Episode Number
10458
Transcript
cmr261013
The October 13, 2026, broadcast of the Closing Market Report, hosted by Todd Gleason, provides an update on agricultural markets, farming practices, and weather. Following a rundown of daily commodity prices, Naomi Blohm discusses recent grain export inspections, an EPA proposal regarding renewable fuel volumes, and supply trends in the cattle market. The program then shares a panel discussion featuring agricultural experts John Jones, Dan Schaefer, Nick Paulson, and Eric Miller, who examine the economic and logistical challenges of timing fall nitrogen fertilizer applications alongside soil temperature guidelines. To conclude, meteorologist Don Day shares a forecast predicting cooler, fall-like temperatures, upcoming rainfall across the Corn Belt, and freezing conditions in the Dakotas and western Nebraska.
02:23 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing
09:37 Fall 2026 Fertilzer Management Considerations
20:36 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather
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Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant University in Urbana Champaign, Illinois, this is the Closing Market Report for the 13th day of October 2026. I’m Illinois Extension’s Todd Gleason coming off we’ll talk about the commodity markets with Naomi Blohm.
Todd Gleason: Well, December corn for the day at 482 and three quarters, a quarter of a cent lower. The March down three quarters at $4.96 and a half a bushel, and May corn 504, down a half. November soybeans four cents lower, $12.83 and three quarters. The settlement price, January at $13 down four and three quarters, and the March at 1308 and a half, down six cents for the day. Bean meal off $5.50, the bean oil 61 cents lower. Wheat futures in the soft red down three, $6.69 and a quarter the settlement price. The hard red at 712 and a quarter, down three cents as well. Live cattle futures in Chicago finished the nearby contract 22 and a half cents lower. Feeder cattle were down seven and a half, and lean hogs off 35 cents per hundred pounds. Crude oil for the Brent at $105.52, down $1.13. Gasoline on the wholesale price at 324 and four tenths, four and seven tenths lower. Diesel fuel at $4.93 and a tenth, that’s up 20 and eight tenths of a cent.
02:23 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing
Todd Gleason: Naomi Blohm from Total Farm Marketing now joins us to take a look at what’s been happening in Chicago and the grains and oil seeds, as well as livestock. Hi Naomi, thanks for being with us for the day.
Naomi Blohm: Yeah, thank you for having me.
Todd Gleason: Let’s start with export inspections. What did we do today?
Naomi Blohm: Well, they were pretty modest. So export inspections for corn came in at 1300, that’s thousand metric tons, and that was right within the range of expectation. Soybean number coming in below expectations, near 1100 metric tons. Now the trade was looking for 1200 to 1500, and the wheat came in at 305, so that was also in the middle of the range. And so the market this morning had been trading positive after starting overnight trade in negative price territory, but once these export inspections came out around 10 o’clock, it kind of just helped the market to lose its luster and we saw prices slowly erode throughout the day then. So corn finishing today just down a quarter cent, beans finishing about four to six cents lower. We’re still range bound after Friday’s bearish WASDE report. It feels like we’ve shaken off the bearish WASDE, we’re focused on the future. Harvest has been progressing quite rapidly. We’re still hearing corn yields coming in lower than average, but bean yields a little bit better than expectations.
Todd Gleason: What else have you been hearing in the marketplace?
Naomi Blohm: Well, there was news today that came across from Reuters that the EPA proposed a rule to reallocate 100% of the renewable fuel volume obligations that it had waived for 29 small refineries announced at the end of August. The credits were waived for the 2025 compliance year. So now the EPA is saying that they’re going to propose two approaches and they’re looking for public comment. One approach would split the additional 2025 SRE volume evenly between 2026 and 2027 compliance years. The other approach says that they would allocate all of it into 2027. So they’re seeking comments and thoughts. Comments are due by December 4th of this year. So it’s just another piece of the puzzle of course, as we continue to see a lot of those EPA announcements getting kind of slowly kicked down the road. Here’s another example of that, but it looks like they are trying to make some progress with it.
