- Mental Health Farm Assets
- 10 Years of PCM Data with @ILCorn @farmdocdaily
- Don Day, DayWeather.com
From the Land Grant University in Urbana Champaign, Illinois. This is the closing market report. It is the June 2025. I'm extension's Todd Gleason. Coming up, we'll talk about the commodity markets with Naomi Blohm.
Todd Gleason: 00:12She's at TotalFarmMarketing.com. We'll discuss the weather forecast with Don Day at Day Weather in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and we'll hear from Gary Schnicki and Laura Gentry today about PCM Precision Conservation Management and the kind of data they have collected over the past ten years related to no till, one till, two tillage passes, and more than two tillage passes and the profitability across hundreds of thousands of acres in Central Illinois. We'll do all of that on this Tuesday edition of the closing market report from Illinois Public Media. Todd Gleason services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension. July corn for the day at $4.38 and a half, a quarter higher.
Todd Gleason: 00:56December at $4.38 and a half as well. It finished up two and three quarters. July beans at $10.40 and 3 quarters, up 7 and a quarter cents today. New crop November, '10 dollars '20 '1 and a half a bushel, 4 and a half cents higher. Bean meal futures at $2.94 50, up 60¢.
Todd Gleason: 01:12The bean oil, 53¢ higher at $46.81. July, soft red winter wheat down three at $5.36. The hard red July at $5.36 and 3 quarters, three and three quarters of a cent lower. Crude oil at $63.42 a barrel, up 90¢. Gasoline at $2.07 and 8 tenths, 2 and 6 tenths higher, and live cattle futures were down a dollar 25.
Todd Gleason: 01:36Feeders off 52 and a half cents, and lean hogs were down 40¢. That 400 pounds. Naomi Blohm now joins us from TotalFarmMarketing.com at West Bend, Wisconsin to discuss the marketplace. Hi, Naomi. Thanks for being with us.
Naomi Blohm: 01:52Yeah. Thank you for having
Todd Gleason: 01:53I think I was surprised the marketplace where corn and soybeans jumped today. Were you?
Naomi Blohm: 01:58Well, it was a welcomed, sight to see because after yesterday's close, it looked like technical selling might win the day for Tuesday, but we had a nice recovery bounce today after, market prices tested that new lower support area. And I think traders realized, hey. It's a little too soon to just totally sell this marketplace off. Crop is just in the ground getting planted here, and we've got plenty of summer to get through.
Todd Gleason: 02:23What are the things that you see fundamentally at the moment that are supportive to the marketplace?
Naomi Blohm: 02:29Well, over in the corn market, we saw some good news today from Iowa Corn. They announced that there are some different, Vietnamese firms that are gonna be signing memorandums of understanding with US partners to buy $2,000,000,000 worth of American farm produce. A good chunk of that is going to be corn, wheat, DDGs, some soybean meal. So that was really welcome news. And then they're going to be, having that delegation in Washington, D.
Naomi Blohm: 02:58C. They were in Iowa this week, and now they're gonna be headed over to Washington, D. C. Visiting with U. Grains Council.
Naomi Blohm: 03:05Maybe there'll be some further information released on that later in the week as that delegation occurs. Also on the corn side, think what we saw is just good value at these levels. We know that the South American crop is at the point of getting harvested, and, of course, that's the corn that gets out to the world in August and September before our crop is ready to go. But, again, with corn values now, really cheap. Seasonally, usually, you get maybe one or two weeks here where the corn and soybean market can have a recovery bounce, but then again, that reminder, whatever we can see on that recovery bounce is your opportunity to sell because a lot of times after Father's Day, the marketplace shifts to a lower price momentum on the assumption that the weather is gonna be good enough, barring some sort of a big kind of a dry weather issue in July.
Todd Gleason: 03:59Yesterday afternoon, the United States Department of Agriculture released the weekly crop progress report. How might you expect those numbers, and you can go through them, to change over the next week?
Naomi Blohm: 04:10Well, corn crop is 93% planted, and that is right on the five year average. So we're still watching Ohio. They're now 72% planted, so a nice jump from last week, but they're still behind their five year average of 87%, and that was the state that we were really watching the most. Talking with producers, that are getting rain from the system that's heading through the Midwest, it's been about a half an inch to an inch. So in one regard, this rain is viewed as welcome for the places that have had the corn to get planted.
Naomi Blohm: 04:43But then for those as the system shifts east, you know, they're gonna be struggling to get that last bit of the crop in the ground, and June 5 is that plant date for crop insurance. So that's rapidly approaching. The market will be keeping an eye on that next week, Monday, for the crop progress ratings, and then we'll already start to focus on the June 12 USDA report. That'll be next week, Thursday.
Todd Gleason: 05:06And, of course, at the end of the month, we'll have the acreage report. Any early expectations on your part?
