Apr 14 | Closing Market Report

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Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant university in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, this is the closing market report. It is the 14th day of April 2026. I'm Extension's Todd Gleason. Coming up, we'll talk about the commodity markets with Naomi Blohm; she's at totalfarmmarketing.com. We'll discuss water issues related to agriculture and the Western United States with Eric Hunt. He's at the University of Lincoln, Nebraska, and an extension specialist there. That should be a good conversation about water rights and the Ogallala Aquifer centered in Nebraska but feeding the states going southward, including Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, and Texas. You'll want to stay with us for that. Then we'll turn our attention to the weather. Don Day will be here from DayWeather in Cheyenne, Wyoming, on this Tuesday edition of the closing market report from Illinois Public Media. It is public radio for the farming world, online on demand at willag.org.

01:08 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm

Todd Gleason: Naomi Blohm from totalfarmmarketing.com now joins us to take a look at the marketplace. Hi, Naomi. Thanks for being with us again on a Tuesday.

Naomi Blohm: Thanks for having me.

Todd Gleason: Let's set the stage for our conversation by going through a couple of government reports: yesterday's USDA Crop Progress Report, let me know what it showed, and then the CONAB numbers from this morning outlining the crops in Brazil.

Naomi Blohm: Absolutely. Yesterday afternoon's Crop Progress Report said that U.S. corn is now 5% planted. Last year at this time, it was 4% planted, and the five-year average is 4%. Beans are now 6% planted. Last year, they were only 2% planted, and the five-year average is 2%. Still that pace and trend where beans are going in before corn in a lot of areas. Spring wheat is 6% planted, the same as a year ago, and the five-year average is 7%. Nothing is really behind yet as far as planting goes. As far as the winter wheat crop conditions, they are down a point, now 34% good to excellent. Last week, they were 35%, and these are the lowest spring opening ratings since 2023. That was why that Kansas wheat market traded a little higher again today.

Switching over to CONAB, the Brazil numbers that came out have corn production at 139.57 million metric tons. That's up from March's 138.27. Of that, they've got second crop corn at 109, up a little bit from March. For soybeans, they upped production; they are now at 179.15. That's up from last month's number of 177.85. In general, kind of a weight on grain markets today. Also, yesterday, May, July, August, September, and November beans posted bearish key reversals on the daily charts, so with the close today lower, there was a little bit more follow-through technical selling. Crude oil being down today weighed on corn and soybeans a little bit too.

Todd Gleason: I would like to talk about that as we begin this conversation because West Texas Intermediate, the WTI, what is normally seen as the American price, is down seven, seven and a half dollars for crude oil a barrel today. At this hour, crude oil in the Brent, the world price, is $4.84. That's a different spread than we have had, and it's down sharply. This is despite the fact that the Strait of Hormuz is effectively shut down completely. Is it just taking risk off the table because there aren't bullets flying? What do you suppose is happening in this process?

Naomi Blohm: What you said is definitely true, but what came out newswire-wise today is that the U.S. and Iran are likely going to be talking again on Thursday. Just that potential hope that maybe something good will come from it weighed on that market price today. To your point, not a lot of bad things are happening over there in terms of fighting. Some of that war premium is taken out as well. Keep in mind, though, this crude oil market, when you're looking at prices on the board, $80 is really big support, and on the upside, that $120 area is resistance. That's a $40 range, and we can ebb and flow within that range. Every day, there's a new element of news coming across regarding happenings in the Middle East. We have the potential for this market still to go higher if they can't get things figured out, and it would take a very dramatic peace treaty to make things fall back below $80.

Todd Gleason: Turning your attention to the corn and the soybeans directly. As you said, soybeans were off just a bit today, some follow-through from yesterday. For producers who are going to the field, what are your suggestions to them? They will be very preoccupied for the next month or month and a half as it relates to fieldwork. How should they deal with pricing soybeans, old and new crop, if they have the old left?

Naomi Blohm: With the beans, they still are at decent value in general. There is a risk of prices working a little bit lower. The more I've been talking with clients over the past couple of days, the more I am starting to hear of some of the smaller producers saying that they are switching to soybeans because the costs are so high for getting corn in the ground, especially fertilizer. A lot of these guys did not book early, so they are facing struggles. That may be something where the bean market is catching wind of that, and that's part of the reason why it's been working a little bit lower. It would maybe be okay to be doing some additional pricing opportunities because of this notion of more global supplies out of Brazil and also the potential for more bean acres planted here.

Maybe pull the trigger on a few more sales. Of course, as we go forward, there's a lot of U.S. summer weather to get through. It is still extremely dry in the western plains. They have not had a lot of precipitation there at all, whereas the eastern corn belt has been getting rain. Where I live in Wisconsin, we are under flood warnings. We have smaller dams in some communities, older dams that are breaking. We have two very big, different scenarios across the Midwest depending on where you live.