Todd Gleason: Yeah, an example because what we thought was going to happen was that the allocation was going to be announced in this early fall timeframe or mid-fall timeframe, but really what we’ve got is an announcement that says we’re going to take comments and then think about it some more and we’ll come to some conclusion later. So we’ll see how that plays out for the marketplace. I’ll try to check with Scott Irwin, ag economist here, he’s the expert in this area to see what it really means on both of those fronts. Livestock, do you want to take up for just a bit with you as well. Maybe we’ll come back to grains and oil seeds after that, but the high price of beef, it appears has not changed very much for the consumer and that when you look back at the administration and what it had done in importing or expecting to import some 300,000 metric tons I think it was, 100,000 each month, it’s only gotten somewhere between a third and half of that and it hasn’t really changed what’s happened at the grocery counter. Has it changed what’s happening in the price of beef very much?
Naomi Blohm: So on the board here, cattle prices and feeder cattle prices have been inching higher over the past few weeks here as the funds seems like they exited a lot of their long positions during third quarter. So now that it’s fourth quarter, they’ve been slow buyers back into the marketplace because they’ve realized demand is still strong, the herd is not rebuilding anytime soon. Yes, imports are up, but it is not necessarily offsetting just the demand that we have for beef. The important thing to notice today on the live cattle and both feeder cattle is that those market prices got up to some major resistance in the form of the 100-day and 200-day moving average on daily charts. And the market today almost posted a bearish hook reversal to say maybe our short-term rally had run out of gas. The cattle market needs some very big fresh friendly news quickly in order to justify that market to still trade higher in the short term, otherwise we may see a simple pullback. So cash trade last week pretty much steady. We’re keeping an eye on boxed beef values overall. Next cattle on feed report is not until next Friday, the 23rd. So it’ll be interesting to see as far as the crossroads that this marketplace is at, if the bullish sentiment can win out, meaning still a small US herd and strong demand, or if the efforts to reduce prices ultimately wins and we see a price pullback. So it’ll be very, very interesting in the next week to two weeks for this cattle market.
Todd Gleason: I would think heifers kept for breeding is always the number that you have to watch at this point to see whether there’s some expansion in the breeding herd in the United States, and you’ll be watching for that very closely.
Naomi Blohm: Yes, and that should show up on next Friday’s cattle on feed report. Of course, we had not been seeing that yet, part of that with pasture conditions being so parched and dry over the summer. But we’re going to have smaller placements going into the latter part of this year and next year. So we’ll want to definitely see where the heifer retention stands on that.
Todd Gleason: Yeah, and then even if it is, it is a long haul from heifer retention to actually beef in the freezer.
Naomi Blohm: Oh yeah, absolutely. A very, like a year and a half to four years something along those lines. So it is not a short function.
Todd Gleason: Thank you very much. I appreciate all the really good information you have a good day.
Naomi Blohm: Yeah, you too.
Todd Gleason: That’s Naomi Blohm. She is with totalfarmmarketing.com. Todd Gleason’s services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension.
announce: (Music playing) You could say she’s like a prairie fire. Before the tractor, before the combine, before modern agriculture changed the world, there was a small patch of earth right here at the University of Illinois.
Todd Gleason: This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Morrow Plots, that’s the oldest continuous agricultural research fields in the Americas. For a century and a half, this soil has held the secrets of feeding a growing planet right in the heart of downstate Illinois. Discover the legacy buried in our own backyard on the next episode of Prairie Fire. Join us as we celebrate 150 years of the Morrow Plots. Watch Prairie Fire this Thursday, October the 15th at 7:30 PM Central on WILL-TV or stream it on demand on YouTube and the PBS app. Prairie Fire, the stories of downstate Illinois.
09:37 Fall 2026 Fertilzer Management Considerations
Todd Gleason: The fall harvest across Illinois is moving pretty quickly and by default this means there should be a lag between the end of harvest and the beginning of fall anhydrous ammonia applications. This is all based on soil temperature at the four inch level and it’s a moving target each year. But, as you’ll hear in this edited excerpt from a University of Illinois Extension, Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association panel discussion, the annual timing is slipping deeper into the year. We’ll pick up with John Jones, he’s the campus based soil scientist and fertility specialist leading the conversation.
