T
he seasons are starting to transition to fall as is apparent by the cooler weather that we are experiencing as of this report. Summer had been busy with both wheat harvest and preparations for the next fall harvest as we are just starting to take in some corn. The wheat harvest turned out as we expected as much fewer acres were planted, resulting in fewer total bushels in the elevator. The official wheat harvest tally for Valley Coop stood at 930,001 bushels of wheat. This compares to 2016’s wheat harvest that saw 1,166,541 bushels come into the elevator. We had predicted at the beginning of wheat harvest that we may see 20-25% fewer bushels, and these totals put us at 79.72% of last year’s crop. The yields of the planted acres were strong and test weights were better than average, just unfortunately there wasn’t as many bushels out in the country to be had. Summer also gave us some very hot and dry spells, hitting much of the corn during tasseling. Because of this, we have had a great concern that we may see an increase of aflatoxin in the corn, but so far this has not been the case. The weather has hurt the yields, test weights and kernel size of the corn of which we have seen come into the elevator so far. Milo acres are still drastically down as well, as the threat of the sugar cane aphid had deterred many farmers from taking the chance of planting milo. This year, only 4 cases of sugar cane aphid infestation have been reported in Cowley County. Some of that is the result of fewer acres planted, but also the weather conditions may have factored into this reduction. The soybeans still look good given the summer dry spells and heat. Recent rains have rejuvenated the soybeans, so hopefully the rest of the season is favorable leading into harvest and we will see abundant bushels brought into the elevator. Last year was a record bean crop and we hope to break that again this year as soybean acres are strongly increased this year. We will be coordinating frequently with our merchandising arm to make sure the elevator locations stay open and have space for the upcoming crop.
Our grain merchandising company, CoMark, has now completed the transition of merging with EMA, creating CEA, or CoMark Equity Alliance. With this new company formed, CEA has 160 grain elevator locations spread across Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas and Nebraska as well as a train loading terminal located in Medford, OK. The marketing power this creates will give us a bigger footprint for merchandising the farmer’s grain. The CME (Chicago Mercantile Exchange) has also shown interest in making the Medford Terminal a futures delivery point as well, further demonstrating the marketing force that this new company gives Valley Coop access to. CEA will also offer more advanced grain contracts to the producers and you can call our main office or call CEA directly to find out more about grain contracting strategies. You can find out more about CEA by going to on the internet.
Time has been spent improving our truck fleet as well, purchasing two trucks and a grain trailer to add to the fleet. The trucks will help in the feed delivery and agronomy operations and the grain trailer will help us better deliver grain to markets and to do inter-company transfers among the locations.
With the startup of fall harvest, I want to remind our producers to keep in contact with your local elevator location on your harvesting plans. We want to be sure to be available to serve you as you harvest your fall crops. I have listed all of the locations and phone numbers in this newsletter, as well as my cell phone number to contact if you have any questions or concerns arise as we get this harvest in the elevator.
Cooperatively Yours,
James L. Jirak
General Manager
Technology Advances in Agronomy at Valley Coop
Valley Coop’s agronomy department is now utilizing a geographic information system (GIS) produced by SST Software (Figure 1). Simply put, the system allows us to digitally associate management practices with the specific field to which they were applied. When data is collected with a GIS software over multiple growing seasons a field history develops. That information can be analyzed statistically to help you make data driven management decisions that maximize profit. Contact agronomist David Abel (620) 218-4427 and learn how you can get started today!
Figure 1 Logo,
Soil Sampling
Plant health is dependent on soil fertility. A proper fertilizer application requires an accurate soil test analysis. Unfortunately, soils tend to be highly variable. Soil texture (Figure 2), organic matter, topography, and management practices are all factors that introduce layers of variability. Consequently, what your crop needs also varies across your field. Valley Coop has partnered with Heartland Soil Services to provide the highest quality grid sampling service at the most affordable price (Figure 3). For more information about Heartland Soil Services visit their website at Heartland’s variable rate fertility maps are easily uploaded into Valley Coop’s precision equipment. Information to application made simple!
Figure 2 Soil texture triangle.
David S. Abel
Valley Coop Inc.| Agronomy Manager
(620) 218-4427
Well there is a different feeling in the air and fall won’t be far behind it. We have been preparing for the next feed season. There has been some minor repair work done to spouts and such in the feedmill. In August we’ll be shut down for three days to rebuild the shaker that sits on the top of the feedmill. It is what separates the fines from the pellets and returns it to the mill to be repelleted. We have upgraded one of our bobtail delivery trucks. We have replaced one of the Freightliners with a Mack truck keeping the same feed body, just moving it over to the Mack chassis. We took the Freightliner and turned it into a liquid tender truck. We are currently booking the 20% nuggets for the fall and winter months. Give me a call for a quote.
It will be interesting to see what the fall harvest brings. I am afraid the hot and dry month of July has hurt most of the corn but the beans seem to be ok. As far as the milo I couldn’t say. This has to be the least amount of milo that I have ever seen planted in my 37 year career. It seems very strange not to see fields of milo mixed in with the beans.
I would like to introduce a new employee to our crew. Chris Fatout joined us this summer. He has been working in the elevator with Tony and helping out where needed. Please join us as we welcome Chris to the association.
