Extension Update by Jenny Rees

Winter in-person meetings are ‘a go’ for this week for this part of the State. Also, the online pesticide training is available for those who would rather not attend in person. It’s found at: https://web.cvent.com/event/4efa4d41-c770-4a78-99d7-4c4ea75d45ae/summary

Dicamba Training will be conducted by the companies, not UNL. Most have an online training option. Some also have live webinars and in-person meetings. Please see each company’s info:

Bayer (Xtendimax): https://www.cvent.com/c/calendar/7829eb5d-ddef-4c2f-ac2c-a67626018ece
BASF (Engenia): https://www.engeniaherbicide.com/training.html
Syngenta (Tavium): https://www.syngenta-us.com/herbicides/tavium-application-stewardship

Farm Bill: Because the tools are the same as in the past, I’ve updated a blog post (go to the “Farm Bill” category) at jenreesources.com. It shows step by step instructions on how to enter data into the Texas A&M and Illinois decision making tools. Your election this year is for one year only (2021). Some of my data was saved in the Texas A&M tool, so hopefully that’s the case for you individually as well.

After looking at data, here’s some things that may be helpful for consideration. Yes, we’ve had good market prices recently. However, remember ARC-CO is based on a 5-year Olympic average where the high and low are thrown out. This average is based on 2015-2019 (2020 doesn’t come into the picture until the 2022 decision. And, if it’s the high, it gets thrown out then…so it may take a couple years of high prices). And, the reality is that PLC corn price of $3.70 may also not trigger depending on the MYA price.

Another consideration for the 2021 election is county yields for ARC-CO payments (looking at years 2015-2019 where the high and low are thrown out). Because different weather events hit portions of counties, and because some counties have separate payments for irrigated and non-irrigated acres, it’s important to look at your individual county data to make decisions.

If you don’t want to use the decision tools from Texas A&M and Illinois, another option is a simple calculation. On my blog, you can click on a link to download a USDA excel spreadsheet which shows data for figuring ARC-CO triggers and payments. I’ve hidden the cells for the rest of the U.S. and only have Nebraska shown; once downloaded, you can unhide cells if you want to look at other states. For the calculation: 

Take your 2021 County Guaranteed Revenue for a specific crop and divide that by 2021 County Benchmark Yield for that crop. For example, York County irrigated corn (irrigated and non-irrigated are combined) shows a 2021 Guaranteed Revenue of $745.35. The 2021 Benchmark Yield (which is an Olympic average yield from 2015-2019) is 234.24. Taking 745.35/234.24=$3.18. Based on these numbers, an ARC-CO payment would not be triggered for corn in York County unless the price went down to $3.18. This is in comparison to PLC in which the trigger is $3.70 for the corn price. This helps with decision making as it leans towards enrolling in PLC for corn. (Again, no guarantee of a payment even with PLC depending on the MYA price). You can also try other figures (ex. trying 240 and 220 bu/ac) if you think the trendline yields may be higher or lower than the current estimate to see other potential ARC Co price triggers. You can use this same calculation for other crops such as soybean, wheat, sorghum, etc. and compare the prices obtained vs. the PLC price for that crop.

The windstorm, fairly widespread in this part of the state, impacted many individual corn yields. I don’t know how that compares to average county yields for 2020. In the past, we had those at some point in February, so it will be interesting to look at this later.