John Jones: If we look at trends over time, and specifically what we want to pay attention to relative to soil temperature, specifically wanting to target specific temperature thresholds that we want to apply nitrogen after, that’s something that may be changing over time. And that’s something that I think we’ll kind of throw out to the panel for our first discussion of when you’re considering, and we’ll kind of move through I think we’ll go Dan, Eric, and then Nick here, we’ll talk about how maybe your experience has been trying to manage nitrogen application timing in the fall systems or fall scenarios. What conditions you’re looking at relative to soil temperature, maybe moisture, and even just balancing logistics of getting fertilizer on the fall. So Dan, maybe we can take it from your experience working in these systems?
Todd Gleason: Dan is Dan Schaefer. He works for IFCA or the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association. It has a mandate to assist and represent the crop production supply and service industry while promoting the sound stewardship and utilization of agricultural inputs. You’ll hear him mention NREC, which stands for the Illinois Nutrient Research and Education Council. It’s a state mandated organization that funds agricultural nutrient research, soil fertility programs, and educational outreach in the state.
Dan Schaefer: So in the last 10 years, we’ve seen a change in the dynamics of when we put on fall nitrogen. It seems to be moving a little bit later. And if you take a look at some of the research work that NREC has funded, we’re finding that in the soil testing we may start seeing quite a bit of nitrate N by the first to the middle part of December. And last year was an example of a warm fall that continued on into December. And when we have that, the guidelines tell us to wait until we have a 50 degree soil temperature at the four inch level and trending downward. And if you look at the graphs from last year, we were up and down through most of November and some of the October applied nitrogen was almost completely nitrate probably by the time we hit that March 1st timeframe. And when that happens in our tile drained fields, we have a loss of nitrate through the tiles and that can end up in Lake Decatur or Lake Springfield or somewhere, and then they have to remove it. So it’s important to follow the guidelines even if it means we don’t get the fall application on. Now that being said, logistically for our area, we need to get nitrogen applied because we can’t handle it all probably in the spring. Now, if we get a good spring, there’s no problem, but if we have a late spring, then we kind of get boxed up with transportation and all that kind of stuff. And that’s where we look at it and we found with the NREC guided and funded research from the Douglas County site since 2013, that fall is a leakier system even with an inhibitor. And it’s kind of raised the question of should we be splitting more nitrogen and should we be getting more of our nitrogen, if we’re wanting efficient use of the nitrogen we’re applying, we probably need to move more to spring.
Todd Gleason: Now here’s a voice you’ll recognize, Nick Paulson, agricultural economist at the U of I, a member of the farmdoc team.
Nick Paulson: Yeah, I mean from the I guess from the pure economic side. I also grew up on a farm in southern Minnesota and so like this kind of discussion is sort of different up there. It’s almost like you apply the amount of fall anhydrous you can before it gets too cold and you get into Christmas basically sometimes before harvest is over. And so a little bit different here in central Illinois, but yeah, I think discipline and sort of adapting and kind of calling audibles on the fly within your farm management plan is something that farmers just have to deal with and it is a balancing act and, you know, it’s a farm management, it’s a risk management decision as to whether you can, how long you can delay and what that means for what your spring plan is going to look like.
Todd Gleason: Again, this is John Jones.
