Fertilizer cost

Most fertilizers are Petro Chem derived, that is due to SCUPJoe's Oil Gambit.

allisbred wrote: Just wondering if fertilizer is up 1/3 across the country? Will be hard to make a profit this year if inputs are this high. May need to go another direction here shortly and start considering human waste. Just seems like another way the government will have more control at the end of day.

Heard all that whining about fertilizer prices back in the “ethanol corn boom “. Right before everyone made record farm profits.

Do your math, plan accordingly. There are worksheets available that calculate N requirements based on price of corn and price of N to arrive at optimal return on investment., rather than just pouring to it for max yield in bushels. Net dollars per acre is more important than bu/acre.

jim, be careful on the city sludge... it can contain a lot of chems and heavy metals that are not conducive to livestock feed... 

Edited by jaybmiller - 15 Apr 2021 at 5:50am

At 12K there would be a lot ( think you typed an extra 0), but yes at 6$ corn & beans there is still a little room. They hay ground is a different story unless all turns to premium hay. I would say on average, 30-40% is perfect 40-50% is fair, 10-20% is poor( rain etc..).

allisbred wrote: At 12K there would be a lot ( think you typed an extra 0), but yes at 6$ corn & beans there is still a little room. They hay ground is a different story unless all turns to premium hay. I would say on average, 30-40% is perfect 40-50% is fair, 10-20% is poor( rain etc..).

Edited by Tbone95 - 15 Apr 2021 at 10:27am

Well, tickling 6$ sounds like a windfall, and it is if that is what you got for your corn. For the last 6 years corn has seen a lot of 3s in front with an occasional 4 and up to about 4.40$ after you subtract the basis which has been from .20$ to .33$ a bushel here. I sold corn for $3.12 last summer so when the price hit $4 here i figured i had better sell some because historically that has been an excellent price. Figured that price wouldn't last very long. Well what do you know, it went to $4.15 so i sold some more. Sold some more for $4.33, the highest price i have had for several years. I was feeling pretty good about it, and all the "experts" were saying "don't let this tremendous rally pass without selling your crop". Well, corn hit $4.50, so i sold some more. By the time i brought it in they were paying$4.75. Decided to hold out for $5 for the rest of it, and i really didn't think it would get there. I guess i am a poor marketer, but this gives you a bit of an idea why even tho corn is $6 that is not neccesarily what we sold for. They say the market takes the stairs up and the elevator down. It's more like and elevator with a broken cable when it starts going down, and you never know what small geo-political event will set that in motion. It just does not sit well when you have worked hard to make that slim profit over the years, and when the market suddenly rewards you every input supplier jacks the prices up on their products. I wish we could do that.

Well yes, actual sale price varies. Your local basis could be different than mine. Moisture, FM, etc etc...so market price is the starting point we all can use. That’s what I meant, starting with that, there’s room to work with.

I've always seen the fertilizer prices follow the grain prices to an extent. It seems the fertilizer price will rise with the prices of grain but then not decrease as fast as the grain prices.