Author: staff

Today, at USDA’s 101st annual Agricultural Outlook Forum, the agency released the 2025/2026 Grains and Oilseeds Outlook. The outlook pegged U.S. corn and wheat acres higher year-over-year while soybean acres were expected to decrease. The outlook assumed normal weather conditions.  Combined, USDA estimated U.S. farmers will plant 225 million acres of corn, soybeans, and wheat, up less than 1% from the previous crop year. Corn  In the report, USDA attributed corn’s boosted acres to “favorable prices relative to competing crops such as soybeans, cotton, and sorghum.”    2024/2025 Planted Acres  2025/2026 Planted Acres Projection  Corn  90.6 million  94 million “The…

DAILY Bites Dairy farmers averaged only 6 hours and 15 minutes of sleep per night during peak calving season, below the recommended 7–9 hours. Despite expectations, once-a-day milking did not significantly improve sleep duration due to additional farm tasks. High heart rate data indicated increased physiological stress, raising concerns about health and safety risks. DAILY Discussion Dairy farming is a physically demanding profession with long hours and early start times, particularly during the high-workload spring calving season. Sleep deprivation has well-documented consequences, including increased risk of accidents and negative health effects, yet little quantitative data exists on how much sleep…

The 2024-25 National FFA Officer Team recently returned from the National FFA Officers International Experience Program in Japan, where they experienced Japanese culture and agriculture in partnership with the sister organization Future Farmers of Japan. This annual trip allows National FFA Officers to experience firsthand how agriculture transcends geographical boundaries and strengthens a partnership that dates back to 1950. The NOIEP develops the national officers’ language skills, business practices, and communication techniques to build cross-cultural cooperation while providing an opportunity for them to practice peer leadership on an international scale, explore the complexities and implications of agriculture as part of…

According to data compiled by the Successful Farming team, more than 5,400 acres of Nebraska farmland are set to be auctioned in March 2025. Listings range from single tracts of 20.5 acres to two auctions of over 1,100 acres. Here’s a closer look at the farmland expected to change hands across 12 Nebraska counties. Garden County Agri Affiliates The largest Nebraska farmland auction is set to take place in Garden County where a single tract of 1,264 acres will be available in an online-only auction that runs from March 11–12, 2025.  Agri Affiliates will handle the auction on behalf of…

As the 2025 corn planting season gets underway in Texas, corn growers in the state are facing drastically different planting conditions depending on their operation’s location.  Planting Progress Put on Pause in the Coastal Bend Colin Chopelas, a corn grower in Mathis, Texas, said he was able to get started planting his corn crop in mid-February, however freezing overnight temperatures towards the end of the month put a pause on planting progress.  The corn that Chopelas was able to get into the ground managed to emerge prior to the freezing conditions that initially brought planting progress to a halt. Chopelas…

If you take a drive through America’s Corn Belt in mid-summer, you’ll see endless fields of maize stretching to the horizon, each plant standing tall like a miniature green skyscraper. These plants owe much of their success to nitrogen — a nutrient as critical to their growth as oxygen is to ours. In most cases, that nitrogen comes from synthetic fertilizers, but what if there was a way to supplement or even replace some of it using nature’s own microscopic chemists? A 2024 study published in Agronomy Journal explored that possibility, evaluating whether nitrogen-fixing bacteria could step in to help…

Just before 9:00 a.m. CT, May corn was down 6¢ at $4.87½¢ per bushel. May soybeans were 4¢ stronger at $10.45¼¢ per bushel. Jamey Kohake, Senior Risk Manager with Pinion said, “Really, the big news is from the [USDA Agricultural Outlook Forum], 94 million corn acres are expected to be planted. Corn was trading sharply lower off of it.” May wheat contracts saw a sharp decrease at the open. CBOT wheat was down 10¾¢ at $5.69 per bushel. KC wheat dropped 10¢ at $5.88½¢ per bushel. Minneapolis wheat was 6¢ lower at $6.11¾¢ per bushel.  Livestock saw mixed trade in…

DAILY Bites Agricultural commodity trading is stabilizing, with a 25 percent drop in value pools as inventories return to normal and volatility declines. Despite compressed margins in 2024, long-term projections show steady growth, with trading value pools expected to reach $115 billion EBIT by 2030. Traders must adapt by refining risk management, leveraging data analytics, and investing in emerging sectors like biofuels and ag technology. DAILY Discussion Commodity trading has entered a period of normalization following the exceptional profit margins of recent years. In agriculture, a 25 percent drop in trading value pools year over year reflects a return to…

As the 2025 corn planting season gets underway in Texas, corn growers in the state are facing drastically different planting conditions depending on their operation’s location.  Planting Progress Put on Pause in the Coastal Bend Colin Chopelas, a corn grower in Mathis, Texas, said he was able to get started planting his corn crop in mid-February, however freezing overnight temperatures towards the end of the month put a pause on planting progress.  The corn that Chopelas was able to get into the ground managed to emerge prior to the freezing conditions that initially brought planting progress to a halt. Chopelas…

By Scott Irwin The operational efficiency of any industry is key to long-term profitability, no less so for the U.S. ethanol industry. Fortunately, the USDA began publishing the Grain Crushings and Co-Products Production report in October 2014 and this important data source allows us to examine trends in key industry efficiency measures, including gallons of ethanol per bushel of corn, pounds of dried distillers grain with solubles (DDGS) per bushel of corn, and pounds of corn oil per bushel of corn. The purpose of this article is to compute these measures at the aggregate level for the U.S. ethanol industry and to examine trends…