Corn

OSU Extension Latest Crop Guide Now Available

October 23, 2014 By Ron Sylvester Leave a Comment

The 2014 Guide on Corn, Soybean, Wheat and Alfalfa now available for purchase from OSU Extension Service. The printed guide is $12.50. There is also a PDF version of the guide if you’d like to put it on your computer or mobile device available for download for $10.00

Click the image to go to the Extension’s online store to order.

According to OSU Extension:

The guide contains information on insect, disease and weed identification as well as agronomic information that should be valuable when checking fields. The guide is divided into seven sections: Corn Management, Soybean Management, Wheat Management, Alfalfa Management, Weed Identification, Sampling, Pesticide Application Technology, and General Crop Management. This spiral-bound book includes color photographs, as well as an index of topics that can be used to quickly locate page numbers for your topic of interest.

U.S. EPA keeps renewable fuel standard in place

November 16, 2012 By Ron Sylvester Leave a Comment

Some states had requested loosening in wake of drought

You may recall that during the height of the summer drought season, some states had requested that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency temporarily loosen the renewable fuel standard affecting gasoline. States argued that looser standards would help alleviate expected price pressure on corn due to the drought. Here’s what the EPA said in a press release today:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today announced that the agency has not found evidence to support a finding of severe “economic harm” that would warrant granting a waiver of the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS). The decision is based on economic analyses and modeling done in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

“We recognize that this year’s drought has created hardship in some sectors of the economy, particularly for livestock producers,” said Gina McCarthy, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation. “But our extensive analysis makes clear that Congressional requirements for a waiver have not been met and that waiving the RFS will have little, if any, impact.”

To support the waiver decision, EPA conducted several economic analyses. Economic analyses of impacts in the agricultural sector, conducted with USDA, showed that on average waiving the mandate would only reduce corn prices by approximately one percent. Economic analyses of impacts in the energy sector, conducted with DOE, showed that waiving the mandate would not impact household energy costs.

EPA found that the evidence and information failed to support a determination that implementation of the RFS mandate during the 2012-2013 time period would severely harm the economy of a State, a region, or the United States, the standard established by Congress in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPAct).

EPAct required EPA to implement a renewable fuels standard to ensure that transportation fuel sold in the United States contains a minimum volume of renewable fuel. A waiver of the mandate requires EPA, working with USDA and DOE, to make a finding of “severe economic harm” from the RFS mandate itself.

DROUGHT: Corn conditions in Ohio worse than nation as whole

July 30, 2012 By Ron Sylvester Leave a Comment

More than half of Ohio’s corn crop is rated poor to very poor for July – a number up 5 percent since last month. Nationwide, 45 percent of the corn crop is rated poor to very poor.

OSU Extension: Corn, soybean input costs expected to climb 20% in 2012

October 18, 2011 By Ron Sylvester Leave a Comment

The following was released by the Ohio State University Extension on October 17, 2011.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Led by increases in fertilizer and seed, farmers can expect to spend as much as 20 percent more to produce corn and soybeans in 2012 than they did in 2011, according to Ohio State University Extension experts.

“We’re expecting to see input costs increase somewhere between 5 and 20 percent, depending on the crop and the level of inputs relative to the quality of land farmed,” said Barry Ward, leader of the Production Business Management program in the Department of Agricultural, Environmental and Development Economics. “There will be increases, in some cases substantial increases, but this is not unexpected. Most growers are already seeing it showing up in planning for 2012 as farmers make pre-purchases.”

Ward said increases in the cost of fertilizer and seed are the key drivers of the expected increases, reflected in newly released enterprise budgets developed at Ohio State. Extension professionals develop the annual enterprise budgets as guidance for farmers planning the next year’s crop.

“We’ve seen enough significant increases in fertilizer costs that it will be a pretty big bump over last year,” he explained. “The way fertilizer prices have been moving, it’s been purely demand driven. With worldwide crop prices being high, fertilizer prices are staying relatively well correlated with commodity prices.”

That correlation is the market’s way of telling farmers “not to skimp on fertilizer,” according to Ward. He said farmers in the U.S. compete with agricultural sectors in competitive countries like Brazil and China for many crop inputs, but especially for fertilizer. That demand drives the cost of the product.

Ward said other energy-related crop inputs, however, will see only moderate increases, if prices appreciate at all.

[Read more…]

Some states had requested loosening in wake of drought

NATIONAL FARMERS UNION

Click to Take Action

Contact