Naomi Blohm: 05:13Well, you know, I would say that the corn number in general that I've heard, I think, is right on. I'm curious if, if producers take prevent plant on corn for those who can't get it in by June 5, that'll be up to our discussion yet. And I'm not sure that we'll see too big of a shift in numbers just based on producers that I'm talking to. But, of course, things can change over the next couple weeks here, and we'll see about the soybeans and and the remaining crop there that needs to get planted. Beans were 84% planted.
Naomi Blohm: 05:46That's what was announced on yesterday's report, but that is slightly ahead of the five year average of 80% for the same time of year.
Todd Gleason: 05:53You've talked some about the seasonals already. Have you been watching the technicals, and what's top of your mind there?
Naomi Blohm: 05:59Well, as yesterday, I was concerned with the lower close that corn and beans both had. It just really looked like it could pave the way to some more technical selling to the downside. So that still is in the back of my mind, where if if July corn can't get some fundamental news, and get some friendly news behind it, July corn futures might take a wash down to about four and a quarter. But then at the same time, I'm thinking, you know, why would it do that when we have ending stocks tied at 1,400,000,000 bushels? And if prices go lower, all that's gonna do is stir up more demand.
Naomi Blohm: 06:35And, again, like I said, we have so much weather to get through yet for the, grain markets. But do keep an eye on wheat. Wheat seasonals are at that point where they start to shift lower for prices over the next week. And the wheat has, I think, in the short term priced in about all the friendly news it can find. We're still waiting to get confirmation quality as all of this rain goes through parts of the Southern Plains and then, of course, through Illinois.
Naomi Blohm: 07:06We're wanting to see the quality there. But seasonally, wheat is at that point where sometimes prices go lower as we get into harvest.
Todd Gleason: 07:13Thank you much, Naomi.
Naomi Blohm: 07:14Thank you.
Todd Gleason: 07:15Naomi Bloom is with TotalFarmMarketing.com joined us on this Tuesday edition of the closing market report that comes to you from Illinois Public Medium. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand anytime you'd like to listen at will ag dot org. That's willag.0rg. And there you'll find each and every day information from the crop scientist, the animal scientist, and the agricultural economist from the Urbana Champaign campus of the University of Illinois. Up next, you know that from time to time, I'll talk to you about mental health as it's related to the farm in the state of Illinois across the Midwest.
Todd Gleason: 07:57Today's one of those times. However, I'm going to let Susan Littlefield from Nebraska tell you a story with the new secretary of agriculture under the Trump administration, Brooke Rollins. Littlefield is a member of the National Association of Farm Broadcasting and a colleague of mine.
Susan Littlefield: 08:14The understanding of the current status of the mental health of our farmers and ranchers has caught the ears of Brooke Rollins, secretary of agriculture with the USDA.
Brooke Rollins: 08:25The suicide rate with our farmers is similar to our veterans, and it's stunningly and heartbreakingly high. And we have to realize that something has to be done. Doug Collins is secretary over at the VA, he himself comes from a similar background, so many of us in this room, he and I have talked about this, you'll be seeing more on this, you'll be seeing us rolling things out. I think that one of the great, most brilliant pieces of the way that
Brooke Rollins: 08:54our founding fathers set up America, and I
Brooke Rollins: 08:56may have mentioned this to you Susan when we talked, is as laboratories of democracy, and that most of the power and the sort of innovation should come from the states, not the federal government. We already put together with our incredible Ag Commissioners, Governor Pillen's now been in a few meetings with me with our governors, really working to support the innovative ideas on some of the most important issues facing our farmers and ranchers, and this is certainly one of them. So we're hearing more from us on this, and please send us any resources you have or you think that we should model or effectuate in a bigger way around the country.
Susan Littlefield: 09:29At that same event where the secretary was visiting Nebraska, I asked Lucas Fricki, a sixth generation farmer from just outside of Ulysses, Nebraska, how he and his peers talk about mental health. Because we know times have changed, and generations before him have been a little bit more tight lipped. So what does that new generation of agricultural producers do when it comes to their mental health?
Lucas Fricke: 09:55I gotta be very careful about the words. This is not fun. I don't know how else to say it nicer, and I don't wanna sound complaining like, oh, my life is so terrible. You know, all of this, like you try to look for the good opportunity, but it gets extremely stressful trying to make all the ends meet, juggle all the balls. I mean, it's not where we have multiple employees.
Lucas Fricke: 10:18A lot of us are one, two people teams. It's me and my brother and my mom and our hired guy that's been here with us for twenty five years that does without just like we do to because you have that respect and that responsibility to it. But I think that's one of the situations where that mental health does come into it because the world you feel is on your shoulders and people are gonna look down on you if you fail and the neighbor down the road's doing way better. So I should be doing better. What am I screwing up and doing wrong?
