corn price

Doesn't most cottenseed used in feed already have the oil extracted? If so it shouldn't affect the feed price, except to possibly send the feed price down (such as if we begin importing more cottonseed for oil production).

__________________
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Libertarindependent

That would really surprise me.

'Round here you get 175-225 bu corn per acre. The ethanal plants around me are averaging 2.8 to 2.9 gal of ethanol per bu. That would be 550 - 625 gal of ethanol per acre. This is 'real' numbers today.

Switchgrass, cornstalk, wood waste, wheat straw processing into ethanol shows a lot of promise. 'Today' I don't think they can get 100 gal per acre???? It is a future technology, in it's infancy. They are hoping, if research over the next 10 years works out, to get good production out of it. Using these materials requires a great deal of processing a great volume of material for the ethanol. I believe your 1500 gallon info is based on perfectly collecting every bit of a corn stalk - including the rootmass - and converting all available biomass 100% perfectly into sugar and then into ethanol.

Nothing ever works out 100%. As well, you can only collect about 1/3 of the corn mass, or 4/5 of the switchgrass or you start hurting the soil/ erosion issues.

If enough research is done, perhaps in 10 years we will figure out a way to make 500-750 gal of ethanol per acre from switchgrass/ cornstalks.

You are comparing 5 year old data from corn ethanol to 10 year into the future possible perfect conditions data for switchgrass/stalks.

That really isn't fair???????

We are using corn because that works the best in the USA to make ethanol from what we have available. At this time.

Mind you, I'm all for the cornstalks or switchgrass to work out - I support continued research into it, & hope the breakthroughs come that people such as you think already are here. I'm all for it! Corn will never be 'the' answer, it is only a small part of the answer.

--->Paul

Put an immediate end to the$1.38 per bushel the Federal government gives the ethanol plants to buy the corn and see how much interest investors have in operating the plants or traders have in buying corn futures.I'm paying twice for corn; as a tax payer and as a livestock producer feeding my animals.We, as dairy and hog producers don't get subsidies for a bad year,i.e. LDP's. I guess corn farmers have priority over the rest of agriculture....as Ag Secy. Johanns told a group of California dairymen" you'll just have to tough it out for a couple of more years."The National Pork Producers have made it clear that when this artificial market for corn goes bust they will have no mercy for the grain farmers....but then again Uncle Sam pays 90% of all subsidies to corn, soybean, wheat, rice and cotton producers.( that comes from American Farm Bureau) Not only are we paying almost double for feed, fertiler price are way up and there are spot shortages because all supplies have been bought up for the corn country.I'll be thinking about all the smiling corn farmers when I mail in my check to the I.R.S. this week.Glad to help make a profitable year for you Rambler; keep up the ethanol propaganda.... it sure has worked so far...

Seems there is a pretty strong milk subsidy as well. How far are you from Wisconsin??? Would you like to try living on what my neighbor gets for 100 milk?????

Arid Texas? I dug my own well on my own dime. How much water gets shipped around you on the govt dime to help water your critters & grow your local feed? Want to build those systems yourself, no help from me????

Didn't think so.

'Round here most folks grow their own feed, so we don't get into the bickering between different segments of agriculture. We all sink or swim together.

Drop the price of corn & soybeans as much as you wish, & you won't see any produced in the USA. Think that would be lot more 'bother' than getting ethanol going.

The grain subsidies are there to help you - cheap corn 18 out of 20 years because of them, and you are complaining about the 2 years it hurts you?

There is enough difficulty in agriculture for us to not waste time being at each other's throats.

Farming is tough, & the money in it is tougher. Subsidies level out the price spikes & keep all in business - livestock producers too.

I raise livestock as well.

Sucks when hogs are under a dime, milk under $9, corn under $1,50, Beans under $5. Doesn't matter who you are, what you raise. We all are in this together.

I totally disagree with ya. Farming has to work together. Not the seperate parts against each other.

We can't be against each other. Poor policy. I helped work at the pork dinners & promotions many times around here. Haven't had hogs on this place in 35 years. But they are important to me as a farmer. Use my corn, use my soy meal. Good for agriculture. All for one. No way I would bad-mouth you.

