary Natural Disaster Areas.

USDA Designates 10 Counties in South Dakota as Primary Natural Disaster Areas
Decision Allows Farmers and Ranchers to Apply for USDA Assistance

WASHINGTON, Oct. 16, 2009 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture designated 10 counties in South Dakota as primary natural disaster areas because of losses caused by the combined effects of severe storms with hail, high winds, flooding and grasshopper infestations, which occurred during the period of Jan.1,2009, and continuing. The ten counties designated are Aurora, Brown, Custer, Fall River, Gregory, Hutchinson, Jackson, Marshall, Mellette and Yankton.

“President Obama and I understand these conditions caused severe damage to the area and serious harm to the farms in South Dakota and we want to help,” said Secretary Tom Vilsack. “This action will provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to forage and pasture, corn, oats, sorghum, soybeans, sunflowers and wheat.”

Farm And Ranch Guide reports that six northern Minnesota counties designed ag disaster area.

Six northern Minnesota counties designed ag disaster area
By USDA
Monday, October 12, 2009 9:49 AM CDT

On Oct. 8, the USDA named six counties in northern Minnesota as primary natural disaster areas. Those counties, Kittson, Koohiching, Lake of the Woods, Marshall, Pennington and Roseau, were named because of losses caused by the combined effects of excessive snow, rain, flooding, flash flooding and unseasonably cool temperatures, as well as frost and freezes that occurred from April 1, 2009 through June 30, 2009.

In making the announcement, USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack said, “President Obama and I understand there conditions caused by severe damage to the area and serious harm to the farms in Minnesota and we want to help. This action will provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to alfalfa, barley, canola, corn, oats, rye, soybeans, sunflowers, wheat and forage crops.”

Chron reports that New Mexico counties declared disaster areas.

NM counties eligible for disaster aid
© 2009 The Associated Press
Nov. 4, 2009, 8:25AM

CLOVIS, N.M. — Four eastern New Mexico counties have been declared eligible for disaster assistance due to their proximity to Texas counties that are disaster areas due to drought and other problems.

Farmers and ranchers in Lea, Curry, Quay and Roosevelt counties can apply for low-interest emergency loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Farm Service Agency.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., says farmers and ranchers of the four counties have been economically affected by severe weather this year.

The Daily News Online reports that 39 upstate counties named disaster areas in Michigan.

Genesee and Orleans named disaster counties
Tuesday, October 27, 2009 10:14 AM EDT

Farmers in Genesee and Orleans counties may be eligible for low-interest government loans due to excessive rain and hail that hit beginning May 1, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced.

Genesee and Orleans are among 39 upstate counties [in Michigan] named to a disaster assistance list released last week by the USDA.

The counties were named due to natural disasters that damaged crops. Farmers in eligible counties have until June 21, 2010, to apply for loans to help cover part of their actual losses. The federal farm Service Agency will consider each loan application on its own merits, taking into account the extent of losses, security available and repayment ability.

Stltoday.com reports that Missouri farmers to get disaster aid.

Missouri farmers to get disaster aid
10/23/2009

JEFFERSON CITY > FARMERS TO GET DISASTER AID Farmers in about two-thirds of Missouri's counties, including St. Charles and Franklin, may be eligible for aid because of a federal disaster declaration for water and wind damage. Gov. Jay Nixon said Thursday that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has declared a disaster as a result of rain, winds and flooding that occurred between Feb. 1 and July 31. Farmers may qualify for federal emergency loans or payments. The agricultural disaster declaration covers 28 primary counties, plus 47 counties located next to them.

The Quad-City Times reports that disaster declaration includes Iowa's Jackson county.

Disaster declaration includes Iowa's Jackson County
Rod Boshart Posted: Tuesday, September 1, 2009 2:00 am

DES MOINES - U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack declared 22 Iowa counties, including Jackson County, as disaster areas Monday due to storm damage earlier this year.

Earlier this month, Gov. Chet Culver asked Vilsack is issue a secretarial disaster designation after damage to plants and significant production losses due to severe storms between May 15 and July 31.

The declarations were made after assessments on crop and agriculture losses were done throughout Iowa [See this? The USDA VERIFIED the damage to Iowa’s crops]. Declarations are still pending for several Iowa counties not covered by Monday's announcement, but may be added at a later date.

The Star-telegram reports that wet weather delays harvest from midwest to south.

Wet weather delays harvest from Midwest to South
Posted Thursday, Nov. 05, 2009
By BECKY BOHRER

Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS — And most will need "significant" help, either from the government or another source, to get financing for 2010, he said.

Low-interest loans or other aid may be available to farmers in the handful of Louisiana parishes and Mississippi counties that have been declared federal disaster areas due to late spring and early summer flooding, but state officials are seeking additional help for those affected by the drought and subsequent rains.