John Jones: And one of the things I think has been we have a paper that’s about to be out and published from NREC funded research that’s comparing fall anhydrous applications and spring anhydrous applications looking at optimum N rates when 100% of the nitrogen was applied in the fall or the spring. And generally what we found is a range of about 16 to 20 pounds per acre lower optimum N rate with spring applied anhydrous ammonia. Now there is not a large change in yield within that optimum N rate. So if we’re supplying enough fertilizer N, the yields aren’t necessarily being shifted as much and it’s really site specific, drainage specific as well. Mentioning things like conditions in southern Minnesota compared to here, certainly we’re both dealing in tile drained landscapes, but then you’ve gone into different scenarios in the fall relative to soil temperature and field logistics as well. So if we kind of think about ways that we can then make decisions whether it’s in the fall or spring, a lot of what we focus on relative to nitrogen rate guidelines for Illinois is the total nitrogen rate that’s applied. And that data is supported by a large network of on-farm trials. Our lab is running around 75 to 100 on-farm trials a year to feed into our database that sits on the Corn Nitrogen Rate Calculator. One thing that it’s kind of important to think about is the focus on profit or return to nitrogen maximizing N rates really doesn’t need to mean a sacrifice in bushels compared to we’ll say chasing the highest yield. In fact across over 800 of our research trials around the state, the difference between the max bushels that we could produce at a given trial and a specific site specific location around the state is generally only about 1.3 bushels lower when we focus on a profit maximizing N rate. The difference really when we start to look at how the economic return to N would shake out would be that 10 to 18, sometimes 24 pounds of N lower amount of nitrogen that would be needed to reach that yield. And that’s certainly been the case. If we even look at different bins of crop yield, there isn’t necessarily a shift of these higher yielding sites are requiring more nitrogen. More often than not, there’s quite a few of those research trial sites that require very low optimum N rates because they are such productive soils.
Todd Gleason: This is Eric Miller. He is a Piatt County, Illinois farmer and works closely with IFCA and the University of Illinois.
Eric Miller: And I feel like when we’re having these dry falls, harvest goes smoothly and then it becomes a how much discipline do I have to wait for 50 and going down. And that’s a challenge. And then a lot of it I think also depends on what’s the forecast at the end of October or beginning of November. If it looks like it’s going to be a wet forecast, that 50 degree may get pushed to 55 degrees and hopefully trending down. So that’s a challenge to maintain that discipline. If you don’t have a fall back for how you’re going to get your nitrogen applied and it’s fall anhydrous, that’s where the challenge is. If you’re comfortable with spring anhydrous applications, if you have the ability to put some on at planting time, certainly sidedress, those are your plans B, C, and D to consider.
Todd Gleason: That was John Jones. He is a soil fertility extension specialist at the University of Illinois joined by Eric Miller a Piatt County farmer, Dan Schaefer with the IFCA, and ag economist Nick Paulson. You may see the whole of that program on YouTube, look for the farmdoc channel. Or if it might be easier just to go to willag.org, I posted the full video on the website. It’s also in the podcast for audio only. You won’t miss a lot, there are a few slides in this, but mostly it is a discussion. So if you’re in the tractor or the combine you can still just listen to the program via the Closing Market Report podcast. Again check it out at willag.org. It is the second one back at this point this afternoon. If you’re listening later you may need to go further back into the podcast. You’re looking for the podcast in the Closing Market Report that is titled Fall 2026 Fertilizer Management Considerations.
20:36 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather
Todd Gleason: You’re listening to the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media. On this Tuesday afternoon, turning our attention now to the weather forecast, we’re joined by Don Day. He is with Day Weather. He is in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Don, thank you much for being with us. Can you give us an update on what’s taking place across the Corn Belt?
Don Day: It’s gonna be feeling a lot more like fall here in the week ahead as the very warm start to the month of October is gonna transition to some colder weather, even some snow out west, and some wet weather again for parts of the western Corn Belt and the northern areas along that I–80 corridor as another swath of subtropical moisture coming out of Mexico will work its way north and east through Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas and into Missouri, covering a good part of Nebraska, Iowa, northern and central Illinois, and northern Indiana, and a good part of Ohio with one to two inches of rainfall between now and the end of the week with areas of showers and thunderstorms. Now initially that will come with some pretty warm conditions, but a storm system coming out of the Rockies which will produce snow in the high country of Colorado, portions of Wyoming back into Utah, this will also send colder air with it eastward and south. We’re going to see freezing temperatures in the Dakotas, a good portion of western Nebraska, northeastern Colorado we’ll see some temperatures getting down to near to below freezing, portions of northwest Kansas as well. Now we don’t expect the freezing temperatures to get deep into the Corn Belt, but we could see lower 30s across portions of Minnesota and Wisconsin this weekend.
Todd Gleason: Hey thank you very much Don. We appreciate that. Don Day is with Day Weather. He is in Cheyenne, Wyoming and helped us to wrap up this Tuesday edition of the Closing Market Report that comes to you from Illinois Public Media. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand at willag.org.