--->Paul

The pay price in Wisconsin is higher than here in Texas, has been always, nothing new. Feel free to enlighten me on this "stong milk subsidy". People around here pay to dig their own wells......to date I haven't seen ONE drop of water from the govt. not sure what you refer to; please tell all of us about it. If any thing I said was untrue or incorrect,Iwould be glad for you to correct me. Once again, put an immediate end to the tax dollars going to ethanol plants to subsidise their corn purchases if ethanol is all you and others make it out to be; let them compete on a level playing field and see how long the corn boom lasts.Since you seem well versed on the benefits of ethanol production , perhaps you can respond on reports that DDG and WDG being fed to cattle have caused internal bleeding due to mycotoxins.( this is from the latest of Dairy Herd Management)

This is what I face here in Minnesota:

Despite producing 620 million gallons of ethanol in 2006 MN still exported 57% of it's corn production. The ethanol plants only used 15% of the MN corn and livestock consumed another 17%. I assume the balance of the crop is in storage. MN currently has under construction another 450 million gallons of ethanol production.

Corn is typically 40-50 cents a bu under what CBOT is here in MN. It is normal for me to get less than $2 a bu. With Katrina & the mess New Orleans was in, couldn't hardly give corn away here. Rail costs to the west coast are _expensive_. And we need to get rid of over 1/2 of what we grow.....

Ethanol was started in my state, farmers got together & built their own plants. Have to do something with our worthless corn, or go out of business. The rest of the nation is picking up on it. It's not for every region. I bet corn in your area has a positive basis? Pretty high-priced stuff for you even in a down year?

I can't do anything about that. I just need to try to keep my farm afloat. You do the same? We can't be against each other. That is pointless.

--->Paul

Sure. Your version of a level playing field.....

And you don't know nothin' about the Fedral milk orders? Nor the price support system? You don't know nothing about 15 cents per 100 miles from Eau Claire either, I don't suppose. Don't know nothing at all about any govt money ever given to dairy farmers???? Nothing about the Milk Compacts..... None of those ever got you a dime, never helped build a milk industry around you that supports you now..........

http://www.moomilk.com/archive/bailey-16.htm

Oky then. I think I understand. You're having a bad day, & want to take it out on corn farmers. No problem then.

Have a good one, & I'm still pulling for hogs & dairy to have good years. You'll have to make your own fortune, don't think anyone else can help you.

--->Paul

You choose to ignore my questions and at the same time bring up imaginary water programs, so there is no point in any further discussion. I never said dairy farmers never received any govt. aid. The price support you speak of is the same program that hinders us in the west while protecting the upper midwest. The only dairy compact to have ever been in effect was the northeast Compact done away with years ago......The MILC program? I got a big check for almost twenty dollars back in January....helped out alot...was able to buy 4 bushels of corn with that.....good luck to you corn farmers I hope you have the biggest crop in history with the highest yield ever;the ethanol plants need every kernel and have a check from Uncle Sam to buy it with.......

Jeez Milkinpigs quit whining. Livestock producers, at least those who buy their feed, have been subsidized with undervalued feed for years now. Now finally prices are back to where crop producers can make a bit from the market and subsidies can drop back and you're whining about having to pay the full cost of the feed you're buying instead of letting taxpayers keep it cheap. Bring on high corn prices, all it does is make the livestock producers with the landbase to produce their own feed competitive again like they would have been all along without a cheap grain policy.

As for subsidies to ethanol plants, if you want to take subsidies away, take them away from the competition (oil) as well. That's, what, 90% of the US military budget being spent to keep US access to Mideast oil?

Are you aware they Changed that?? No longer is it based on How Far You Are from Eau Claire WI. but now that has been moved to New England State of Mass.~!!!! Just a few years ago that change was made.~!

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I know they have changed the milk programs quite a bit in the past 10 years. Totally revamped. Looks nothing like it did in the 1980's & 90's.