Lucas Fricke: 10:45And it was a lot of fun to sit next to another younger peer of mine today, and it was like, I feel the same exact way. I'm like, oh my God, thank God I'm not the only one. At least I said it to you, but I'm not the only one. And I think a lot of us feel that way is there's the responsibility tradition, and there's responsibility that, hey, I'm in this. I made this choice.
Lucas Fricke: 11:04I wanna succeed, and it just doesn't happen.
Susan Littlefield: 11:06So with all those pressures of trying to keep up with what the previous generations have done for them able to farm, how does this new generation of farmers and ranchers deal with mental health?
Lucas Fricke: 11:17Being honest and talking, finding good friends to talk about it and lament with a little bit, you know, misery does love company. And again, farmers are the eternal optimist. Catch me on the right day. And I'll be like, I can do this for another hundred years. There's the days that just the wind gets taken out of your sails and you're like, why am I doing this?
Lucas Fricke: 11:34Like, you know, you really question. And so I think that's one of the things. Have a good support network, laugh a lot, have good friends.
Susan Littlefield: 11:41Thanks to Lucas Fricki for sharing his thoughts when it comes to mental health and, of course, the comments that came from the ag secretary. If you or someone you know is in crisis, please call or text 988 or visit 988Lifeline.org. I'm Susan Lettlefield.
Todd Gleason: 11:58Again, that number to dial is 988 if you're just having some mental health struggles, emotional distress, alcohol or drug use concerns, or you just need someone to talk to. You can dial again 988 or you can go online to 988lifeline.org. That's for immediate use. And then through University of Illinois Extension, you can request a free mental health voucher where you can talk to a mental health professional directly. Eligible voucher recipients include adults 18 and older who identify as working in the agricultural industry or any of their immediate family members.
Todd Gleason: 12:38Recipients, of course, must reside in the state of Illinois. You can search that outlook for Farm Mental Health and University of Illinois Extension. Today we're going to talk about ten years of PCM data. That's precision conservation management. We're joined by Laura Gentry.
Todd Gleason: 13:01She is with the Illinois Corn Growers Association and Gary Schnitkey, Agricultural Economist here on campus at the University of Illinois. I think Laura, I'd like to start with you if we could. Exactly what is PCM and its goal?
Laura Gentry: 13:17Well, Precision Conservation Management is a farmer service program. It was designed by the Illinois Corn Growers Association and launched by us in 2015 with the help of a USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service grant, an RCPP, Regional Conservation Partnership Program grant, back in 2015, and it was designed to help farmers address the goals of the Illinois nutrient loss reduction strategy. And the whole idea behind it is to help farmers to lose fewer nutrients from their fields, to have a more positive impact on the environment, to improve water quality, local water quality, drinking water, also to have a positive climate impact and reduce soil erosion.
Todd Gleason: 14:03Now, Gary, you've been involved, I believe, since the beginning of this project. What has been your role in the collection and analysis of the data?
Gary Schnitkey: 14:12So it's hard to believe it's ten years already, but we helped Illinois corn and Laura was there and we all helped design the system that collected the data. And that data collection system is modeled off of FBFM to a large degree and has standards that were used by FBFM. So it's involved in that initial design as well as look at the data and do special things. We've had a number of students look at stuff over the years, include a sir including Sarah Sellers, and she did her PhD thesis on it. So we've used it in research as well.
Gary Schnitkey: 14:54What's notable
Todd Gleason: 14:54from the data that you've been able to pull over that last decade?
Gary Schnitkey: 14:58That's a good question. I would I would I would say that that the most notable thing that we keep reinforcing is is that the MRTN is actually right. That if you apply in the MRTN range that is the most profitable range, and if you apply above it you may get a bit higher yield, but you won't get above much higher yield. We're zeroing in on cover crops and what is the better strategies. Corn are ahead of soybeans, cereal rye, with soybeans planted early and cereal rye terminated early is an alternative that makes a lot of sense, and in tillage we generally find that no till and one pass tillage are the most most profitable ones with some exceptions occasionally with soybeans.
Gary Schnitkey: 15:58The in rate calculator or MRTN
Todd Gleason: 16:00can be found online. You can search out in rate calculator. It'll pop up. It's good across the Midwest. Illinois is very proud, Laura, that the numbers in that generated by Emerson, Nafsig, or and others, are the largest dataset.
Todd Gleason: 16:17How important, from the corn growers point of view is it that people are using the MRTN and for you as an organization to talk about it as it's related to policy and moving in rate and fertilizer applications to down to a level that, is well, that the data proves out to be the optimum in rate for any particular field in the state.