The October 13, 2026, broadcast of the Closing Market Report, hosted by Todd Gleason, provides an update on agricultural markets, farming practices, and weather. Following a rundown of daily commodity prices, Naomi Blohm discusses recent grain export inspections, an EPA proposal regarding renewable fuel volumes, and supply trends in the cattle market. The program then shares a panel discussion featuring agricultural experts John Jones, Dan Schaefer, Nick Paulson, and Eric Miller, who examine the economic and logistical challenges of timing fall nitrogen fertilizer applications alongside soil temperature guidelines. To conclude, meteorologist Don Day shares a forecast predicting cooler, fall-like temperatures, upcoming rainfall across the Corn Belt, and freezing conditions in the Dakotas and western Nebraska.
02:23 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing
09:37 Fall 2026 Fertilzer Management Considerations
20:36 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather
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Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant University in Urbana Champaign, Illinois, this is the Closing Market Report for the 13th day of October 2026. I’m Illinois Extension’s Todd Gleason coming off we’ll talk about the commodity markets with Naomi Blohm.
Todd Gleason: Well, December corn for the day at 482 and three quarters, a quarter of a cent lower. The March down three quarters at $4.96 and a half a bushel, and May corn 504, down a half. November soybeans four cents lower, $12.83 and three quarters. The settlement price, January at $13 down four and three quarters, and the March at 1308 and a half, down six cents for the day. Bean meal off $5.50, the bean oil 61 cents lower. Wheat futures in the soft red down three, $6.69 and a quarter the settlement price. The hard red at 712 and a quarter, down three cents as well. Live cattle futures in Chicago finished the nearby contract 22 and a half cents lower. Feeder cattle were down seven and a half, and lean hogs off 35 cents per hundred pounds. Crude oil for the Brent at $105.52, down $1.13. Gasoline on the wholesale price at 324 and four tenths, four and seven tenths lower. Diesel fuel at $4.93 and a tenth, that’s up 20 and eight tenths of a cent.
02:23 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing
Todd Gleason: Naomi Blohm from Total Farm Marketing now joins us to take a look at what’s been happening in Chicago and the grains and oil seeds, as well as livestock. Hi Naomi, thanks for being with us for the day.
Naomi Blohm: Yeah, thank you for having me.
Todd Gleason: Let’s start with export inspections. What did we do today?
Naomi Blohm: Well, they were pretty modest. So export inspections for corn came in at 1300, that’s thousand metric tons, and that was right within the range of expectation. Soybean number coming in below expectations, near 1100 metric tons. Now the trade was looking for 1200 to 1500, and the wheat came in at 305, so that was also in the middle of the range. And so the market this morning had been trading positive after starting overnight trade in negative price territory, but once these export inspections came out around 10 o’clock, it kind of just helped the market to lose its luster and we saw prices slowly erode throughout the day then. So corn finishing today just down a quarter cent, beans finishing about four to six cents lower. We’re still range bound after Friday’s bearish WASDE report. It feels like we’ve shaken off the bearish WASDE, we’re focused on the future. Harvest has been progressing quite rapidly. We’re still hearing corn yields coming in lower than average, but bean yields a little bit better than expectations.
Todd Gleason: What else have you been hearing in the marketplace?
Naomi Blohm: Well, there was news today that came across from Reuters that the EPA proposed a rule to reallocate 100% of the renewable fuel volume obligations that it had waived for 29 small refineries announced at the end of August. The credits were waived for the 2025 compliance year. So now the EPA is saying that they’re going to propose two approaches and they’re looking for public comment. One approach would split the additional 2025 SRE volume evenly between 2026 and 2027 compliance years. The other approach says that they would allocate all of it into 2027. So they’re seeking comments and thoughts. Comments are due by December 4th of this year. So it’s just another piece of the puzzle of course, as we continue to see a lot of those EPA announcements getting kind of slowly kicked down the road. Here’s another example of that, but it looks like they are trying to make some progress with it.
