Newsletter Articles
Class III and butter mixed on Friday, top still in place
Following two days of consecutive booming trade volumes, the Class III market once again returned to a lull, only 486 contracts traded last Friday to conclude a declining price week. The June-December pack closed at $17.41 vs. $17.57 the preceding week. Not only was milk volume lethargic but also spot volumes backed off to just 12 total cheese loads for the week. Prices there declined as well but modestly so; 2.5 cents in the blocks and 1.75 cents in the barrels.
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New tool available to determine replanting decisions
A “Corn Replanting Decision Tool” has been released as part of the University of Illinois’ FAST series of Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. Mathematical functions in this tool estimate yields from the original and replanted stands. Estimated yields, along with cost and crop insurance information, then are used to calculate net income from replanting.
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Class III rebounds, butter under pressure
A day after a market price collapse, spot prices were steady for blocks and only a half cent lower for barrels. This gave the market the confidence it needed to rally back and hard. We attributed the sell off from Wednesday to two factors; 1) CME stock revisions 2) outside market weakness.
Following outside market influences occurred for a second day yesterday as prices for “things” fell and rallied back in most markets, dairy included.
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Say adios to La Niña
After an April and early May that brought record rainfall to much of the Midwest, climatologists agree the weather pattern is improving somewhat.
La Niña is the weather pattern keeping much of the Midwest wet, and keeping much of the Southern Great Plains hot, dry and dusty. “We’ve come through a strong La Niña event that is now weakening fairly rapidly, says Jeff Andresen, state of Michigan climatologist and Michigan State University associate professor of geography.
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Commentary: Consumers more confident of food safety
Maybe, just maybe, food safety messages are starting to sink in with consumers. A recent trend report seems to show that people are taking more ownership of their responsibilities when it comes to food safety and health.
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Financial management with high prices
Rarely do many agricultural producers see above average prices for both grains and livestock at the same time. Even though prices of feed, seed and fertilizer are also at historical highs, many farm families may find themselves with more than the usual amount of cash left over in 2011.
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Poll: Do you support laws that make taking undercover videos on livestock farms a crime?
While several state legislatures ponder bans on undercover videos on livestock operations, others say agriculture should be more transparent and open, not defensive. Do you support laws that make taking undercover videos on livestock farms a crime?
-Yes
-No
-Not Sure
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Late planting's impact on corn and soybean insects
Questions are surfacing about the impact of late planting on key insect pests of corn and soybeans, says Mike Gray, University of Illinois extension entomologist. Based upon the progress of planting this spring, Gray said he can understand the interest.
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'Atlas' shows corn gene expression information
Just as a road atlas helps travelers find their way, a new corn atlas will help plant scientists navigate vast amounts of gene expression data from the corn plant, as described in the May 10 issue of The Plant Journal.
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Dairy futures collapse on found butter
Class III got started lower right from the start this morning pulled down mostly by collapsing outside markets. The butter stocks revision was one thing that caused prices there to fall the limit and NFDM revisions caused the bids to practically disappear from early this morning. When the grain report was bearish, class III started to move lower falling 10 to 25 cents early before the spot session.
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Dirty Jobs’ Mike Rowe testifies before Congress
Dirty Jobs' Mike Rowe testified in Congress about how disconnected Americans in general have become from the people who produce their food, fix their pipes, make their clothes, etc.
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