It’s planting season in Oklahoma
Oklahoma’s wheat farmers are back in the fields planting their 2009 crop, reports Mark Hodges, executive director of the Oklahoma Wheat Commission. As of Monday, 44 percent of the new wheat crop had been planted, leaving farmers on a pace of about 4 percent behind the five-year average for planted acres at this time.
Said Hodges:
This is not surprising as we have seen a shift away from grazing (grazing promotes earlier planting dates) as crop prices have increased and fertilizer price has increased.
Most of Oklahoma has not received significant moisture in the last 2 weeks plus, so surface conditions are drying out quickly as temperatures remain in the mid to upper 80’s.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported its final wheat harvest estimate for 2008 of 166.5 million bushels. That’s up a whopping 70 percent over last year’s 98 million bushels harvested statewide.
Jim Stafford
Business Writer
CNBC Focuses on Grains and Rails
Watch the video of today’s interview on CNBC with Mark Hodges, executive director of the Oklahoma Wheat Commission. Hodges was part of a group discussion titled “Grains on the Rails,” which focused on the rail infrastructure and its affect on grain movement this summer.
Here’s the link to the video of Hodges’ interview.
Jim Stafford
Business Reporter
National Exposure for State’s Farm Rail Challenges
Mark Hodges, Oklahoma Wheat Commission executive director, will appear on CNBC financial news network at 1:20 p.m. CDT on Friday to discuss the transportation challenges faced by state wheat farmers this year.
A lack of rail cars during harvest was cited by some grain elevator operators as a bottleneck in the delivery of grain this past harvest season to out-of-state shipping points. The situation became critical during late June when some elevators in the Fredericka and Altus areas were filled to capacity and grain was stored in the open ground.
So, CNBC officials asked Hodges to discuss the situation in Friday’s interview. Stay tuned.
Jim Stafford
Business Reporter
Ken Biddle’s farewell party
My favorite memory of Ken Biddle is not the times I saw him shooting photographs for the Oklahoma Agriculture Department or the ag-related events we shared in the mid-1990s when I was on the ag beat pretty much full-time.
Rather, it was watching Ken spend a Saturday morning policing the grounds and cleaning the facilities at his church, St. Monica’s Catholic Church in Edmond. I was there with my then-Cub Scout son for a soap-box derby event. Ken displayed a zeal for the drudgery that amazed me.
Anyway, Ken is retiring on Sept. 1 after 13 years as a public information officer with the ag department, and his co-workers held a retirement celebration for him this afternoon the foryer of the ag department building on Lincoln Blvd. I was privileged to attend and shot a photo of the event.
The picture above is Ken delivering some comments and acknowledging his family and co-workers. That is Oklahoma Secretary of Agriculture Terry Peach in the background.
Congratulations, Ken.
Business Reporter
Rain sets up wheat planting season
This map provided by the Oklahoma Wheat Commission’s Mark Hodges shows the amount of rainfall received nationwide in the past two weeks. Oklahoma has received quite a share, and rain continues to fall outside my window this afternoon. ”Oklahoma was in great need of this moisture prior to planting of our hard red winter wheat,” Hodges said.
Business Reporter
Oklahoma’s crop forecast
The story I wrote for today’s newspaper on the latest crop forecast focused on the surprising national corn estimate and the lack of trust in its accuracy.
Much of the nation’s prime corn growing regions were inundated with floods at the start of the growing season, and experts don’t believe that 12.3 billion bushels will be brought in this year. That’s only a 6 percent decline from 2007.
While Oklahoma is not a big corn growing the state, the issue is key to cattle farmers who use corn as a prime feed for their livestock. So, they were watching the forecast with interest.
Oklahoma’s wheat harvest — it’s largest grain crop — is forecast at 171 million bushels. That’s a whopping 74 percent over the weather-plagued 2007 crop. In fact, the two previous wheat crops were virtually wiped out by weather-related issues.
While the state’s wheat industry should celebrate the big harvest numbers, many farmers are concerned about the high cost of inputs — diesel fuel and fertilizer — as they plan for next season’s crop. There is always a black cloud behind the silver lining, it seems.
Here’s a stat that stood out in the state wheat forecast: 4.5 million acres. That’s one million more acres that were harvested for wheat than in 2007. That’s big.
Other state crops:
Corn: 41.6 million bushels, up 6 percent from 2007 and the largest in Oklahoma since 1932.
Cotton: 290,000 bales, up 3 percent
Grain sorghum: 12 million bushels, up 6 percent.