Todd Gleason: Yeah, an example because what we thought was going to happen was that the allocation was going to be announced in this early fall timeframe or mid-fall timeframe, but really what we’ve got is an announcement that says we’re going to take comments and then think about it some more and we’ll come to some conclusion later. So we’ll see how that plays out for the marketplace. I’ll try to check with Scott Irwin, ag economist here, he’s the expert in this area to see what it really means on both of those fronts. Livestock, do you want to take up for just a bit with you as well. Maybe we’ll come back to grains and oil seeds after that, but the high price of beef, it appears has not changed very much for the consumer and that when you look back at the administration and what it had done in importing or expecting to import some 300,000 metric tons I think it was, 100,000 each month, it’s only gotten somewhere between a third and half of that and it hasn’t really changed what’s happened at the grocery counter. Has it changed what’s happening in the price of beef very much?
Naomi Blohm: So on the board here, cattle prices and feeder cattle prices have been inching higher over the past few weeks here as the funds seems like they exited a lot of their long positions during third quarter. So now that it’s fourth quarter, they’ve been slow buyers back into the marketplace because they’ve realized demand is still strong, the herd is not rebuilding anytime soon. Yes, imports are up, but it is not necessarily offsetting just the demand that we have for beef. The important thing to notice today on the live cattle and both feeder cattle is that those market prices got up to some major resistance in the form of the 100-day and 200-day moving average on daily charts. And the market today almost posted a bearish hook reversal to say maybe our short-term rally had run out of gas. The cattle market needs some very big fresh friendly news quickly in order to justify that market to still trade higher in the short term, otherwise we may see a simple pullback. So cash trade last week pretty much steady. We’re keeping an eye on boxed beef values overall. Next cattle on feed report is not until next Friday, the 23rd. So it’ll be interesting to see as far as the crossroads that this marketplace is at, if the bullish sentiment can win out, meaning still a small US herd and strong demand, or if the efforts to reduce prices ultimately wins and we see a price pullback. So it’ll be very, very interesting in the next week to two weeks for this cattle market.
Todd Gleason: I would think heifers kept for breeding is always the number that you have to watch at this point to see whether there’s some expansion in the breeding herd in the United States, and you’ll be watching for that very closely.
Naomi Blohm: Yes, and that should show up on next Friday’s cattle on feed report. Of course, we had not been seeing that yet, part of that with pasture conditions being so parched and dry over the summer. But we’re going to have smaller placements going into the latter part of this year and next year. So we’ll want to definitely see where the heifer retention stands on that.
Todd Gleason: Yeah, and then even if it is, it is a long haul from heifer retention to actually beef in the freezer.
Naomi Blohm: Oh yeah, absolutely. A very, like a year and a half to four years something along those lines. So it is not a short function.
Todd Gleason: Thank you very much. I appreciate all the really good information you have a good day.
Naomi Blohm: Yeah, you too.
Todd Gleason: That’s Naomi Blohm. She is with totalfarmmarketing.com. Todd Gleason’s services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension.
announce: (Music playing) You could say she’s like a prairie fire. Before the tractor, before the combine, before modern agriculture changed the world, there was a small patch of earth right here at the University of Illinois.
Todd Gleason: This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Morrow Plots, that’s the oldest continuous agricultural research fields in the Americas. For a century and a half, this soil has held the secrets of feeding a growing planet right in the heart of downstate Illinois. Discover the legacy buried in our own backyard on the next episode of Prairie Fire. Join us as we celebrate 150 years of the Morrow Plots. Watch Prairie Fire this Thursday, October the 15th at 7:30 PM Central on WILL-TV or stream it on demand on YouTube and the PBS app. Prairie Fire, the stories of downstate Illinois.
09:37 Fall 2026 Fertilzer Management Considerations
Todd Gleason: The fall harvest across Illinois is moving pretty quickly and by default this means there should be a lag between the end of harvest and the beginning of fall anhydrous ammonia applications. This is all based on soil temperature at the four inch level and it’s a moving target each year. But, as you’ll hear in this edited excerpt from a University of Illinois Extension, Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association panel discussion, the annual timing is slipping deeper into the year. We’ll pick up with John Jones, he’s the campus based soil scientist and fertility specialist leading the conversation.