"More than ever, Louisiana producers are in need of disaster funds," state Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain said.

My reaction: The USDA has declared half of the Midwest to be an agricultural disaster area, which leads to some interesting questions.

Why is the USDA is predicting the biggest soybean crop ever, while at the same time declaring that half the Midwest to have suffered “significant production losses” due to natural disasters? Isn't that slightly contradictory?

Trip To Visit Black Earth Farmland In Russia

2009-11-12T08:15:00.000-08:00

This is a quick entry to:

1) Let everyone know that I am organizing a trip to visit Black Earth farmland in Russia
2) Promote Regia Russia Agro Investment Ltd (the fund I launched to invest in Russian agriculture).
3) Highlight that now is the time to invest in agriculture
4) Announce that I am lowering the minimum subscription for Regia Russia Agro Investment Ltd.

1) *****Trip To Visit Black Earth Farmland In Russia*****

I am organizing a trip to visit Black Earth farmland in Russia. So far, at least 5 people are coming on trip. Please Email me if you are interested.

Dates for Russia trip

The plan is for investors to arrive in Moscow on the Saturday December 5 and leave Russia on Friday December 11. We will visit Black Earth farmland in the middle of the week (December 8^th and 9^th).

2) Regia is the only Russia Ag fund aimed at retail investors

When I became bullish on Russian agriculture in May 2009 and looked for an investment that I could recommend on my blog, I was surprised to discover that there are no "quality" funds for small investors. Instead, there were only a couple of institutional funds where the lowest minimum investment was at least a million dollars, out of reach for 99.999% of my readers.

At the time I thought, “This is a waste,” and decided to, if there was enough interest, start a fund to create an investment alternative for retail investors.

Today, Regia Russia Agro Investment Ltd is up and running and receiving subscriptions from international investors (Please Email me for a copy of PPM). For U.S. investors, a US Domestic LLC (ie: Regia Russia Agro Investment LLC) is being set up as a feeder fund (which should be ready before the end of November).

3) Now is the time to invest in agriculture

As I have been writing about for a while, the world is facing a food shortage and dollar collapse in 2009/10, both of which are bullish for agriculture. Right now, Black Earth farmland (ultra-fertile agricultural land found in Russia and Ukraine) is available at $270 per acre, less than a tenth of what comparable land sells for in the US and Europe. Now is the time to invest to take advantage of this amazing investment opportunity.

There is a delay of around one month between the time that Regia Russia Agro Investment Ltd receives subscriptions and when Black Earth farmland can be acquired (negations to acquire land can’t begin without first having the funds). When the global food shortage becomes really obvious (December/January timeframe), a panic will begin and money will pour into agriculture (and out of the dollar) around the world, very quickly raising prices. To maximize returns on an investment in agriculture, it is key to invest now while the market is still calm (ie: before dollar/food panic).

4) Lowering Minimum Subscription

As a result of gold’s recent appreciation, the minimum subscription amount is being lowered to 3000 grams of gold (1 gram of gold per share), which is about $106,500 right now ($35.5 per gram). As gold continues to appreciate, the minimum investment will be lowered as appropriate.

Under compelling circumstances, the minimum subscription amount can be waived for international investors.

There is a 10% discount to the Offering Price (.9 grams of gold per share) for first 100,000 gram of gold invested in fund.

Please Email me for a copy of PPM.

Goldmoney

Regia Russia Agro Investment Ltd is using Goldmoney to receive subscriptions. GoldMoney is a digital gold currency founded in 2001 by James Turk which allows the instant transfer of gold, silver and platinum between user holdings.

Here is the link for opening a Goldmoney account. The process is simple and transparent.

Market Skeptics

Mainstream Waking Up To Miserable 2009 Harvest

Abnormal Weather Across The Midwest

Hail Ravages Iowa In 2009

Dynamics For Disaster In Agricultural Markets

Britain Risks 'Debt Spiral'

Fed Buys Another 71 Billion Mortgage-backed Securities

49 mn Americans food insecure: USDA study

USDA Designates Mississippi As Disaster Area

China Plans To Drop Dollar Peg to Slow Inflation

"The stimulus is working" (humor)

*****Worst Harvest Season Ever Seen*****

El Niño Wrecks Havok In The US

Goldman Sach Doing "God's Work"

Farmers Scramble To Finish Harvest From Hell

*****Maine And New York Farmers Facing Disaster*****

*****USDA Declares Half Of Midwest As Agricultural Disaster Area*****

*****Trip To Visit Black Earth Farmland In Russia*****

Worst Harvest Season Ever Seen

Maine And New York Farmers Facing Disaster

USDA Declares Half Of Midwest As Agricultural Disaster Area

Trip To Visit Black Earth Farmland In Russia