The point is, the old laws & programs & such totally changed the milk industry, and moved processing & production from the midwest to California, Texas, Florida, and other states at the expense of midwestern states. Even if all the milk programs were totally ended (they aren't, they still help our fellow from Texas), the 'damage' has been done, and folks living in - for example - arid Texas are in business now because of those govt manipulations helping them establish a milk industry there. Again, at the expense of midwestern farmers. So, now there are less cows around here - where the corn is. And there are more cows down there - where little corn is grown, and it takes a lot of irrigation & transportation to get the feed to them. Regional irrigation & all types of transportation end up being supported, or subsidised, by the govt - to grow corn in Nebraska or Kansas or Texas. Rail & highways get money from the govt to keep transportation cheaper.

The end result is that a lot of govt money was used to make both livestock & corn farming less profitable up here, and more profitable down there for dairy producers.

All along, grain is supported by the govt to make grain prices super cheap and always abundant for folks who don't grow their own. That's been a national policy for 50 years - cheap grain to keep the ecconomy stable.

And now, we have sour grapes on top of that, from some who don't understand how much the govt has especially helped them.

Too silly.

Doesn't bother me that he is making use of the govt programs, old & new, that greatly benifit him. They are there, he darn well better make use of them. I would & do when I can too. Just kinda silly that he wants to make sour grapes about it, when he is one of the biggest benefactors of the whole system over all these years.....

--->Paul

It's great to here that there is some effort to address the demand of corn, but what do they plan to do about the enormous amounts of ground water that these ethanol plants are draining from our reserves.

We've been in a semi-drought for about 10 years in the area where I live, now they want to build a plant practially in my back yard (same county). All ready I've had springs that have been running for years, become seasonal springs at best.

Dubya will go down in history as the biggest fool since U.S. Grant (he was a drunk, too)

Thats 385 MILLION GALLONS of gasoline a DAY we are burning. Your Minnesota corn crop ethanol is gone in less then 48hr (also consider gasoline has 115,000 Btu/gallon Ethanol has ~70,000 Btu/gallon) because you'd burn more ethanol then that considering all else stays the same.

Corn is better off used for food, IMO...

Hey good thread with lots of variety!

tinknal, I feed whole cottonseed right from the gin. It's gone up $32 a ton since fall due to corn prices.

Here's what I have "distilled" from years of reading about this topic:

As far as ethanol subsidies, they are based on an irrefutable fact: It takes more total energy to produce a gallon of ethanol than there is in the gallon. That's why the best distilling use of grain is for alcohol for consumption.

OK, but the politicians on both sides of the aisle see a way to get the attention of Grain Belt voters with ethanol, and to appear to be doing something to help the fuel situation, which gets the attention of voters nationally -- all in one fell swoop!

Except for this inconvenient truth (LOL) that it takes more in total energy output to make a gallon of ethanol than there is in it. That includes energy for seed production, transport, farming, drying, storing, and distilling. Well, the pols know how to fix that -- subsidize it.

But at least it doesn't pollute as much, right? Ahem. Ethanol pollutes more than fossil fuels, if all pollution is taken into account -- that created by obtaining the stock, the distilling process and burning the fuel. And that's air pollution, it does not take into account additional waterway pollution from nitrogen runoff that is a byproduct of corn-on-corn production.

OK, OK -- but once we get it so we can cut grass and use that, it'll be better, right? Well -- once there is value in the complex cellulose sources for stock, then farmers will begin to collect cornstalks and other "field trash" instead of leaving them on the ground for no-till, increasing erosion, and forests will be under more pressure as "trash trees" now used for paper pulp find another use. Plus, we have no known use for the waste created by the complex cellulose process as-yet. So it's a potential solid waste problem.

You know, anytime the solution seems simple, it really isn't. The real solution is cutting consumption, and working on all the new technologies that could make our country a leader again in doing that. Then we'll be energy independent PLUS have a great export -- those technologies and products.

