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October 2012

Stories, features and columns from the September 2012 issue of Corn & Soybean Digest.

Think Different

  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Think Different: Find Common Ground

    With our national election less than a few weeks away, I do hope you cast an informed vote, no matter what your political persuasion. Will our votes help Congress learn how to work together? Who knows. But if we don't vote and we don't express our concerns that we want compromise, will the seemingly polarized two-party system continue its debilitating partisanship? Especially when 80% of the country disapproves of their actions....More

Profits

  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Groom Your Successor

    When preparing the farm for the next generation, it’s easy to get wrapped up in the legal pieces and forget the most important one – succession planning. It’s the piece that, without time and effort, will throw everything off track for generations to come. Poor succession planning is the greatest estate tax of all!...More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Short Crop Pricing?

    What type of market are we facing? Is the main feature of this market the butt-kicking drought that started the current crop year, or is it the tight stocks that will end it? The answer might help me do a better job in pricing....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    What to do Next

    A magazine editor once told me that she could take some of my educational articles that I wrote 30 years ago, rerun them today and other than changing the prices, no one would know the difference. She’s correct. Markets change and prices change – but people don’t. The human psychology element of marketing is the same now as it was 30 years ago....More

Features

  • Sep. 27, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Spin Data Into Gold | Do You DIY or Hire an Expert? 2

    Your farm data represent dollars spent and dollars to be made. Spinning them into gold is the challenge. Farmers 50 years ago knew every field like the back of their hands, no doubt better. With bigger farms and more fields, truly knowing a field is more likely done through data. However, with grid sampling, yield monitoring, variable-rate seeding and fertilizer applications, crop histories and more, data can overwhelm even the most analytical farmer ever....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Transforming China | Will a Modernized Chinese Agriculture Undercut U.S. Corn, Soybean Sales?

    A growing wave of soybean imports appears to make China increasingly dependent on U.S. supplies. Last market year, one out of every four rows harvested was bound for China. In the new market year, nearly two out of every three bushels of soybeans sold by U.S. exporters has a Chinese destination....More
  • Sep. 27, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Match Input Purchases with Crop Sales | Cover All of Your Risks

    “Don’t pull a VeraSun.” Illinois Extension Economist Scott Irwin’s warning is for growers who may teeter on economic catastrophe if they pay high prices for fertilizer or other inputs without matching them with corn or soybeans sales. His reference to the bankrupt biofuels company – which apparently failed to hedge against grain it purchased – illustrates the enormous financial risks farmers take....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Manage Your Basis | Expand Your Horizons to Help Improve It

    “What happened? Corn futures went up 25¢ so I sold a contract. But the basis dropped 20. That stinks. Am I getting the shaft?”...More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Bean Bushel Busters | Soybean Yield Champs Share Some Secrets

    Winning yield contests takes knowledge, skill and, often, a little luck. For some winners, their reward is not just about hitting new yield highs, but about fine-tuning their production practices. These three state soybean contest winners have made some profitable discoveries on their quests for more bushels, and they’re happy to share strategies that have worked best for them....More
  • Sep. 26, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Space Age Sidedressing Ties N Dose to Weather | New Online Tool Brings New Accuracy Level to N Prescriptions

    You can’t control the weather, but you can now manage your N as weather changes. The same computer modeling technology guiding NASA, engineers and doctors can now assess your crop’s N needs every 24 hours....More
  • Oct. 5, 2012
    blog

    Extreme Beans: The App

    Access valuable research information, plus two calculators to help you determine which inputs get you the most bang for your buck and which seeding rates are optimal for your highest return.m...More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Stop Gully Erosion | Improve Crop Productivity with Control Basins Instead of Grass Waterways

    Year after year, Donnelly, Minn., farmer Dave Liebl would close the gully that formed in one of his fields, only to have it reopen. “I’d dig it, and it would look smooth. Then after a hard rain, there’d be another gully in the same place.” The ditch below the field had silt several feet deep....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Data Drive Market Agility | Use Technology to Prepare for the Worst, Succeed in Good Times

    The recent drought in half a century was a reminder that market moves in all directions make it prudent to arm your business to ride through any price scenario. Efficient use of data has bullet-proofed Nick Frey’s farm business. "Data make you a better farm manager," says the fifth-generation farmer with WCI Family Farms in Linden, Ind. Frey attributes his knack for using data effectively to his Purdue farm management degree....More
  • Sep. 27, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Prescribe Your Water | Variable-Rate Irrigation Applies Rates by Soil Type, Topography, Yield goals

    Tim Schmeeckle is learning to grow corn with less water. Precision-irrigation management is helping him and other farmers apply the right amount of water on every part of the field. Variable-rate irrigation (VRI) adjusts water application depth for differences in soil water-holding capacity, topography and yield potential....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Irrigator Innovator | Young Nebraska Farmer Pushes Variable-Rate Irrigation Forward

    A young farmer from eastern Nebraska is pushing irrigation management to a new level of precision. Nick Emanuel, founder and president of CropMetrics, is a leader in variable rate irrigation management. The innovations he developed on his farm are helping growers match water application rates to soil type, conserving water and reducing yield variability. “He’s a small-town Nebraska boy who is making a global impact on water management,” says Dave Varner, a University of Nebraska Extension scientist in southeast Nebraska....More
  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Built From Scratch | Top Corn Yields from Desert Ground

    Paul Evans stands in a lush corn field on the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe Farm and Ranch and marvels at the changes on this ground over the past 20 years. A couple of decades ago, when he came to the 597,000-acre reservation in the southwest Colorado desert near the New Mexico border, this land near the toe of Sleeping Ute Mountain produced nothing. Zip. Nada....More

Africa

  • Oct. 1, 2012
    Article
    Corn and Soybean Digest

    Trials of African Corn

    Rain makes grain. This is something that almost every U.S. farmer hasn’t had enough of this year, and yields have suffered because of it. We, too, had that problem last year at our farm on the Afram Plains in Ghana, West Africa. We’d planted a 140-day maturity, No. 2 yellow corn Pioneer hybrid, which was produced in Brazil and imported into Ghana. I was confident the genetics were good, but due to the lack of rain/irrigation we ended up with a 27-bu./acre yield....More
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