Todd Gleason: Regarding the switch to soybeans because of the price of fertilizer, I did make note from Josh Linville and also from India, which are related. India is about to tender for urea or nitrogen in some form, someplace across the planet, and it appears it may be out of the United States and New Orleans, because there has been a jump in the price of N per pound there. That would exacerbate some issues in the northwestern part of the United States potentially.

Naomi Blohm: I hadn't heard that, but Josh is a straight shooter, so if he is talking about some of those types of things, I think that it would definitely be of merit. It is still a potential risk going forward, for sure.

Todd Gleason: I don't know whether it's completely related to urea, but I'm pretty sure that generally speaking, India uses urea as opposed to anhydrous ammonia, though I don't think he thought it was going to be that big of a problem there. Again, about 80% of what they need is already on, like much of the Midwest. On the price of corn, what do you see going forward?

Naomi Blohm: Looking just probably for quiet values, but what is interesting to notice is that the spread between December 2026 and December 2027 corn is actually starting to wake up, where we're starting to see some technical buying on that spread. Folks are looking at the December 2026 market now slowly starting to gain on the 2027 market. That could be part of this need for corn maybe needing to do some last-minute buying of acres as we are hearing of this shift over to soybeans. It also could be very much the fact that, maybe down the road this summer, producers don't apply as much fertilizer, so corn is aware of that, and might surprise us here yet.

Todd Gleason: That is Naomi Blohm. She's with totalfarmmarketing.com.

09:15 The Changing Climate of Western Water Rights

Todd Gleason: Today we're going to take up something a little different. We'll talk about water in the Western United States, particularly as it relates to the past winter when there wasn't a lot of snowpack. Eric Hunt is now here. He is with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, an extension climatologist and ag meteorologist there. What can you tell me about the Ogallala as it relates to the Western U.S. and how it is fed?

Eric Hunt: The main recharge for the Ogallala Aquifer is the Nebraska Sandhills, which are primarily in the north-central part of the state. The Ogallala extends really throughout the High Plains. It gets to about Seward, Nebraska, which is about a half hour west of Lincoln. The very eastern side of Nebraska is not under the Ogallala, which is another reason you don't see irrigation if you drive east of Lincoln; it basically looks like the I-states.

The Ogallala is a very important source of groundwater for corn and soybean production, and to a certain extent, wheat and sorghum production as well in the state. The downside is we've had drought on some level here for about six straight years now. At times it's gotten better and gone away. Last year, we actually had pretty good moisture for most of the summer, so I do think irrigation was less than it probably had been since 2019. That was a definite plus for a lot of farmers. Some farmers actually got really good yields on rain-fed production last year.

Because we have regulated groundwater pretty effectively in Nebraska since the mid-1970s, we don't have the issues that you do down in Kansas or Texas with water almost running out. That being said, there are parts of the state, in particular the southwest corner and Box Butte County in the northern part of the Panhandle, that are a hotbed for commodity crops. You see more corn, a lot of dry beans, or sugar beets. There's a lot of irrigation in that area, and we've seen some pretty big declines there in the last 5 to 10 years with more drought conditions.

The latest groundwater report showed declines in most of the wells in south-central and basically the entire western half of the state between 2024 and 2025. Northeast Nebraska was a positive area where we saw either no real change or slight improvements, a reflection of how wet the late spring and first half of the summer of 2024 was. By and large, this year will put a real strain on water resources in some parts of the state if we don't start getting moisture soon. If they start irrigating on a semi-regular basis in the month of May just to keep things going, they are going to use a lot more water than they probably want to, or in some cases, will be able to.

A lot of the Natural Resources Districts that cover our whole state are based on watersheds. Some of those districts out west have water allocation restrictions on a two-, three-, or four-year period. The upside is some probably used less last year, so they may have a little bit more available water to use this year. Because there are areas where we have seen stronger groundwater declines, they have put on more restrictions. They do meter the wells, and they may be facing a situation where if they put on a little bit in May, they may not be able to put on as much as they would like to in July and August when you really need it. You're going to have people making some very tough decisions. If you go further south into Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas, the situation with the Ogallala is actually pretty dire. They are probably within about a decade of running out of water in parts of southwestern Kansas and the Texas Panhandle, meaning they'll either have to revert to rain-fed production, turn it back to pasture, or grow something less water-intensive.

Todd Gleason: Eric, when you put this into context of long-term climate, how long has the Western United States currently been in drought, and how does that compare to the last century?

Eric Hunt: Most of the Western United States has had drought issues since about the start of the 21st century. There have been periods where things have gotten better. California, for a little while earlier this year, was completely free and clear of drought and normal dryness on the Drought Monitor for the first time since 2000. In general, the Western United States has had a rough quarter-century.