As far as the grain market, I watch all this stuff too and I say we are in a classic bubble mentality right now, from producer through buyer, and this bad boy is gonna fall hard when it comes down. It is going to take some farms with it, too. Might be a year, might be two...but the era of "Farm Aid" benefits is coming back around as sure as I am typing this. If it holds for two, then guys who are being conservative and not riding the bull will start to feel they have missed out and will jump in, too, which will make the fall even worse and spread more pain.

Bloomberg...

April 2 (Bloomberg) -- Corn plunged by the exchange-imposed limit for a second day as U.S. farmers plan to sow the most acres since World War II in response to increased demand for the grain to make alternative fuel and supply livestock feed.

The biggest two-day fall in more than a decade followed a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Friday showing farmers plan to sow 90.5 million acres (36.6 million hectares) of corn this spring, 15 percent more than last year, the most since 1944 and above analysts' estimates.

Farmers hope to take advantage of corn prices, which have risen 50 percent in the past year and reached a decade-high in February due to record production of ethanol, used as a substitute or additive to gasoline. Ethanol is made from corn in the U.S. by companies such as Archer Daniels Midland Co.

``The USDA report weighed on prices and things were amplified by the size of the long positions in the market,'' Tobin Gorey, commodity strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia Ltd., said by phone from Sydney. Long positions are bets that prices will rise.

Corn futures for May delivery fell 20 cents, or 5.3 percent, to $3.545 on the Chicago Board of Trade and stayed locked at that level in after-hours trading at 3:52 p.m. in Singapore. It was the biggest two-day loss since June 1996.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...ykE&refer=home

__________________
Jim Steele
Sweetpea Farms
"To avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing." -- Robert Gates

If ethanol can be made out of any plant material, why hasn't anyone looked at kudzu?

Anna... Its just more spin to assure people that we are going to be saved by technology (biofuels!)... Its BS... Only way we are saved is through huge increases of nuclear or coal... Ethanol isn't saving anything. I didn't even factor in that ethanol requires huge amounts of NATURAL GAS to make the stuff. It could be made from coal/nuclear...but probably too expensive @ this point?

I caught something on Bloomberg from the Cato institute. Basically laughing at what a waste of time the pursuit of ethanol is especially from corn, but it makes great PR in the US because it makes people feel like thiey are helping the farmers. They said the cost is extremely high ($4-6 per gallon) if not subsidized. They also made mention that it's actually worse for the environment.

__________________
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Robert Frost

Your basic fact is actually incorrect. It has been spun by some fellows that wanted to see ethanol fail. It has been refuted many times over. Your 'fact' has it's roots in a study by one professor who wished to prove ethanol is evil. Anti-farming groups took that & ran with it. He used 10 year old data (we get 2.8+ gallons of ethanol from corn, not the 2.4 he used, the enzymes & yeast is much better & efficient saving time, energy, water, etc., and the fella tried to include the energy from the sun in his study - duh. The sun shines on the patch of ground, with or without ethanol, it's not a cost to us. As well, the 17 lbs of dds feed and the pop fizz gas created were just tossed in a land fill by this fella - no value??????? Much of the ng energy used by these plants is actually to make the feed, not for the ethanol production. If you don't count the feed at all, you at the least couldn't count the energy used to make the feed as a negative????

Anyhow, your basic premise is based on a very flawed study that has been debunked many times, by real scientists. There is a net positive gain in energy, counting all energy needs from seed & fert & transportation and all that.

However, you do raise some good issues, and much of what you say adds balance to the whole ethanol hype.

Ethanol is supported & promoted by American Lung Assc, and others as giving us better air quality. However, it does shift some of the pollution, it isn't like it burns 100% clean or anything! A 10% blend will produce less nasties than pure gasoline. E85 will also produce much less of some nasties, but can add to other nasties. It's not a perfect world, overall ethanol gives us better air quality but it's certainly no cure-all and everything is now perfect.... Depends on your climate & what nasties are collecting in your air this week....

Money is an odd thing. If you want an industry to succeed, it's helping an industry, or establishing one that can't compete because of all the money given to other industries, or it provides a stable ecconomy/ happy people.

If you are against it, it's an evil govt handout that just lines people's pockets & destroys the world.