John Jones: If we look at trends over time, and specifically what we want to pay attention to relative to soil temperature, specifically wanting to target specific temperature thresholds that we want to apply nitrogen after, that’s something that may be changing over time. And that’s something that I think we’ll kind of throw out to the panel for our first discussion of when you’re considering, and we’ll kind of move through I think we’ll go Dan, Eric, and then Nick here, we’ll talk about how maybe your experience has been trying to manage nitrogen application timing in the fall systems or fall scenarios. What conditions you’re looking at relative to soil temperature, maybe moisture, and even just balancing logistics of getting fertilizer on the fall. So Dan, maybe we can take it from your experience working in these systems?
Todd Gleason: Dan is Dan Schaefer. He works for IFCA or the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association. It has a mandate to assist and represent the crop production supply and service industry while promoting the sound stewardship and utilization of agricultural inputs. You’ll hear him mention NREC, which stands for the Illinois Nutrient Research and Education Council. It’s a state mandated organization that funds agricultural nutrient research, soil fertility programs, and educational outreach in the state.
Dan Schaefer: So in the last 10 years, we’ve seen a change in the dynamics of when we put on fall nitrogen. It seems to be moving a little bit later. And if you take a look at some of the research work that NREC has funded, we’re finding that in the soil testing we may start seeing quite a bit of nitrate N by the first to the middle part of December. And last year was an example of a warm fall that continued on into December. And when we have that, the guidelines tell us to wait until we have a 50 degree soil temperature at the four inch level and trending downward. And if you look at the graphs from last year, we were up and down through most of November and some of the October applied nitrogen was almost completely nitrate probably by the time we hit that March 1st timeframe. And when that happens in our tile drained fields, we have a loss of nitrate through the tiles and that can end up in Lake Decatur or Lake Springfield or somewhere, and then they have to remove it. So it’s important to follow the guidelines even if it means we don’t get the fall application on. Now that being said, logistically for our area, we need to get nitrogen applied because we can’t handle it all probably in the spring. Now, if we get a good spring, there’s no problem, but if we have a late spring, then we kind of get boxed up with transportation and all that kind of stuff. And that’s where we look at it and we found with the NREC guided and funded research from the Douglas County site since 2013, that fall is a leakier system even with an inhibitor. And it’s kind of raised the question of should we be splitting more nitrogen and should we be getting more of our nitrogen, if we’re wanting efficient use of the nitrogen we’re applying, we probably need to move more to spring.
Todd Gleason: Now here’s a voice you’ll recognize, Nick Paulson, agricultural economist at the U of I, a member of the farmdoc team.
Nick Paulson: Yeah, I mean from the I guess from the pure economic side. I also grew up on a farm in southern Minnesota and so like this kind of discussion is sort of different up there. It’s almost like you apply the amount of fall anhydrous you can before it gets too cold and you get into Christmas basically sometimes before harvest is over. And so a little bit different here in central Illinois, but yeah, I think discipline and sort of adapting and kind of calling audibles on the fly within your farm management plan is something that farmers just have to deal with and it is a balancing act and, you know, it’s a farm management, it’s a risk management decision as to whether you can, how long you can delay and what that means for what your spring plan is going to look like.
Todd Gleason: Again, this is John Jones.