As always, thanks for your business and have a safe fall.
Donnie and the Kellogg Crew: Mark, Ingrid, Roger, Tony, Larry, Logan, Ryan, Derek, Scott, Terril, Chad and Chris.
HAVE YOU HEARD THIS ONE?
A man takes his dog to the vet. “My dog is crossed eyed. Is there anything you can do for him?” he asks.
“Well,” says the vet, “let’s take a look at him.” So she picks the dog up a;nd examines his eyes, then checks his teeth. Finally, she says, “I’m going to have to put him down.”
“What? Because he’s cross-eyed?”
“No,” she says. “Because he’s really heavy.”
Wheat harvest has come and gone. We are busy preparing for fall harvest. There are lots of soybeans and corn planted in our area. We have been moving grain and getting our facility ready to take the grain.
We have had a lot of weed pressure in soybeans this year. Later this fall we hope to have some meetings to learn more about pre-emerge chemicals and controlling chemical resistant weeds. Keep an eye on worms and bugs in soybeans. Be sure to keep checking your milo for aphids, too.
We continue to offer you a full service Coop. We have a wide variety of feed, chemicals, tires, vet supplies, automotive supplies, fertilizer and much more in services such as dry and liquid application and tire repair.
Thank you for your continued patronage. Hoping to see you soon.
Atlanta Branch,
Darren, Jimmie, Andy, Paul, Terri, Katherine, Justin and Lyle
Well, here we are again at the last few weeks of another summer season. Usually this part of the country is pretty miserable this time of year with extremely high temperatures and hardly any moisture, but this year we have been blessed with very mild temps and above average precipitation. It was 59 degrees when I woke up this morning and just flat out nice outside. With that, we are expecting to have some good yields on most of the fall crops in this immediate area. Currently, we have taken approximately 50,000 bushel of dryland corn at this point and haven’t had any samples of full season milo but we are anticipating to in the very near future. We finished the ground pile of wheat a couple weeks ago and now we are just cleaning bins and trying to free up as much storage space as possible for the upcoming fall harvest. The number of soybean acres this year is pretty remarkable. I haven’t seen any figures yet but this must be a record year for Cowley County in terms of planted bean acres. With any decent yield at all I would fully expect to have a record year in terms of bushels received at this location. So far we have been fortunate in the aflatoxin tests that we have performed on the new crop corn as we have only had a handful of samples that tested positive. Hopefully, the majority of the corn crop will continue to test mostly negative as I think we can all agree upon would be best for everyone involved this season.
With wheat planting just around corner be sure to give us a call to schedule any of your seed cleaning needs. Our machine has been cleaned and serviced and ready to start scheduling loads for this fall. We are fairly limited on the amount of bushels we can clean per day so try to give us a few days notice so we can be efficient as possible in scheduling your needs for cleaned seed wheat. I wish everyone throughout the Valley territory a safe and bountiful fall harvest. As always we appreciate your continued support of your cooperative. We’ll see you soon!
Hackney Crew: Todd L., Todd P., Isaac, Kevin, Lee, Stacie, and Judy
Happenings at the Main Office
Barrett Crittenden was born to Stacie and Dustin Crittenden on May 3, 2017.
Big sister Emma was excited to welcome him home.
Galilee Rain Abel was born on June 5, 2017 at 2:29am. She weighed 7 pounds exactly. After meditating one John 1:14, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” Kendra and David chose the name Galilee. Galilee is the region of Israel where Jesus lived (dwelt) physically on earth. They want their baby girl to always remember that Jesus still dwells with us spiritually and he is full of grace and truth.
You may have noticed some personnel changes at the main office. Rebecca and Wayne Romero have adopted 2 boys in addition to their daughter and she has decided step down from Valley Coop and focus on her family. We have added David Leonard to our bookkeeping staff here and Stacie Crittenden is now in the main office most mornings and at Hackney in the afternoons. Rebecca is still here a couple days a week to aid in the transition.
Well, we finally got some much needed rain. I just wish it would of spread out some instead of all at once. Too bad it didn't come soon enough to help most of the corn, but it sure helped the soybeans and the pastures.
We are still in the process of getting the rest of the wheat shipped out of the elevators so we will have room for all the soybeans out there. We have seen some corn and so far the test weights have been on the light side but I haven't seen any with aflatoxin.
Hope you have a safe Harvest and a good Labor Day.
Thank you for your Patronage
Nick, Scott, Mark, and Kelly
Location Contact Information
Atlanta: 394-2290
Burden: 438-2314
New Salem: 221-4290
Kellogg: 221-0154
Hackney: 221-4370
Winfield: 221-2079
Main Office: 221-4343
General Manager (James’s Cell): 218-1189
Ranch Style Hash
Recipe Shared by Donna Fagg
1 lb. ground beef 1 cup green bell pepper (chopped) 3 1/2 cups canned tomatoes 1/2 cup onions (chopped)
1/4 teaspoon basil1/2 cup uncooked rice
1/2 teaspoon saltdash of pepper
sliced cheese (optional)
Brown the hamburger. Add all other ingredients except for cheese slices. Simmer for 25 minutes. Melt cheese slices on top.