I really, really, really wish we didn't have any of the govt subsidies - for anything. Let capitalism work. No money for grain production, no money for dairy, no money for oil companies, no money for airlines, no money for coal mining, no money for nuclear storage/mining/etc.

Back in high school my German teacher said he was going to Germany that summer, he said it was wnderful how cheap tickets were that we all had the oppertunity to travel, the govt keeps air tickets so cheap. I thought, heck, what a bad thing, I'm not going anywhere this year, why should I be paying for what others do?

Diamond Tool Company was in northern MN. The Fed Govt came in, gave them a large sum of money, and had the whole company relocate to the south east - Georgia I believe? Pretty much paid all the moving fees & no taxes & no interest on a new plant down there. Was great fanfare, all the jobs it created.....

What the heck? Northern MN has been in an ecconomic slump for decades, and this took away jobs, it didn't create any. Govt tricks. what a load of crap.

I truely dislike subsidies, have all my life.

The problem is: "Everybody else gets one."

What do we do now? Petrochemicals are established, & have a century or so of govt help. How do we get anything else to replace them without subsidies?

Grain subsides started out to make cheap food & happy voters. It was really scaled up to try to repair the extreme damage Jimmy Carter did to farmers. It was scaled up again in the early 90's as a way to control enviornmental issues, be able to track the industry. Today we will never get rid of them - the control of the industry is more important than the other reasons. imho

Ethanol subsidies are to get some sort of competition started for energy. I don't believe we can change to solar, wind, or liquid fuels without a lot of research, new construction, and so forth. How do we get away from what we have, without govt influence?

So, do I support grain & ethanol subsidies just because it lines my pockets, or do I support them because it barely helps to level the playing field with the other energy sources out there?????? I wish they all, every one of them, would go away. That won't happen, so then what?

You say Bush is an idiot for his energy policy. Looks like he is trying to support some new energy sources. He's all for importing ethanol from Brazil - that isn't exactly friendly to USA farmers or the ethanol plants here. Seems like more than other administrations have done tho? Don't think he's perfect, but hey - trying something?

Again, I appreciate your message, ethanol isn't all roses & a walk in the park. You have some good issues. I don't believe ethanol from corn will ever be 'the' answer, but perhaps it will help to get us from here to there - wherever 'there' is. Doubt we will ever net more than 15% liquid energy from grain ethanol. But, that's 15% more than we had before, and we all can see what a 2-3% disruption in oil production does....

--->Paul

No it isn't, and no it is not just the study of one man. I'll just list three articles here for brevity, from a wide range of sources.

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/200705...-the-poor.html

http://www.saukvalley.com/articles/2...4594403801.txt

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660207597,00.html

Now I know where you are politically, Paul. Cuz I LIVED in Illinois corn country at that time, I was in my mid-20s, and it was the recession under Ronald Reagan that caused all of the following in central Illinois: 1. forced farm sales and foreclosures (I attended many of those forced sales); 2. a decline in per acre land value, from a Carter value of $5,250 per tillable acre to a Reagan value of $2,500; 3. the consequent loss of tax base in rural communities and small towns; 4. loss of rural jobs dependent on ag, as corn prices fell.

The upshot in my home state was that I personally know of many friends who simply tossed their house keys on the front porch, got in the car and drove South. Cuz the house was gone, man, they could never pay it off. They lost everything. My sister and brother in law during these rust belt days lost everything when he lost his ag equipment factory job. Like thousands of other Midwest couples, they divorced under the stress. People had bumperstickers saying "Would that last one to leave, please turn out the lights."

My wife and I were among the Southern migrants, too, not because we lost jobs but because we saw where the money was, and it was in Reagan's military buildup states. The day we left Illinois in 1982, statewide unemployment was estimated at 25% due to the Reagan recession. Carter had been long gone by then. We drove a couple days to Virginia, got out of the U-Haul in 4% unemployment. Money everywhere, everyone who wanted a job had work. Virginia has getting a ton of defense cash from the Reagan defense buildup.

When you talk subsidies, all you need are 3 letters...ADM.