John Jones: And one of the things I think has been we have a paper that’s about to be out and published from NREC funded research that’s comparing fall anhydrous applications and spring anhydrous applications looking at optimum N rates when 100% of the nitrogen was applied in the fall or the spring. And generally what we found is a range of about 16 to 20 pounds per acre lower optimum N rate with spring applied anhydrous ammonia. Now there is not a large change in yield within that optimum N rate. So if we’re supplying enough fertilizer N, the yields aren’t necessarily being shifted as much and it’s really site specific, drainage specific as well. Mentioning things like conditions in southern Minnesota compared to here, certainly we’re both dealing in tile drained landscapes, but then you’ve gone into different scenarios in the fall relative to soil temperature and field logistics as well. So if we kind of think about ways that we can then make decisions whether it’s in the fall or spring, a lot of what we focus on relative to nitrogen rate guidelines for Illinois is the total nitrogen rate that’s applied. And that data is supported by a large network of on-farm trials. Our lab is running around 75 to 100 on-farm trials a year to feed into our database that sits on the Corn Nitrogen Rate Calculator. One thing that it’s kind of important to think about is the focus on profit or return to nitrogen maximizing N rates really doesn’t need to mean a sacrifice in bushels compared to we’ll say chasing the highest yield. In fact across over 800 of our research trials around the state, the difference between the max bushels that we could produce at a given trial and a specific site specific location around the state is generally only about 1.3 bushels lower when we focus on a profit maximizing N rate. The difference really when we start to look at how the economic return to N would shake out would be that 10 to 18, sometimes 24 pounds of N lower amount of nitrogen that would be needed to reach that yield. And that’s certainly been the case. If we even look at different bins of crop yield, there isn’t necessarily a shift of these higher yielding sites are requiring more nitrogen. More often than not, there’s quite a few of those research trial sites that require very low optimum N rates because they are such productive soils.
Todd Gleason: This is Eric Miller. He is a Piatt County, Illinois farmer and works closely with IFCA and the University of Illinois.
Eric Miller: And I feel like when we’re having these dry falls, harvest goes smoothly and then it becomes a how much discipline do I have to wait for 50 and going down. And that’s a challenge. And then a lot of it I think also depends on what’s the forecast at the end of October or beginning of November. If it looks like it’s going to be a wet forecast, that 50 degree may get pushed to 55 degrees and hopefully trending down. So that’s a challenge to maintain that discipline. If you don’t have a fall back for how you’re going to get your nitrogen applied and it’s fall anhydrous, that’s where the challenge is. If you’re comfortable with spring anhydrous applications, if you have the ability to put some on at planting time, certainly sidedress, those are your plans B, C, and D to consider.
Todd Gleason: That was John Jones. He is a soil fertility extension specialist at the University of Illinois joined by Eric Miller a Piatt County farmer, Dan Schaefer with the IFCA, and ag economist Nick Paulson. You may see the whole of that program on YouTube, look for the farmdoc channel. Or if it might be easier just to go to willag.org, I posted the full video on the website. It’s also in the podcast for audio only. You won’t miss a lot, there are a few slides in this, but mostly it is a discussion. So if you’re in the tractor or the combine you can still just listen to the program via the Closing Market Report podcast. Again check it out at willag.org. It is the second one back at this point this afternoon. If you’re listening later you may need to go further back into the podcast. You’re looking for the podcast in the Closing Market Report that is titled Fall 2026 Fertilizer Management Considerations.
20:36 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather
Todd Gleason: You’re listening to the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media. On this Tuesday afternoon, turning our attention now to the weather forecast, we’re joined by Don Day. He is with Day Weather. He is in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Don, thank you much for being with us. Can you give us an update on what’s taking place across the Corn Belt?
Don Day: It’s gonna be feeling a lot more like fall here in the week ahead as the very warm start to the month of October is gonna transition to some colder weather, even some snow out west, and some wet weather again for parts of the western Corn Belt and the northern areas along that I–80 corridor as another swath of subtropical moisture coming out of Mexico will work its way north and east through Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas and into Missouri, covering a good part of Nebraska, Iowa, northern and central Illinois, and northern Indiana, and a good part of Ohio with one to two inches of rainfall between now and the end of the week with areas of showers and thunderstorms. Now initially that will come with some pretty warm conditions, but a storm system coming out of the Rockies which will produce snow in the high country of Colorado, portions of Wyoming back into Utah, this will also send colder air with it eastward and south. We’re going to see freezing temperatures in the Dakotas, a good portion of western Nebraska, northeastern Colorado we’ll see some temperatures getting down to near to below freezing, portions of northwest Kansas as well. Now we don’t expect the freezing temperatures to get deep into the Corn Belt, but we could see lower 30s across portions of Minnesota and Wisconsin this weekend.
Todd Gleason: Hey thank you very much Don. We appreciate that. Don Day is with Day Weather. He is in Cheyenne, Wyoming and helped us to wrap up this Tuesday edition of the Closing Market Report that comes to you from Illinois Public Media. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand at willag.org.