Prices temper great wheat outlook

Randy Peters shows off Ardent Mill's wheat test plot, which has benefited from this year's nearly ideal growing weather. (Courtesy photo)

McCOOK, Neb. -- For the wheatgrowers of Southwest Nebraska and Northwest Kansas, there is some really good news ... and there is some really bad news heading into the final few days before the Harvest of 2016.

First, the good news. "This year's wheat crop could be the best we have ever had," said Randy Peters, a long-time McCook area wheatgrower, seed specialist and association leader. "I look for yields in this area to be sensational, with some fields approaching all-time highs."

Wow, that's awesome! With top yields of 75 to 100 bushels per acre and above in peak years, a record-setting crop would over-fill area elevator towers and force mountainous piles of on-ground and on-farm storage.

So why aren't wheat growers dancing with glee? It's because of the bad news ... the really bad news. The price being paid for wheat this summer is in the pits. "It's terrible," Peters said, "We thought the price we were getting last year was bad, but this year is even worse," dropping to as low as $3.80 per bushel the last time I checked."

Challenged by the constantly rising cost of producing a wheat drop, Peters says it now takes a price of at least $5.50 a bushel for wheat growers in the Golden Plains to break even.

So what are wheat growers going to do?

As the farmers and ranchers of the Golden Plains have learned through dozens of price-and-yield cycles, there's only one sure-fire secret for survival: You have to hang in there, which is a piece of advice that is much easier to say than to do.

As the owner of Randy Peters Seed Farms Inc. -- a company which he started more than 40 years ago -- Randy says one of the worse things wheat farmers can do is lower their standards.

"If you don't start out with good certified seed that's treated, you're cutting your throat at the gate," Peters said. "You don't have a chance of making money in the long run if you sacrifice quality," Peters declared. "The grain price will change, probably sooner than some people expect. When it does, wheatgrowers want to be in the driver's seat, storing their grain now, and selling it when the price reaches profitable levels."

One way or another, we're going to know very soon how this year's wheat crop turns out for the wheat producers of the Golden Plains. Cathy Humphrey, one of the grain originators for Frenchman Valley Co-op, says, "We have already taken in a couple of loads, and I expect the harvest to be going strong in another week."

Randy Peters agrees. If weather conditions continue as they have, Peters is guessing wheat growers will be cutting quite a bit of wheat on the Nebraska side of the border by July 1, just a few days before the traditional Fourth of July starting date for harvest.

That's only a week away, so it appears that once again it will be a time of mixed emotions for area farmers as they enjoy good yields, but endure a continuing slump in grain prices.