We don't...there will be govt influence. Let's influence the right things, though. It's not hard to tell why Japan -- which has zero oil of its own -- was first to develop hybrid tech that our car companies now have to pay them royalties to use. Check into the Japanese govt. influence in that process.

Ethanol would never stand up on its own two legs. But there are other technologies out there that will. Why not let the market be free to select those that will work? Get in your search engine and start researching ADM. Especially its political contributions, etc.


[QUOTE}You say Bush is an idiot for his energy policy.[/QUOTE]

I never said any such thing, maybe someone else did. But I do think Bush has fulfilled his promise to the oil industry by bringing it great profits during his term. The more fear and instability in the world there is, the higher the market will drive those prices.

Let's not confuse an energy policy with an attempt to paper over 6 years of neglect of Central America. He's using ethanol to try to battle Cahvez' increasing influence there. Cuz the U.S. is a "my way or the highway" country, and Chavez can outspend us all to heck and back in the region with his oil money largesse. He never asks for anything in return for Venezualan foreign aid, to what he calls his brother countries. U.S. aid has tons of strings.

Paul, we're heading for recession...may be just in the first part of it now, with lagging reports and all not showing it yet. That recession, absent more scare tactics on the world stage, will lower oil prices. When that happens, ethanol will go the way it went the last time...bye-bye. It'll go the same route as shale oil and all those other schemes that dried up when crude prices declined.

That's the inherent flaw in the strategy. It gets us no farther from the old-economy way. Look at telephones. The U.S. is old tech in those, we still rely on hard wires for the vast majority of telecom. Now look at Brazil, which had none of that old infrastructure for companies to protect. It's all CELL there!

We need the government to subsidize energy policy that will lead us away from old-economy fuel sources and toward new thinking about energy. Ethanol does not do that, nor does increased reliance on coal or nuclear.

The only real solution is solar, and that scares the crap out of companies, cuz the best solar is disconnected fromt he grid. Read above about cell phones in Brazil. Guess what? The Chinese are developing their electrical system for rural communities based on off-grid solar. We are about to be leapfrogged again.

I'd rather we lead someday than be left farther behind. Cuz the tech we don't lead in, we will have to pay others to use.

__________________
Jim Steele
Sweetpea Farms
"To avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing." -- Robert Gates

Carter era did the grain embargo, which forever changed ag exports from the USA. Several countries put money into South America and opened up the prairies & rainforests of Brazil & Argentina as our competition. Before the Carter adm we were the country to get food & feed from. Never again since. Other countries of the world woke up & realized we could use food as a weapon.

It is the single biggest setback to American agriculture. Ever. Surely agriculture would have evolved in those areas over time, and the whole world probably sleeps better have multiple sources of food..... But, the sudden change because of a pointless grain embargo totally crashed American agriculture.

Ecconomies ebb & flow, that is natural. The damage to USA ag in the late 70's (which showed up in the far too many neighborhood auctions I attened in the early 80's) had nothing to do with the Regan administration which first came in after the damage was long done. Doesn't matter which party, who it was. The grain embargo changed the world on ag policy, USA ag, and rainforests in SA. I don't care which party - what does gall me is that it was a farmer as president that did us in.

If you study the references you list, you will see the U of MN fellas see a 15% return on ethanol, and their study was done a while ago, things have gotten better. So even your own sources are showing positive net energy, even if they are based on older data? Current studies show a 1.4 - 1.7 return on total energy investment for corn ethanol. Quite respectable all in all. Current efforts at the locally owned (what is ADM????) plants focus on squeezing oil for biodiesel first, and using some of the fiber DDG for either steam/electric generation, or if the biomass enzymes get better make biomass ethanol from it. Research continues....... Efficiencies & net energy gain improves......

And so on. I sure stand by what I said.

And that includes, that corn ethanol isn't going to be 'the' answer. And that I appreciate your concerns. We probably see the world a little differently, but we will help each other get to a better place in the long run.

Corn has dropped around 50 cents in the last 3 trading days. Anyone see the change in their feed bills?

--->Paul