If you go back through time, there have clearly been periods where the western portion of the U.S. was pretty dry. What's a little bit different now is the temperatures, just because the planet is warming at a pretty accelerated rate. We are seeing temperatures hitting thresholds in the month of March that we've really never seen before in recorded history. That affects the hydrologic balance even more. While some of this is probably part of a natural cycle largely based on the Pacific Decadal Oscillation—which has been in a more negative phase for most of the 21st century—we have noticed that its behavior has been changing more in the last couple of decades. That's led to a bit more hydrologic whiplash.

A warmer planet compounds issues in the Western U.S. because they are inherently more semi-arid. It's easier to heat up dry air than it is to heat up moist air. I think the prognosis for the West is actually pretty concerning. I'm hopeful that at some point natural cycles tip back into where it gets a little bit wetter, but I think we're headed for some really challenging times ahead for states like Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and California. If you think about where populations have been migrating over the last 20 to 60 years, they tend to migrate toward places that have more water risk and more climate risk in general. My advice is if you don't hate Illinois, stay there.

Todd Gleason: This will be a political issue going forward into the Western United States. Water rights are already a political issue. I can only imagine those discussions have already begun to take place.

Eric Hunt: Yes, and I think the Western U.S. has been a bit more proactive about trying to get ahead of this, but there are still going to be some very challenging conversations between states and within states. Certainly, within California, you've long had issues regarding water rights for agriculture. We have important agricultural areas in Arizona that seem to keep getting drier and hotter. You're going to see some real political issues in the Western U.S. in the coming years and decades based on water rights. Water is going to be more and more volatile and unreliable just because of climate change.

I do think that is going to extend into our portion of the country. For Nebraska, we're going to have some real challenges coming forward in the next 20 to 30 years as we see more erratic winters. This past winter, we were the warmest and driest on record by a landslide. There's nothing in the last 100 years that looks like these last four months for Nebraska. If we have these winters where we're not getting snow cover, the ground is thawed, and we're losing moisture in the winter that we can't afford to lose, it puts us in a precarious situation going into spring. If that aquifer starts becoming more and more stressed, at some point you have to start thinking about maybe diversifying our crop rotations.

Todd Gleason: Thank you much. I appreciate it. We look forward to talking to you again sometime in the future.

Eric Hunt: Thanks a lot, Todd.

Todd Gleason: That's Eric Hunt. He is an assistant extension educator of agricultural meteorology and climate resilience.

20:28 Ag Weather with Don Day

Todd Gleason: Don Day at DayWeather in Cheyenne, Wyoming, now joins us to take a look at the forecast for the United States, covering the growing regions from the western plains all the way through the eastern corn belt. Hi, Don. Thanks for being with us. What can you tell me about the weather so far and the upcoming week?

Don Day: Over the last couple of weeks, a recurring theme has been for most of the precipitation in the United States to be clustered from Texas through eastern areas of Oklahoma, Kansas, parts of Missouri, then into parts of the northern and western corn belt. That's exactly what we're going to see for another week. The pattern has been stuck. There's been a pipeline of moisture coming up from those lower latitudes from east of Mexico through the center part of the country. We're going to see significant rain amounts of 1 to 3 inches over the next seven days over a good portion of Iowa, Wisconsin, parts of Michigan, the northern counties of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. Some of that rain will also get into Missouri, eastern Kansas, eastern Oklahoma, and a good part of central and eastern Texas.

We continue to fight dryness in the Dakotas. While there will be a little bit of shower activity getting into North and South Dakota, we're only going to see the extreme eastern counties of Nebraska in that area get into some rain. The areas who have been getting wet will continue to get wet, and the areas who have been drier will continue to be drier. After this upcoming week, we may see the dynamic change a little bit, and some of those western areas may start to see better opportunities for precipitation.

Todd Gleason: As you look forward over the next two to four weeks, do you suppose some of those areas in the West will pick up the moisture they might need to help with the crops?

Don Day: A lot of folks don't realize that in the High Plains, your wettest times of the year are actually the end of May and into June. There's plenty of time. If you look at historical averages, the big slug of moisture comes in late May, June, and early July for the western plains. They still have their primary wet season ahead of them. This is typical for spring; things tend to favor areas further east early, and then the rain goes west as the heat starts to build in the central parts of the United States.

We are still in an El Niño pattern that will likely persist through the summer. If we can get a persistent flow coming out of the subtropical Pacific, that could aid precipitation across the plains states going into the next 30 to 45 days. We just have to be patient. We know patience is wearing thin for a lot of folks who want to get in the field and folks who are looking at their pastures out west and not seeing much green-up yet, but it's early. Let's see how May shakes out, but right now, it is a continuation of that wet east, dry west pattern.

Todd Gleason: Thank you, Don.

Don Day: Thank you.

Todd Gleason: Don Day is with DayWeather. Find them online at dayweather.com. That concludes the closing market report for this Tuesday. You can find us online at willag.org. From the land-grant university in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, I'm Illinois Extension's Todd Gleason.