Peanuts: 53.2 million pounds, down 8 percent and the lowest production since 1956.
Soybeans: 7.13 milion bushels, up 70 percent
Hay production: 6.21 million tons, the second highest on record, although it is down 12 percent from 2007.
Peaches: 1,800 tons, up 80 percent.
Business Reporter
‘Plasticulture’ farming: see the video
Tuesday’s visit to the “Garden Spot” owned by Rochelle King in Spencer was a real eye-opener for me. There were two acres of lush, green vegetables that should yield hundreds of pounds of okra, tomatoes and peas befeore the summer is over.
King is a participant in the state’s “Plasticulture” farming program that provides small farmers with limited resources the tools to generate income from farming. King is the poster child for the program, said Micah Anderson, coordinator.
Anderson drives the Plasticulture program by personally laying down the plastic on most of the 45 participating farms, providing the tools and teaching them the most efficient ways to operate. He climbed on a tractor and demonstrated how he puts down the plastic for a group of visitors to King’s farm from the Kerr Center Small Farms conference.
Click on the video above to hear Anderson and King talk about the program. Below are some photos I shot at Kings farm on Tuesday.
Business Writer
Cattle call at the Reed Center
I sat in on a Cattle Producers Committee business meeting at the annual Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association convention Thursday and found out some interesting things.
First, the cattle producers don’t want to hear anyone talking about the price that “fat cattle” are bringing any more.
The politically correct term is “fed cattle.” That takes away any concerns that consumers may have about not getting “lean beef,” although fat cattle only refers to cattle that have been fed at a feed lot and are ready for slaughter. Oh, sorry, I mean “harvest.”
Anyway, heard some discussion on ethanol and other items of concern, along with a report from State Conservationist Ron Hilliard on how certain aspects of the new farm bill will affect cattle producers.
Then I wandered through the trade show and exhibition and took some snapshops. Here are a few.
At the top is Monty Baker of Agri-Services in Taft. He’s showing off a hand-made, leather saddlebag that was produced by female inmates at the Eddie Warrior Correctional Insitute in Taft. The exhibit booth had all sorts of cool leather items, including some beautiful saddles.
Above left is Dallas Moore of the OCA staff as she prepared silent auction items that cattle producers will bid on throughout the convention.
Below is a photo of Hilliard in the exhibit area, along with Terry Fry of Agri-Services and a view of some portable cattle chutes on display outside the Reed Center.
Business Reporter
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Cattlemen come in from the range
Today is the opening of the annual Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association convention at the Reed Center in Midwest City.
The convention annually draws cattlemen — and cattlewomen — from all corners of the state and features one of my favorite events, the Cattlemen’s College. That’s a series of concurrent seminars that cover everything from the economics of cattle production to creating better pasture and forage.
This year, the cattlemen’s group is bringing in David Anderson, an economist from Texas A&M University, to close out the Cattlemen’s College and the convention as a whole with a briefing on the cattle market outlook in session that begins at 10 a.m. Saturday.
I’ll report more from the event, along with some photos of the trade show.
Jim Stafford
Business Reporter
Acreage report: Oklahoma soybean plantings expand
The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimated this week that Oklahoma acres planted to soybeans grew by 68 percent this year over last year’s acreage. They didn’t tell us what’s driving the increase.
However, after talking to a producer and an economist today I think it comes down to what drives most any market: supply, demand and price. Here’s what I got from producer Jim Curl of Braman and economist Kim Anderson at Oklahoma State University:
- * Supply: Soybean stocks, or the carryover from last year’s crop is very low. Plus, flooding in the Midwest has delayed planting or ruined fields already planted.
* Demand: There are myriad uses for soybeans in everything from food to ink, and strong demand for beans from China and other foreign markets.
* Price: September soybean contracts closed Thursday at $16.32 per bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade, about $7 per bushel above the price they commanded at the same time a year ago.
Other Oklahoma crops and their estimated acres this year:
Wheat, 5.7 million, down 3 percent; corn, 350,000, up 9 percent; soybeans, 310,000, up 68 percent; sorghum, 280,000, up 17 percent; rye, 250,000, down 17 percent; cotton, 190,000, up 9 percent; oats, 50,000, down 37 percent; peanuts, 20,000, up 11 percent.
That’s Curl in the above photo, which I took in a soybean field in 2006. Look for more about the crop planting report in Friday’s Oklahoman.
Jim Stafford
Business Writer
