How does that work? that buying acres.

[OKdon]

The big cheeses at the major commercials sit down  at the table and declare these farmers are not going to raise cheap corn. Should we raise the price by a half buck or a whole buck? Should we hold the market down for thetime being and then bid the hell out of it just before planting. What strategy really works to this end? Or do we need to pump things up abit before the years end while farmers are still making up their mind.

As long as we are having strategic manipulation of the markets should we farmers play that game as well. Lets not buy any seed until march or early april. Let them think we are planting nothing. 100% set aside. That will fix those commercials and end users. And we can short corn and beans as well. We then can make more not growing than we can by growing.

This is all so simple this market manipulation. We shoulda thought of it along time ago. Ray Jenkins is gonna hate me!

[BA Deere]

Well, the Hefty Boys are doing their part, they say they`ve gotten alot of questions about raising "continuous beans"    

If the RA insurance guarantee in March isn`t up there, I would imagine on the fringe acres, seeding back to pasture with $230 feeders might look good to some with a long term outlook.

[Shaggy98]

Good point BA, but if one needs to seed back to grass it probably should have never been broken out in the first place.

[Jim Meade / Iowa City]

NFO tried market manipulation50 years ago without much long term success.

The corn belt will be about 50-50 more or less.  It is the fringe states that make the changes.

Since I'm going to plant corn and soybeans about half and half, it makes no sense to me to defer buying my seed at the deal that is best for me.  Boycotting to maybe help someone else and not so likely halpe me doesn't seem like a high pay-off strategy.

[bruce MN]

With As many tanks and tenders as I've met and been stuck behind the last couple of weeks I'd expect that somebody is at least planning on growing some corn next year. A co-op employee did tell me, however, that NH3 is up but dry is down some. FWETIW

[tree fmr]

Ya know Shaggy, 30 some years ago my father told me "you can't row crop those hills".  Less than 10 years later he was the one that sold the cows and planted the entire farm to corn!  Today they are nowhere near the steepest hills in the neighborhood that are in row crops.  And some of the steepest hills are conventional tillage, not that I condone this.

It is never too steep, too wet, etc.  Just matters the type/size of machinery and how well the operator uses that thing between his ears.  You know, the thing that tells him it might work better to seed it and buy some 4 legged friends! 

[OKdon]

Another advantage is you don't have cows falling out of the pasture!

[hanktbd]

Don,

I always ask that same question. The buying acres concept always seemed to me to be the dumbest grain market concept ever. Finally came to the conclusion that as we approach planting time and the planting intentions become better known, the end users look at the projected harvest and usage numbers and decide how many bushels they need to forward contract at what price makes sense. Hence, if the projected acres are low and usage high due to low winter prices, the end users try to hedge more of their future needs nd so drive up the price a bit. All of which ends up to be called buying acres but is really just a byproduct of end users making the logical choice to hedge to cover their future needs if they believe the price will be higher later. All of which was probably obvious to many here, but some of us are a bit slower on the uptake. 

[OKdon]

That makes more sense than anything! Although they  are really just buying grain or contracts.