USA: Just 30 percent of the crop was in good to excellent condition

TWIN FALLS • It’s too early to call the 2014 Idaho wheat crop a bin buster, but the crop is clearly ahead of those in the heart of the nation’s winter Wheat Belt.

According to the latest U.S. Department of Agriculture’s crop progress report, 22 percent of the U.S. winter wheat was rated in very poor condition on June 8, with another 22 percent rated poor. Just 30 percent of the crop was in good to excellent condition.

In contrast, Idaho’s winter wheat crop was rated 84 percent good to excellent on the same date. The winter wheat crop is 42 percent headed out, well ahead of the five-year average of 23 percent.

Idaho is one of the nation’s top 18 states in winter wheat production.

The excellent spring conditions in the Pacific Northwest were not enough to offset the drought impacting the Southern Plains.

Growers in Texas and Oklahoma have harvested about a third of the winter wheat crop, while producers are beginning to test cut a few fields in Kansas. Wheat in the more drought-stressed areas of Texas and Oklahoma is just 6 to 8 inches high, which is making harvest a challenge. Yields have been running 5 to 30 bushels per acre, down from last year’s average of 31 bushels per acre in Oklahoma, and 29 bushels in Texas.

Although yields are down, protein levels are running ahead of last year at 14.3 percent, above the 2013 average of 13.4 percent, said Plains Grain Inc, a nonprofit trade group.

Hard red winter wheat, the largest wheat class grown in the U.S., is typically milled into flour for bread. USDA officials pegged 2014 production at 720 million bushels, the smallest in eight years.

A smaller crop usually means higher prices for producers, but not this year. Brian Hoops, with Midwest Market Solutions, said low corn prices are pulling wheat prices lower also. Corn futures prices have fallen to the lowest levels since mid-January.

Larger than expected ending stocks are also pressuring wheat prices. USDA forecasters pegged ending stocks for the 2014-15 marketing year, which began June 1, at 574 million bushels, up 34 million bushels over last month’s estimate. Hoops said that USDA expects livestock producers will feed more corn, and less wheat, in the coming year, thus building stocks.

USDA is also projecting that the European Union will overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest wheat exporter in the coming year thanks to the EU’s second consecutive bumper crop. U.S. wheat exports have been curtailed by tight carry-in supplies, a smaller 2014 crop and relatively higher prices than competitors.

Local winter wheat prices were down this week. Hard red winter prices were off by 4 to 21 cents, while soft white winter wheat was 5 to 35 cents lower.

Soft white wheat grown in Idaho competes with soft red wheat grown in Ohio, Illinois and Indiana in the cracker market. Good moisture in that region of the U.S. has increased yields of soft red winter wheat by 2 percent over the May projection.

Hoops, who during a telephone press conference after the June 11 USDA World Agriculture Supply and Demand Estimate was released, said growers may see their best marketing opportunities of the year in June and July when the U.S. harvest begins. After that, global competitors will begin harvest and will likely gain market share.

Idaho’s spring grain crops are developing ahead of normal thanks to favorable growing conditions. Nearly 80 percent of the spring wheat crop is rated as good-to-excellent with 6 percent headed out. Fourteen percent of the barley crop is headed out, well ahead of the five-year average of 2 percent.
 

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