Laura Gentry: 16:43It's it's very important for corn growers across Illinois and all all of the the Midwest states where the MRTN is available. It has been a a tool that we have proven out over the past six or seven years especially, but it's been around since like 02/2006. And it really for us at Illinois corn growers wasn't until we started seeing all the data rolling in from precision conservation management fields that we were able to look at it and ourselves say with no hesitation that the MRTN is doing exactly what it was designed to do. It's very important for us because it addresses so many issues that are important to commodity crop farmers. It addresses issues, of course, of financial profitability, which is very important, of maximizing efficiency, but also of reducing our carbon footprint, our greenhouse gas footprint, and it's very important for local water quality.
Laura Gentry: 17:46All of those things together are really important for maintaining agriculture as low regulation as we possibly can so that farmers have the freedom to operate in the most innovative and economic ways that they possibly can. So it's very important to us that farmers have the best tools and the MRTN has been one of the best that we have been able to produce in Illinois.
Todd Gleason: 18:08Here on campus, Emerson Nabseger, Emeritus Agronomist, John Jones, Agronomist, both fertility specialists would talk about these numbers from MRTN. I think they would also want to make sure that we noted that the number that you see from MRTN, the nitrogen rate is not the application rate for just anhydrous ammonia or urea, but it's all of the nitrogen rate. So you count what's going on in in, DAP and MAP and other things and add that all up. So that number, Gary, then is, lower than a lot of producers will have been using over the decades. When you couple that with the tillage pass information, all that PCM data that has come in, it really makes a difference in the bottom line for farms.
Gary Schnitkey: 18:52Yeah. And I guess what we would we would we are
Gary Schnitkey: 18:57more
Gary Schnitkey: 18:57and more looking at is sort of, if you will, a low cost producer. And those are ones that keep that within that MRTN, tillage practices within lower lower ranges. But one of the things we also see continue to see is that just maintaining low cost will pitch in those high profit categories over time more than any other thing that we see. So continue to find that on grain commodity farms. Thank you much, Gary.
Gary Schnitkey: 19:32I appreciate it,
Todd Gleason: 19:33and thank you too as well, Laura. Gary Schnitke and Laura Gentry help out with the PCM or Precision Conservation Management program joined us here. You can find their webinar online right now. Do that at farmdocdaily.illinois.edu. Let's turn our attention now to the weather forecast.
Todd Gleason: 20:03Don Day is here. He's with Day Weather in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Hello, Don. Thanks for being with us today.
Don Day: 20:08Thanks for having
Todd Gleason: 20:09Please give me a broad overview of the Midwest growing season to this point and then turn your attention to the month of June.
Don Day: 20:18Well, know, when we take a look, you know, what I like to do is I like to look at soil moisture profiles this time of year and we still have that deficit in the northern and northwest areas of the Corn Belt and I like looking at those soil moisture profiles because a lot of times it gives you a hint on how maybe early summer is going to go. And so from the Northern parts of Illinois through a good portion of Iowa, northern Missouri, eastern Nebraska, then parts of Wisconsin and Minnesota where I've seen much worse soil profiles before with moisture, but there is a deficit there. And as we look at the month of June, I would say that what we see over the next week to ten days is that some of those dry areas are going to get some rain. And rains in early to mid June certainly help maybe get some of those thunderstorm chances going as we get into the the July. So I guess what I'm saying here is is that so far, the Northern And Northwest Corn Belt has been a bit dry this spring, but I do see over the next week or two some better opportunities.
Todd Gleason: 21:25Have you thought very much yet about the rest of the summer? I know it can be very difficult in meteorology to forecast so far out.
Don Day: 21:34I will tell you that I have never had such low confidence in a summer forecast this year than I've ever had. And the reason I say that is we have some pretty strong conflicting signals. The European model, which a lot of people are hanging their hats on, is predicting a very warm summer for a lot of the nation's midsection, a very hot one. And we have some other models which do pretty good in the summer season, such as the Canadian model and also the model that the which is called the climate forecast system or CFS aren't nearly as hot. So we've got some contradicting signals.
Don Day: 22:10So this summer, I think, poses some challenges because I do see some opportunities for heat building in, especially during the June into early July for a lot of the Midwest in the Corn Belt. I also see the potential that if we get some pretty wet weather here in the next week or two, that could kinda take an edge off the heat as we go into July. So I I I don't wanna sound like I'm I'm wimping out on the forecast, but I will tell you this. I'm not so convinced of the hot summer that a lot of other forecasters are going for.
Todd Gleason: 22:41Thank you much, Don.
Don Day: 22:43Thank you.
Todd Gleason: 22:43Don Day is with Dayweather in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He joined us on this Tuesday edition of the closing market report that came to you from Illinois Public Media. Our theme music is written, performed, produced in courtesy of Logan County, Illinois Farmer Tim Gleason. You may find us online. Listen to us on demand anytime you'd like at willag.org.
Todd Gleason: 23:01That's willAG.0RG. I'm University of Illinois Extension's Todd Gleason. Doctor.